My M2M : July - Week 3

Hello and welcome back to my M2M series, where every month I take on a new skill and try to meet an ambitious goal in that skill. This month’s goal is to type at 60 WPM in Colemak (an entirely new layout for me) for one minute, without any errors.

James O'Keefe
Jul 22, 2017 · 2 min read
I’m doing this challenge on a MBP 2011 keyboard

At this stage, I feel really comfortable typing in Colemak, which is just as well, because I’ve lost my familiarity with Qwerty. During this week I attempted to use Qwerty again, not out of frustration, but out of curiosity. To my surprise, my touch-typing ability was completely gone. Vanished. I was back to hunting and pecking.

At the start of this program of monthly challenges, I stated that I was pursuing some challenge to witness the enigmatic brain’s neuroplasticity. This is the first of what I hope will be several brain re-wiring events. After a mere 2 weeks of using an alternative layout, my previous muscle-memory in Qwerty had disappeared. The brain cells which control my typing had been re-programmed in the space of 14 days.

Getting back to the challenge, I’m tantalisingly close to my goal, of typing at 60 WPM with 0 errors for 1 minute. I’ve crossed the 60 WPM mark a few times, but never with 100% accuracy. In fact I’ve never reached 100% accuracy, even under 60 WPM. My best result was 62 WPM at 99.5% accuracy.

For the final week, I plan to continue typing on typeracer.com. I’m going to force myself to type slower, to reach the elusive 100% accuracy. Other than that, it’s just brute practice as I try to reach the finish line before the end of the month.

Paradoxically, when I type slower, I actually reach higher WPM than when I type in sprints. I attribute this to the frequent errors I make while typing in sprints. Every error forces me to delete ~3 letters to get back to the incorrect letter, while also losing my momentum. Also, after I lose speed on an error, I feel the need to speed up even more to make up for lost time originating from my mis-type. This causes me to make more errors, forcing me to spiral into lower and lower speed and accuracy.

Hopefully this time next week I’ll have finished my first month’s challenge.

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade