Fine Motor Skills for Typing!

This student has poor fine motor skills for handwriting. Let's move them to typing! 

But what happens with this same student's fine motor difficulties affect their ability to type? 

There is sometimes an assumption that typing is a quick and easy fix for a child with handwriting difficulties. While handwriting and typing have different fine motor skill requirements, typing itself is a complex skill. Typing requires an integration of fine motor skills, visual motor integration, bilateral coordination and executive functioning skills. 

Of course typing is not the only way that we can access technology.  There are speech-to-text options, touch screen options and even more complex technology like eye-tracking. It wonderful that there are so many options available. Adaptive technology is the key for some children and adults to access the online world and record information too. 

Occupational therapists have a role working with school-aged children in teaching correct keyboarding technique, supporting assistive technology use and helping students with handwriting difficulties to transition to typing.  For our children who we want to teach to type, we want to build their fine motor skills to access the keyboard.  Not all of these students will end up as touch-typers but we can lay good foundations that can also be transferred to other activities such as using a computer mouse, playing a piano (or other musical instrument) and managing self care tasks such as buttoning or shoe laces.  

Fine Motor Fundamentals for Typing

* Wrist extension
Similarly to handwriting, if we can encourage the wrist and forearm to be placed on the table, this provides stability needed to use our fingers.  If the wrist and forearm are too high (ie. hovering) or below the table, this may lead to fatigue and poor endurance.  Ergonomically, there are wrist supports that may be used for extended typing, however for our children learning to type, it is more important to develop the wrist strength and forearm stability. 

Wrist strengthening activities may include weight bearing on the forearm and arms (eg. over a therapy gym ball and walking on hands), donkey kicks, carrying loads (eg. bucket of sand), pulling or climbing up rope ladders, monkey bars, or working on vertical surfaces (Eg. drawing on easels). 

* Strong Palmar Arches 
Our hand muscles help to form the arches of our hand: longitudinal, traverse and oblique. These arches work together to build the natural curvature of our hand (structure) and also allow finger dexterity. They help us with opening up the webspace of our hand and provide a foundation for other fine motor skills (including in-hand manipulation and thumb opposition). In addition to typing, we need strong palmar arches for so many every day activities such as opening and closing bottles, cupping our hands to roll a dice, playing ball games and more!
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In typing, the palmar arches allow the hands to form the natural curvature so that the pads of the fingers touch the keys. Other parts of the fingers do not need to rest on the keys and it can prevent accidental touching if the fingers are held straight (extended). 

Activities that help develop the palmar arches of the hand include crawling and weight bearing activities onto the hands.  The hand strengthening activities mentioned earlier will also help with the development of the palmar arches. Squeezing a stress ball or playing ball games (eg. handball, tennis) can provide more opportunities to develop the palmar arches. Occupational therapists love to use a "munchy ball" which is a tennis ball with a slit (often decorated as a face).  Thes balls are squeezed open so that they may be "fed" with various items.  

* Open Webspace
An open circular webspace is achieved when the thumb and index finger can form a circular shape when touching. This relies on the thumb being able to fully rotate at the carpal metacarpal (CMC) joint so that it can touch each finger tip. 

In typing, an open webspace provides stability for dynamic thumb movements. The thumbs typically press the space bar. Activities such as "thumb wars" can promote thumb mobility. 

* Individual finger strength with isolated movements
Each finger needs to be able to press a key on the keyboard individually with adequate force.  This can be difficult for children with poor joint stability and hyper-mobile joints.  Some children hyper-extend at the proximal or distal interphalangeal joints. Some children press multiple keys at the same time.  

While the separation of the two sides of the hand is not as important in typing as it is in handwriting, stability of the hand is important so that each finger can demonstrate the dexterity needed to type individual keys. The fingers are required to move up and down as well as from side to side to reach different keys on the keyboard. 

