The acquisition of skill in telegraphy consists mostly in learning these higher units of reactions. It is the same in {324} learning to typewrite. First you must learn your alphabet of letter-striking movements; by degrees you reduce these finger movements to firm habits, and are then in the letter-habit stage, in which you spell out each word as you write it. After a time, you write a familiar word without spelling it, by a coÖrdinated series of finger movements; you write by word units, and later, in part, by phrase units; and these higher units give you speed and accuracy.

Along with this increase in the size of the reaction-units employed goes another factor of skill that is really very remarkable. This is the "overlapping" of different reactions, a species of doing two or more things at once, only that the two or more reactions are really parts of the same total activity. The simplest sort of overlap can be illustrated at an early stage in learning to typewrite. The absolute beginner at the typewriter, in writing "and", pauses after each letter to get his bearings before starting on the next; but after a small amount of practice he will locate the second letter on the keyboard while his finger is still in the act of striking the first letter. Thus the sensory part of the reaction to the second letter commences before the motor part of reacting to the first letter is finished; and this overlap does away with pauses between letters and makes the writing smoother and more rapid.

With further practice in typewriting, when word habits and phrase habits are acquired, overlap goes to much greater lengths. One expert kept her eyes on the copy about four words ahead of her fingers on the keyboard, and thus was reacting to about four words at the same time: one word was just being read from the copy, one word was being written, and the two words between were being organized and prepared for actual writing. The human typewriting mechanism, consisting of eye, optic nerve, parts of the brain and cord, motor nerves and muscles, works somewhat like one of {325} those elaborate machines which receive raw material steadily at one end perform a series of operations upon it, and keep turning out finished product at the other end.

All this is very remarkable, but the same sort of overlapping and working with large units can be duplicated in many linguistic performances that every one makes. In reading aloud, the eyes keep well ahead of the voice, and seeing, understanding and pronouncing are all applied simultaneously to different words of the passage read. In talking, the ideas keep developing and the spoken words tag along behind.

Fig. 52.--(From Book.) Practice curve of a young man learning to typewrite. Each point on the "curve" represents a daily record in number of strokes per minute. With improvement, the curve rises.

In telegraphy and typewriting, it is almost inevitable that the learner should start with the alphabet and proceed to gradually larger units. But in learning to talk, or to read, the process goes the other way. The child understands spoken words and phrases before breaking them up into their elementary vocal sounds; and he can better be taught to read by beginning with whole words, or even with whole {326} sentences, than by first learning the alphabet and laboriously spelling out the words. In short, the learning process often takes its start with the higher units, and reaches the smaller elements only for the purpose of more precise control.