There are lots of free online games but many don't require using
the correct techniques. For learning and games I'd recommend
Mavis Beacon. It has the standard lessons and every few lessons
it gives a game that only uses the letters that you've already
practiced. There's a separate game room where you can play the
games only but the games use all the letters so aren't as good
for beginners. You can tell if kids are doing the lessons or in
the game room. When the game finishes it will go back to the
lesson area or the game room. Useful for those students who
insist that they're doing the lessons but were given a game to
play.

We don't use AlphaAttack because it's a shooting program which
isn't allowed but it is a fun game. Typer Shark is similar in
that you have so long to type words and Cup Stacking
http://www.gamequarium.com/cupstacktyping.html is easy.

If you make sure that the kids don't use the mouse feature and
actually type the words then Word Racer is a great online game
for practicing after they've done some lessons. It's a Boggle
Style game but students can play against each other by signing
on to the same table. http://kids.yahoo.com/games/game/wordracer

You can turn any paragraph into a typing test using MS Word. do
a 2 minute test, then using Tools off the menu bar, pick word
count, use characters plus spaces and divide by 10 to get wpm.
A word in typing is 5 characters, because it's a 2 minute test
you need to divide by 2 to get characters per minute, then
divide by 5 to get words per minute or simplify and divide
characters including spaces by 10. I let students round up so
any partial word counts as an additional word.

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