Teaching Mouse Control / Computer Usage

[TeachingMyToddlers]

Hello All-

1) At what age did you attempt to teach mouse control? At what age were you successful?

2) How long did it take for your DC to become proficient?

3) What are your favorite software programs or websites you used?

4) Did you have any issue with the speed of the mouse & did you decrease it for your toddler?

5) Any other tips when it comes to teaching?

I bought a leapfrog clickstart system for teaching mouse control 6 or 8 months ago and have pulled it out every once in a while. I haven't been happy with the response of the mouse and it just ended up with DD getting frustrated again and again, wanting very much to play it but being unable to do so. Since my kids trashed the Ipad (which still out of commission at the moment ) I decided we could attempt mouse control again.

This time, I bought a tiny laptop mouse b/c the full size mouse was so big under her hand. I put a small velcro sticky dot where she is supposed to click. I have been FAR more satisfied using a real mouse than the click start, but I know many ppl have had great luck with it. She completely understands the clicking part and has for many months, we just need to work on the tracking & moving the arrow. Initially the mouse was too fast for her, so I slowed it down to the slowest setting but then it was dragging along *too* slowly and I had to reset it again at a mid-level speed.

One of the biggest frustrations is when she clicks on things unintentionally while trying to "find" the mouse arrow (like the back arrow or an advertisement, etc). This navigates her to another webpage out of the game, so I don't know if a web based game is really ideal. I was thinking maybe a kids software program would be better, one that fills the entire screen and makes it more difficult to accidentally "leave".  I look fwd to DD being able to use a mouse b/c it will really open up a whole new world of learning programs and she loves her computer lessons we have done so far. We let her pick out her own mouse pad tonight at the store.

Do you have any words of wisdom when it comes to teaching mouse control?

[drummerboy]

Reader rabbit toddler

The games require mouse tracking only not clicking and vary in level from responding to any movement to requiring fine control and logical thought.

Very impressed with this game, don't like the older levels as much though they're still pretty good too

[drummerboy]

Hmm sorry he began playing at 1 and mastered all the games at 18 months though he still enjoys playing the harder ones once in a while now and he's almost three

[Tanikit]

My DD has used our computer since about 2 years. She actually learnt to use the keyboard (arrow functions) before the mouse but has been proficient with the mouse for about 6 months now (since 3 years of age) - this is with an adult mouse on normal speed. We played a number of games (www.noddy.co.uk and various ones we googled - mouse toddler) and also taught her how to find photos and things on the desktop she was interested in - she's actually too proficient now and its hard to get the computer for ourselves these days  We have had to put protection on the computer as she tends to drag things around with the mouse and moves files all over the place, but we have prevented her from deleting most things (except various profiles in games which she has managed to delete) She has a good understanding of google and how it works as well as using skype, but since she is not able to spell and therefore type properly she either tells me what to type or types a list of random letters and numbers. She has learnt some of the larger numbers by typing them and asking me what the number is (eg 1013 - whats that Mom? one thousand and thirteen) but I am not sure how much of this she is retaining.

[eschlem]

My DD does not use a mouse yet, but this is a topic of interest to me because she just started getting around the computer using the touchpad on the laptop of our PC.  Soon after she turned 3, she climbed right up to the laptop and starting surfing around, to my shock.  I know kids these days are able to get around electronics so soon, they are around it all the time.  Our friends who own IPads, which we don't, say that their kids are able to get around the IPad pretty well.

We had been showing her starfall.com and Tumblebooks on the computer.  The only thing I've shown her was to click on the arrow at the bottom of the page in the 'I'm Reading' section of starfall.com.  Though I bought her some vtech toy laptops, she never showed much continued interest in them.

So I downloaded http://www.kidzui.com/ to our laptop.  It's a kids' web browser, that shows only kids' websites and kids' youtube videos, etc.  She really likes to surf around on this.  There are a few sites I don't approve of, I think they are still too old for her, and kidzui used to have a function where parents can block certain sites.  I think they are going to bring that function back soon though. 

I did buy a tiny mouse to hook up to the laptop, it's a Targus compact mouse that plugs right into the USB port.  But she hasn't shown much interest in using it yet, just the touchpad.

[Maquenzie]

We've had success with a Mac laptop tracking pad. It is way more intuitive.

Two programs we've used that filled the screen: dreambox (math program, 14 day free trial) and PBS kids Play (free trial as well). In the beginning of the dreambox one it has three "learn the mouse" games.

[Mela Bala]

My son has always been interested in what our hands are doing on the laptop.  He has now started using the keypad mouse.  He has no idea what he is doing but he keeps at it.  Sometimes when is determined to be in control of the computer I go to this website http://www.puzzlepixies.com/easy/easy/feeding-frenzy.html
http://www.zoodles.com/home/marketing

I found this website had some useful information. 
http://www.edutainingkids.com/articles/masteringmouse.html

[kauaiheidi]

My DD will be 3 in a couple months.  She is surprisingly proficient with the mouse! Coupled with her ability to read and type a few words she has become fairly independent on the computer.  She’ll sit down and open programs on the desktop (such as Little Reader, Readeez etc), or even programs that we don’t have desktop icons for, such as Paint, in which case she’ll click on the start icon first and then select a program.  She also knows how to click on Internet Explorer and click on the pull down arrow at the top to access recent websites, such as MoreStarFall.com and PBSkids.com and IXL.com (when she is online I really have to make sure she doesn’t end up somewhere inappropriate). She does watch videos too, but I personally like the idea of her doing interactive educational games.  I think she may get more out of say, selecting and clicking on rhyming words, than just being shown rhyming words?

She first learned to use the mouse by clicking through a PowerPoint presentation I made for her – she just had to click, she didn’t have to click on something.  Around 18 months she got into watching phonics songs on YouTube, such as Apple Apple AAA, and would want to watch one of the recommended videos that come up on the side but she had trouble communicating which one it was she wanted to watch so I gave her the mouse and showed her how it worked to move the cursor.  We used to let her use a computer my husband used for work – bad idea.  Now we have a “kids” computer with a full warrantee.

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