Typing and Keyboarding for Kids Who Struggle to Write

By Laura Lurns · Reviewed by Philip Weaver · Last reviewed 2026-09-30

What a keyboard takes away, and what it does not

A keyboard takes away forming the letters. It does not take away spelling, composing or holding the sentence in mind. It is worth trying, and worth watching closely.

A child writing a sentence does several jobs at once. They hold the idea. They choose the words and spell them. They form the letters. They hold the sentence in mind as they go.

Letters and spelling that are not yet automatic compete with the ideas for attention. This is one real reason a child writes less than they know. It is not the only one.

To us, that is why a keyboard is worth trying. It takes away one job, not all of them. The spelling is still there. So is the composing.

In our view, look at which job goes wrong. Is it reading the words, spelling them, forming the letters, or getting ideas down?

Then compare one piece your child typed with one they wrote. In our view, that can show whether forming the letters is the hard part. That is a check we use, not a test.

Typing is a skill to be taught

Typing has to be taught, like handwriting. Feng and colleagues (2019) found that children slow by hand tend to be slow at a keyboard too. That is a link, not a test of teaching. We could read only its summary.

Handwriting improves most consistently with handwriting practice; motor work alone has not been shown to improve it.

In our view, a keyboard with no teaching gives a child a second new skill to learn. So teach the keyboard before your child has to rely on it.

The one touch-typing study we hold was of college students, not children (Weigelt Marom and Weintraub, 2015). It had students with and without learning disabilities. Both groups had 14 lessons. Three months later, both groups typed faster than before. There was no group without lessons to compare. We could read only its summary.

Our rule is not to name typing programs. In our view, what counts is steady teaching and practice, not which program.

What the research we hold found

Word processing and weaker writers. One review pooled 27 studies of weaker writers in grades 1 to 12 (Morphy and Graham, 2012). Word processing helped them on the outcomes measured. Those included the quality, length and organization of their writing. They also included how much children wanted to write. Wanting to write is not the same as writing well. We could read only its summary.

In our view, a laptop on its own does not teach writing. In our view, teaching does.

Pen and keyboard side by side. One US study had 241 children in grades 2, 4 and 6 (Berninger and colleagues, 2009). They wrote by pen and by keyboard. At every grade, they wrote longer essays, faster, by pen. The authors tie that mostly to how much practice and teaching each way had had. A small group of children with writing trouble "tended to show the same pattern." That comparison had only 20 children. It did not test whether the pen advantage was bigger or smaller for them. To us, this is one more reason typing has to be taught.

Lessons for students whose dysgraphia had lasted. One small study worked with students in grades 4 to 9 whose dysgraphia had lasted (Beers, Berninger, Mickail and Abbott, 2018). They had 18 lessons. Afterward, they typed about as well as a typical group on every keyboard task. They differed from that group on two pen measures. There was no untaught group with dysgraphia. So we cannot credit the lessons with how they did. We could read only its summary.

Typing lessons for teenagers. One small study gave typing lessons to 35 students who typed very poorly (Christensen, 2004). They were in grades 8 and 9. Its summary does not say whether the lessons taught touch-typing. The comparison group kept a typed journal each day. Both groups typed, so the study does not test keyboard against pen. The lessons group did better on typing, and on the quality of their typed writing. Their handwritten writing did not differ from the other group's. These were teenagers, not beginning writers. We could read only its summary.

Who gains from a keyboard. In one study of college students, both groups wrote longer essays on a word processor. Students with learning disabilities did not gain more than the others (Berger and Lewandowski, 2013).

In our view, that does not make the keyboard wrong. It means the case for it is about what the task measures.

Does typing replace handwriting?

No study we hold tests whether a keyboard cuts into handwriting practice or handwriting growth.

Our position is this. Ask whether a support builds the skill, or replaces the expectation that it gets built. For a keyboard, the answer depends on the task. In a science test, typing lets the science show. In a handwriting lesson, it replaces the practice. We would keep building handwriting through the elementary years. Type where the point is the content.

Handwriting improves most consistently with handwriting practice; motor work alone has not been shown to improve it.

Handwriting practice makes handwriting better, but its effect on composing is not settled. Santangelo and Graham (2016) found gains in composing. A US federal panel, the What Works Clearinghouse, found few studies that measured writing quality. Those few found no evidence of a gain from handwriting and spelling practice. The panel still thinks it helps. So teach composing as well.

Work on handwriting, spelling and composing side by side.

Speech-to-text and dictation

Speech-to-text turns spoken words into typed words. To us, it is a kind of dictation.

We hold no study of speech-to-text that we could read.

De La Paz and Graham studied students in grades 5 to 7 with learning disabilities. Dictation plus taught planning gave better essays than a comparison group. The authors concluded that planning matters when a child dictates. So teach the planning, not only the scribing.

In our view, the same goes for speech-to-text. Plan the piece together first. Then let your child say it.

In our view, dictation lets a child try the parts one at a time. It is not a reason to stop teaching the rest. Work on handwriting, spelling and composing side by side.

When to ask for help

Each of these is a reason to ask for help on its own.

• Little change, even with steady practice and good teaching.
• Writing well below your child's other schoolwork.
• A teacher who raises a concern about writing.
• Extreme upset about writing.
• Complete avoidance of writing.
• Hopelessness about learning.
• Sadness or worry that lasts.
• Significant delays in speech, language or motor development.
• A skill that was there and has gone. Our position is that a lost skill goes to a doctor first, not a tutor.

Start with the teacher. Say what you are seeing at home, and what you have tried. Beyond the teacher, the right person depends on what it turns out to be about. If the work is too hard, someone who works on that school skill. If worry or mood is the thing, someone who works with children's mental health. In our view, delays in speech, language or movement are worth raising with your child's doctor. In our view, if you are worried enough to ask, a professional evaluation is worth asking about.

Any talk of hurting themselves is a same-day call to your doctor or a crisis line.