Keyboard
As the name suggests it is a board of keys, primarily used to input text into the computer. QWERTY is the standard key layout, and was first used in the typewriters, before computers were about.

Monitor
This is a very important part of the computer system, and is often described as the Display or screen. The user interacts with the computer through the monitor and everything the user is doing is displayed on the monitor. Older monitors were made from CRT’s (Cathode Ray Tubes) which made them very heavy and they took up a lot of space. Modern ones are made from LCD (Liquid Crystal Display). They are very light weight and are extremely flat.

Mouse
Along with the keyboard, the mouse it the primary form of data input for today’s computers. Most common mice have 2 buttons and a scroll wheel. The left button is used as the ‘OK’ or ‘Enter’ button and the right hand one is the menu button, although these can be changed to suite the left handed user. The scroll wheel is used to scroll up or down long pages or selections of things.

Printer
A computer peripheral that produces hard copies of things created on the computer, usually on paper, but can also print on other materials such as cardboard.

Router
A router will be used in a network of computers. It is used as the bridge or connection between the LAN (local area Network) and the phone line. Routers can allow multiple computers to share the same internet connection or share peripherals, such as printer’s scanners etc…

Scanner
This is used as another form of data input, and is pretty much the exact opposite of a printer. Where a printer converts digital material into hard copies, a scanner converts hard copies into a digital form. Most scanners have a feature called OCR (optical character recognition), this allows text from a sheet of paper to be converted into an editable piece of writing in digital form.