The Koch Method
Dave Finley, N1IRZ
MFJ Publishing Company
ISBN 1-891237-19-5, MFJ-3400
Read 2003 June 14-19
Reviewed 2004 January 13
In the fall of 2002, Cheryl Tarsala, KB0QJJ passed her Element One, 5 word per minute (WPM) code test, after having learned the code through the Koch Method to 12 WPM in five or six weeks of five or six practice sessions a week. I talked Katy into trying it with me. We started around December 1. We would be done by my birthday, maybe Christmas! We were trying for 18 WPM. I read what little there was about this online, wrote a random character generating C++ program to make up practice material, and we worked 15-30 minutes a day, 5-6 days a week, through vacations and finals and everything.
By June and four or five soul wrenching re-evaluations later, it hadnÕt worked like it was supposed to. I supposed it might have something to do with motivation, but I broke down and bought the book, kind of like cracking the instruction manual. ItÕs a fast read, and fun. I learned very little that was helpful with Katy but did pick up a few interesting ideas.
During WW II learning of Morse was a very important skill, it being the early days of radio. Koch practitioners could learn relatively painlessly. Some hand picked students were proficient at 12 WPM in 40 hours work, a vast improvement over the 16-18 weeks that it typically takes someone to learn the more difficult traditional way.
KochÕs big idea is that you should never learn dots and dashes but only the sounds of letters. This means you avoid the big barrier that we all experienced at about eight words per minute where you have to unlearn dots and dashes and learn character sounds in practice. The problem, however, with getting 90% on two characters then adding a third, getting 90% on three and adding a fourth and so on, is that 90% is hard to get without motivation and there isnÕt much motivation when the whole half hour is three characters. There is nothing coming over that seems worth listening to. Katy was adding about a letter every four days.
Still, both of us stubborn, we worked Katy through to the end. I tried to get more daily time or more daily sessions but she had no spare time and less than no motivation to do any more than contracted. So, it went slowly. Eighteen WPM is probably the worst speed to learn outright. The book mentions that there are differences between the 12 WPM and 20 WPM approaches, but doesnÕt talk more about what they are.
Finley spends most of the words talking about fancy practice equipment, much of it available through MFJ, that would help you do this in the absence of the computer program I wrote which required me to do the sending manually day in and day out.
One idea I did like was an idea from one ham, not regarding learning, but about using CW. (CW stands for Òcontinuous waveÓ and is used interchangeably with the term ÒMorse CodeÓ by hams.) There is a special retreat place where this guy goes and once, having been on phone there and having had his special place polluted by phone coarseness, he vowed that it would be CW only hence. I could do that. ItÕs part of the reason I like the RockMite QRP (low power) transceiver so much.
With all the characters learned, after a fashion, we abbreviated work on the prosigns and put them in predictable places in the practice then did a couple of weekÕs worth of sessions practicing actual 5 WPM, 13 WPM and 20 WPM code tests. In short order, Katy had near perfect copy at 5 WPM and could carry on communications in an emergency (with some gaps) at 13. Viannah left for college accompanied by her mother and brother. That Saturday (August 30, 2003) Katy and I went down to the W6TRW Swapmeet where we paid the fee at the testing session and she easily passed her Element One.
ÒGood for life for operating but only a year for upgrading,Ó they said. The clock is ticking.
Like her mother, she has no interest in using the skill.
I would recommend the book to fellow hams who have CW interest, but my finding is that learning the code by Koch is just as difficult as the more traditional ways, just a different kind of difficulty. There is talk of trying again with John. IÕll think hard about methodology and contract issues. Probably weÕll just try for 12 WPM too.
Postscript June 2007. Last December all code testing for amateur radio was discontinued. Katy now has the only CSCE (Certificate of Successful Completion of Element) for a Morse Code exam in the family. They arenÕt issued anymore. We will never try this, or need to with anyone else, unless there is a need to learn the code for actual communications.