Bean Blog

Remember when you learned how to use a computer mouse? Of course you don’t. Yet millions of children from preschool and on are interacting with computer mice at home and at school on a regular basis. How do they learn?

Thanks to an excellent shared link on Facebook via FOB (Friend of Bean) Chris Klimas, I was introduced to Mousercise, a crazy-simplistic set of online exercises teaching how to move and click a computer mouse, click buttons, use drop-down and scroll-bar menus and fill-out forms.

Go ahead. Click the link: http://www.pbclibrary.org/mousing/mousercise.htm.

Chuckle at how utterly basic it is in terms of old school HTML coding and clip art. Yet I’ll bet you will go through all 41 quick-to-complete screens, just like I did.

It is eye-opening how something like using a computer mouse — something that is as innate as breathing to most of us — is actually a taught skill, and one that can be a bit daunting at first. As a usability advocate, it’s a great reminder about how important it is to take nothing for granted about your audience, and to remember that not everyone comes to the web with the same skills.

Some just need a little mousercise to start flexing their computer muscles…