Around 80wpm, how do I keep improving
By anisometropie - updated: 8 years, 10 months ago - 4 messages
I’ve slowly built up my speed from 5wpm all the way up to around 80 (I started with a new layout BÉPO, was using azerty) and I have reached some sort of plateau.
It really depends on how my concentration is. I have noticed that when I try to pay very close attention to the words and how they are spelled, it helps both my speed and my precision.
I have tried slowing down my speed to really pay attention and make no mistakes, but then I tend to make more mistakes. I think it’s like when you’re driving, you’re not thinking about what you’re doing, you’ve created these automatisms, and you’re not thinking consciously about using your break or your clutch or the gear shift, and it frees up space for your conscious mind to analyse the situation.
When I try to slow down my speed, I think of the letters, and the spelling, and I make more mistakes.
Sometimes I can be super fast and super precise at the same time, but most of the time, I tend to be too fast and it hurts the precision really bad.
What should I do ? work on my precision without slowing down too much, or really slow down and try make zero mistakes ?
Try coming half way between the two options you mentioned. Besides, you are now a star who has nothing left to prove and should feel no pressure to be perfect or improve.
By toddhicks209 - posted: 8 years, 11 months ago
Try coming half way between the two options you mentioned. Besides, you are now a star who has nothing left to prove and should feel no pressure to be perfect or improve.
By kaikaikaikaikai - posted: 8 years, 10 months ago
Looking at your profile, I don't think you need to worry about keeping your accuracy at 100%. I don't get how you can even do that, lol!
What I did to get into the 100ers and beyond is some sort of cycling:
1. I would type in my comfort zone (with the easy flow you describe, like driving) without worrying about either the speed or the accuracy (if the accuracy was worse than 95% I'd slow down, but that rarely ever happened).
2. After some tests, I tried to push my speed, going as fast as I could, sacrificing SOME accuracy, but not throwing it overboard completely. This required a lot of concentration, and when I felt my accuracy degenerating more and more (never did more than 20 minutes, I think), I would...
3. Take a break. Watch some TV. Anything that didn't require concentration. Take a nap if I could. (Always took at least 30 minutes off.)
When I'd come back to typing, I'd start at step 1 again. I often found my 'leisure speed' had increased. If I found that my accuracy at leisure speed had suffered, too, I'd throw in a few rounds of only caring about the accuracy to get it back up again. It's a balancing act, that's for sure, but I don't think you can get to high speeds without actually going at high speeds. You have to teach your brain what it's like. If you neglect that, you might end up with 100% accuracy but limited speed...
By toddhicks209 - posted: 8 years, 10 months ago
Besides what you mentioned above, are there any particular steps that made you an elite typist?
By kaikaikaikaikai - posted: 8 years, 10 months ago
@todd: Nothing really stood out to me at the time, but in retrospect, what probably helped was:
- Typing in short sessions several times a day instead of doing marathons. It's true that practice helps, but only if you have the necessary concentration.
- Typing before going to bed. Since I typed both in the evening and in the morning, I could notice that my typing speed sometimes increased drastically over night. That might have to do with concentration, too, but I've heard time and again that sleeping right after learning or training something accelerates progress. It worked for me.
- Keep motivated to train consistently. Especially in the beginning, that meant keeping a spreadsheet for me in which I tracked my progress each day. That meant that if I skipped practicing for a day, I'd get a blank spot in my graphic, and I didn't want that. (If you're interested, here's how that looked:
https://drive.googl… the y-axis error bars represent the deviation between tests taken that day.)
