Free Typing Resources for Teachers
A real curriculum built from 28 actual lessons, not a list of links — free, no accounts, nothing to grade.
Quick answer
HeroTyping has a free, 28-lesson touch-typing curriculum, typing tests, games, and vocabulary practice — no accounts, no cost, nothing to install. The plan below turns that into roughly a school term's worth of pacing, plus classroom activities and assessment ideas you can use starting today.
What's here
This isn't a links page. It's a suggested pace through HeroTyping's real 28-unit curriculum, built directly from the same lesson list the site itself uses — so it never references a unit that's been renamed or doesn't exist — plus practical classroom activities, assessment framing, and honest speed benchmarks with their source named, not invented for this page.
Week-by-week plan
Three lessons a week is a starting pace, not a rule — slower classes should simply spread this further, and faster ones can double up. Each lesson itself is broken into several graduated steps on the site, so “one lesson” is rarely a single five-minute activity.
Week 1
Home Row: Left Hand · Home Row: Right Hand · Home Row: Both Hands
Week 2
Home Row: Real Words · Top Row: Left Hand · Top Row: Right Hand
Week 3
Top Row: Both Hands · Top Row: Real Words · Bottom Row: Left Hand
Week 4
Bottom Row: Right Hand · Full Alphabet Drill · Full Alphabet: Real Words
Week 5
Numbers: 1 to 5 · Numbers: 6 to 0 · Full Keyboard: Words
Week 6
Full Keyboard: Punctuation · Beginner Checkpoint · Everyday Sentences
Week 7
Building Speed · Numbers & Words · Longer Passages
Week 8
Mixed Practice · Intermediate Checkpoint · Speed Endurance
Week 9
Precision Under Pressure · Long-Form Typing · Numbers & Symbols Mastery
Week 10
Final Challenge
Explore the full curriculum at /lessons — each unit shows an on-screen keyboard and hand diagram live while a student types, so the technique is reinforced during practice, not just explained beforehand.
Classroom routines by time available
10 minutes (daily bell-ringer)
One lesson step or one short accuracy-focused test. Consistent daily reps beat one long weekly session.
20 minutes (typing-block day)
Warm-up lesson step, a timed test, then five minutes of a typing game for a lower-pressure cooldown.
40–45 minutes (dedicated computer-lab period)
Two lesson steps, a longer timed test for the week's progress log, and vocabulary practice or a game for whatever time is left.
Activities
Baseline and re-test
Run a same-duration typing test on day one, log WPM and accuracy, then repeat it every 2–4 weeks under the same conditions. The comparison across tests over time tells you far more than any single score — see the typing test duration guide for which length to standardize on.
Accuracy-first practice days
One day a week, tell students their goal is a clean run, not a fast one — no score wins that day, only accuracy. This directly counters the instinct to rush that causes most classroom typing errors.
Weak-key spotlight
After a test, have students note which specific letters or combinations tripped them up (not just their overall score) and spend the next short session drilling only those, using vocabulary practice or custom text on the typing test for unfamiliar words.
Low-stakes typing races
Typing games turn practice time into something students choose to do rather than endure, without you needing to build or grade anything — useful as a reward block or a Friday cooldown.
Whole-class finger-map check
Project the touch-typing finger map and have students find a few keys aloud together before a lesson — a two-minute warm-up that reinforces the finger assignments visually.
Typing games and vocabulary practice both work well as the lower-pressure half of a session — real practice time that doesn't feel like a drill to a student.
Assessment ideas
Standardize on one test duration and one text type for the whole class so results are actually comparable to each other and to a student's own past scores — mixing a 15-second test one week with a 5-minute test the next makes week-over-week comparison meaningless. See which typing test duration to use for the trade-offs between a quick check and a truer sustained-speed measurement. Track both WPM and accuracy, not WPM alone — a fast, error-heavy result isn't actually faster once correction time is counted; see the accuracy guide for what to do when a student's accuracy is lagging their speed.
Progress tracking
HeroTyping has no accounts and no teacher dashboard — every result lives in the browser that produced it, not on a server. For a classroom, that means tracking is on your side: a simple shared spreadsheet where students log their own WPM/accuracy after each test works well, or have students screenshot their results screen as a quick, low-effort record. It's more manual than a built-in gradebook, but it also means nothing about a student's typing is collected or stored anywhere beyond their own device.
Speed benchmarks (use with caution)
There's no single official WPM standard for schools — state and district requirements vary, and many don't specify a number at all. The ranges below are widely-cited classroom benchmarks, compiled from keyboarding-rate research rather than a government or state mandate; treat them as orientation, not a grading rubric, and defer to your own school's requirements where they exist.
| Grade band | Commonly cited range | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Grades 3–5 | 15–25 WPM | Should not be expected to type faster than the student can write by hand. |
| Grades 6–8 | 25–40 WPM | Accuracy matters more than speed at this stage — aim for 90%+ before chasing WPM. |
| Grades 9–12 | 35–55 WPM | Approaching typical adult casual-typing range by the end of high school. |
Printable reference
The touch-typing finger map includes two chart images sized to print or project — useful pinned up next to a lab computer or shown on a classroom screen during the first few lessons. The WPM/CPM/KPH calculator is also useful if you need to convert a district's typing requirement (often given in KPH) into the WPM number HeroTyping's tests actually report.
FAQ
Does HeroTyping require student accounts or sign-up?
No. Every part of HeroTyping — lessons, tests, games, vocabulary practice — works with no account, and progress is saved only in each student's own browser (localStorage), not on a server. That also means there's no built-in class roster or teacher dashboard: tracking a class's progress currently means students self-report their own result screen (a screenshot, or a number copied into a shared log), not something the site centralizes for you.
What typing speed should my students be hitting?
There's no single official standard — state and district requirements vary, and many leave the exact number open. The ranges above are widely-cited classroom benchmarks compiled from keyboarding-rate research rather than a government mandate; treat them as a reasonable compass, and defer to your own school or district's stated requirements where they exist.
How long should a classroom typing test be?
A 1-minute test is a practical default for a quick weekly check; a longer test (3–5 minutes) gives a truer picture of sustained speed if you have the class time for it. See the typing test duration guide for the full trade-off.
Is this suitable for younger students?
The lessons start from locating individual home-row keys by feel, with no reading level assumed beyond recognizing letters — appropriate for most elementary classrooms. The games and vocabulary practice use everyday English words; review them yourself first if you want to confirm they fit your specific age group.
Sources & references
Last updated 2026-09-25.