I have a wxTextCtrl and I would like to be able to when typing certain key words that after finishing typing the word they key word changes colour.
You'll need to use a TextCtrl in Rich Text mode or the StyledTextCtrl. Then you'll want to monitor the key presses so you can tell when the user has pressed the spacebar and act on that. You should check out Editra, a Python Editor created in wxPython and included with the wxPython demo and docs package. I am pretty sure it has this functionality already.