Cursor jumps to another location when typing

My second computer is a Toshiba Laptop also running Win7. I'm not a touch typist and frequently the cursor will jump to another location within the item I'm typing. I don't catch this until a few letters hve been typed and then it requires correcting and retyping. I thought at first it may be my touching the pad while typing but lately I have been very careful to not touch the pad. I normally use a wireless mouse and I tried shutting off the pad but cannot find out how to do it. Any ideas on what might be causing the cursor jump and/or how to turn off the pad?

Please try the following:
Go to Control Panel>Mouse and the "Pointer Options" tab. Uncheck the "Snap To" option and apply. See if it helps any.

You can disable your touchpad either with a built-in button near it, or sometimes a keyboard key combination (FN key) or via device manager.

I tried your suggestion. It may have helped a little bit but I still have the problem. I will turn off the touchpad as per your suggestion but I don't expect that to help the problem. Any more ideas?

Install the touchpad software from Toshiba Support Downloads webpage, then look on all tabs for a setting to disable touchpad when USB mouse is detected. This may be on a tab of the touchpad Control Panel, or may be added to a tab of Control Panel>Mouse. You can also adjust sensitivity to reduce palm-drag on many but it requires the latest software package where gestures have been included as I suspect your touchpad provides.