Capitals and punctuation together

This review has no new keys. It puts every capital and every mark of punctuation you have learnt into sentences that look like the sentences people actually write: dialogue with quotation marks, questions, lists with colons, contractions with apostrophes. It is the last lesson before the final unit, and its check is the first with a target of eighteen words a minute, which is roughly the speed at which typing stops feeling like an obstacle between you and what you want to say.

Punctuation is where a good rhythm most often breaks. A typist who is steady on letters will stop dead at a quotation mark, work out which Shift it needs, and lose a second. The cure is the same as for any key: enough repetitions that the decision is made by the hand and not the head. This lesson is those repetitions.

• Capital on a left-hand letter: right Shift. Capital on a right-hand letter: left Shift.
• Apostrophe: right little finger, one key right, no spaces. Quotes: left Shift and the same key.
• Question mark: left Shift and slash. Colon: left Shift and semicolon.
• Comma, full stop, colon, semicolon, question mark: nothing before, one space after.

The Weak Spot Drill at the end can now target capitals and punctuation as well as letters, so if the Shift keys have been giving you trouble, expect to see them there.