Games such as pop-its or "Tricky Fingers" are fun ways to develop finger isolation.  Finger and hand strengthening activities may also include the use of tongs or clothespins (pegs) to provide additional resistance when picking up items.  Playing the piano also helps to develop individual finger strength although it is a cyclical discussion as some isolated finger strength is needed to play the piano! 

* Finger dexterity and use of the pads of the fingers
It seems obvious that the pads of the fingers should touch the keys during typing, however in my experience, I have seen children use many alternatives! They may use the sides of their fingers, their nails or their finger joints. 

Children can practice finger touching each finger to their thumb individually. More finger warm up activities can be found here. 

Playdough is one of my favourite OT tools.  Create small balls of playdough and use these to work on the fine motor skills needed for typing. 
1. Squash: This action promotes flexion and extension at the metacarpal joints while developing stability of the wrist, palmar arches and interphalangeal joints of the fingers. 
Begin with your hands positioned on the table as if you are going to type.  Place one ball of playdough under each finger pad.  Squash the ball of playdough with an individual finger or your thumb. Try to maintain joint stability while resting your wrist and forearm on the table. Try not to raise your whole hand as you squash the playdough. 
2. Kick: This action promotes flexion and extension of the interphalangeal finger joints while developing stability of the wrist and palmar arches. 
Begin with your hands positioned on the table as if you are going to type.  Place a ball of playdough in front of each finger.  "Kick" the ball with each individual finger. Try to maintain joint stability and rest your fingers back onto the table after kicking. Try not to raise your whole hand or arm as you kick the ball of playdough. 
3. Thumb flicks: This action promotes thumb joint mobility and strengthening of the webspace of the hand.
Begin with both hands fisted, keeping your thumbs separate.  Place one ball of playdough so that you can flick it with one thumb.  Try to flick the playdough between the thumbs. Try not to raise your whole hand or arm as you flick the playdough. 
4. Squeeze: This action promotes sideways movements of the fingers. 
Place a ball of playdough between two fingers (or thumb and index finger). Squeeze the ball of playdough between your fingers and continue to each finger space. 

Watch these playdough activities with any of these links:
* You-tube
* Instagram
* Facebook 
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Would you like to share this information about "Fine Motor Skills for Typing"?

You can find this resource as a part of the Fine Motor Information Sheets.
This pack contains:

• Fine Motor Skills overview (3 pages) - Definitions, Hand Strength, Games and Activities
• Fine Motor Skills for Handwriting
• Fine Motor Skills for Typing
• Fine Motor Skills for Cutlery and Utensils
• Fine Motor Skills for Managing Fasteners (3 pages) includes visual sequences.

These pages may be emailed or printed to share with families and teachers. I attach them to assessment reports to provide activity suggestions. Get your copy at the YKOT shop or TPT store. 

Fine Motor Skills Information Sheets (YKOT shop $Aus)

FM Information Sheets (TPT Store $US)

Keyboarding or typing has become an important component of learning.  

Working on the fine motor skills that support keyboarding can have additional benefits with other activities that require fine motor skills.  Occupational therapists play a key role in providing this support while coaching and educating parents and teachers too. 

Until next time,
​Cindy

Cindy is a registered occupational therapist practising in Sydney, Australia.  She has two growing children who are a constant source of inspiration and learning.  Cindy loves working creatively to help children to reach their potential, finding opportunities in everyday living and making learning fun. She is also addicted to making printables (even when they take a long time to complete).  Cindy is the author of the Occupational Therapy blog Your Kids OT.  Read more articles from Your Kids OT at https://www.yourkidsot.com/blog

Cindy is a contributing author of the Functional Skills for Kids Therapy Team.  They have together published THE HANDWRITING BOOK, THE SCISSORS SKILLS BOOK and THE TOILETING BOOK.

​The information on this site is general in nature. The activities are safe for most children, however, you should consult an Occupational Therapist or health professional to address specific movement, sensory or other medical conditions. Affiliate links are used throughout this website to promote recommended products. Your Kids OT receives a small commission if any purchases are made through these links. Please see my disclosure policy for more details. ​​​
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