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Labs · Steno lessons

Steno lesson ladder

Six ordered units with Discover → Revise → Drill, plus dictionary import, stroke lookup, free chord play, and TFBF freestyle drills — press keys together on your normal keyboard; highlights turn green when held.

Machine steno is one of the hardest skills on a normal keyboard. Go slow. Unit 1 starts with easy one-key words on purpose.

Practice tool only — not CAT/CART certification, not a replacement for professional steno software or hardware.

Ready for a timed score? Steno practice under Practice runs 30s/60s benchmarks only. Steno guides live under Insights.

Before you start

Machine steno is one of the hardest skills on a normal keyboard. Go slow. Unit 1 starts with easy one-key words on purpose.

What you need

  • A real keyboard (not a phone)

    You press keys on your physical keyboard. The picture on screen is a map — it is not a touch keyboard.

  • A computer browser

    Use a laptop or desktop in Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Edge. Keep this tab focused while you practice.

  • Keys that can be held together

    Steno chords need several keys down at once. Wired keyboards usually work best. Many laptop keyboards drop extra keys when you hold a bunch — we call that ghosting.

How a stroke works

  1. Read the English word at the top (for example: is).
  2. Find the orange keys on the picture — those are the keys for this word in Discover mode.
  3. Press the matching keys on your real keyboard. The tiny letter under each key shows which QWERTY key to use (S is often Q or A on your keyboard).
  4. Hold every key at the same time. Do not tap one-by-one like normal typing.
  5. Let go together. That one release counts as one stroke.
  6. Keys you are holding turn green so you can see what your computer actually received.
  7. For numbers: press a top-row digit (1–9, 0) or hold ` (backtick) as the number bar, then the column key.

What the colors mean

Tall left S
Initial S (start of a word) — press Q or A on QWERTY.
Right-bottom S
Final S (end of a word) — press ; on QWERTY.
# number bar
Hold ` (backtick), or press a top-row digit for 1–9 / 0.
Small letter under a key
Which QWERTY key to press.
Orange highlight
Keys to press for this word (when shown).
Green highlight
Keys your computer sees held down right now.

This lab is practice only — not court reporting certification, not a replacement for real steno software or a steno machine.

Lesson ladder

Units 1–3 use Discover → Revise → Drill — show targets, then hide them as you build recall. Later units add brief-form typing and readback.

  1. Discover · 5 words

    Unit 1 — Machine strokes

    Learn your first machine strokes — one word at a time, with orange hints showing which keys to press.

  2. Revise · 5 words

    Unit 2 — More single strokes

    Five more one-stroke words on the machine layout.

    Complete Unit 1 — Machine strokes to unlock

  3. Drill · 5 words

    Unit 3 — Stroke fluency

    Ten more common outlines to build muscle memory.

    Complete Unit 2 — More single strokes to unlock

  4. Stroke drill · 5 words

    Unit 4 — TFBF multi-stroke

    Type Faster Brief Forms for longer words — two strokes with / between them.

    Complete Unit 3 — Stroke fluency to unlock

  5. Stroke drill · 5 words

    Unit 5 — Courtroom TFBF

    Legal vocabulary in brief-form notation.

    Complete Unit 4 — TFBF multi-stroke to unlock

  6. Readback · 8 words

    Unit 6 — Readback

    See the brief form and type the English.

    Complete Unit 5 — Courtroom TFBF to unlock

Your dictionary

Import outlines you already use (your data, your license). Personal entries override our extended chord lexicon for the same word, but not the 15-word chord curriculum. Built-in content: 649 chord-ladder words, 652 extended chords, 690 brief-form drills — all Type Faster–authored, synced with lessons, lookup, and practice.

No personal entries yet.

Format examples

Stroke tokens: machine keys like T-,P-,H- or shorthand T+P+H. Use S- vs -S for initial vs final S.

{
  "version": 1,
  "entries": [
    { "english": "hello", "stenoKeys": ["H-", "L-"] },
    { "english": "world", "stenoKeys": ["W-", "-L", "-D"] }
  ]
}
english,stroke
hello,H-,L-
world,W-,-L,-D

Stroke lookup

Type an English word to see a machine chord or a Type Faster Brief Form (TFBF) outline—curriculum chords, your imports, extended lexicon, then TFBF drills.

Lab tools

Import your own outlines, use stroke lookup (chords + brief forms from the same built-in library as lessons and timed practice), then free chord play. When a word has both a machine chord and a TFBF outline, lookup shows both so practice modes stay consistent.

Extra practice

Experiment with chords — curriculum, your imports, and our lexicon — no scoring.

TFBF freestyle: random 10 drills from 690 brief forms (text field).

  • Type the brief form using uppercase letters (A–Z).
  • Use / between strokes when a word takes more than one stroke.
  • Example: HEL/O for a two-stroke word.