By the time children reach third through fifth grade, word processing becomes an imperative skill.

While it isn't all that much fun to teach or practice, without formal instruction on some key elements you will find students pushing the space bar to attempt to find the center. You'll also find students forgetting to put a space after a comma or period. In addition, many kids will push the return button at the end of each line.

In regards to formatting text, I have a couple rules that I enforce with my students. First, the font must be one that uses upper and lower case letters. Second, the font must be easy to read for the average person.

Another interesting item to note is that there should only be one space after a period. In the olden days of typewriters, two spaces was standard. Now the rule is to only use one space as the letters are of proportional width. I have found many adults aren't aware of this shift in standard typing practices as we grew up learning on typewriters!

A fun way to teach, practice, and reinforce word processing skills is to use the Preamble of the Constitution. After a lesson about the Preamble (which could include a book called "We the Kids" by David Catrow or the Schoolhouse Rock video about the Preamble) I give instruction for creating a one-page poster. Instruction includes how to center, change the font, size and color of the text, spell check, and add clip art. Next I give each child a typed copy of the Preamble.

Students work individually to create their one-page poster of the Preamble. After deciding that all of the elements are arranged on the page in an appealing manner the document is printed in color. Staple these to red or blue construction paper and you have an excellent bulletin board to aid in the celebration of Constitution Week!