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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: The Death Of Cursive
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
I am now old enough to remember learning to write with that now ancient of scribing instruments, the fountain pen. When we did it - at the age of 6-7, we learnt to write cursive. It was painful and slightly boring, but over time I began to understand its value and to an extent even today I keep seeing afresh the value and sheer beauty of the written word and its various scripts.
Only a few months ago a report came out here outlining teaching and research difficulties faced by universities throughout the land (which covers two countries). The report claimed that the vast majority of schools were no longer teaching cursive to children and at the age when they would normally be doing so, they were now moving directly into typing on a computer. The claimed result was that a very significant number of children could only print when writing with a pen. Universities and colleges are reporting that students cannot read their tutors and lecturers hand written notes and cannot read hand written documents in archives.
I read it, somewhat unsurprised; thought it was another scaremongering piece. Then I was visiting a family in the UK and the 12 year old son couldn't read my writing. I gently enquired about his own writing and he was able to print, but had no notion what cursive was or 'joined up writing'. Is this normal? Is it happening elsewhere in the world? At first, as I say, I wasn't shocked. But now I wonder what the cultural loss will be - not just in reading stuff, but the whole art of writing....or am I scaremongering myself?
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
Posts: 5235 | From: a prefecture | Registered: Jul 2008
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
Not teaching cursive is normal. But I've yet to experience any problems w/ my university students not being able to read my cursive writing. Maybe the problem is not with reading cursive per se, but with reading poorly written/sloppy cursive. Which is sort of why they've stopped teaching it.
[ 09. October 2014, 23:56: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
My children have execrable handwriting. But they can read my script. If it is any comfort to you, I usually use Palmer hand, the 'joined writing' they used to teach in elementary school. I can also write in uncial, italic, and Gothic, and know how to cut a quill or a reed into a pen. However, the TSA took my pen knife from me the last time I went on an airplane.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Evangeline
Shipmate
# 7002
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Posted
In Australian primary schools, children learn a very modified form of cursive that is like joined up printing, but they have handwriting books in which they practice and the technique is practiced, so the reports of the death of cursive, at least in Australia are much exaggerated.
Posts: 2871 | From: "A capsule of modernity afloat in a wild sea" | Registered: May 2004
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
posted by Cliffdweller:
quote:
Not teaching cursive is normal.
Really?! I find that a bit depressing to be honest. That some (maybe even most) cannot do it well seems like a very weird reason to stop teaching people altogether.
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
Posts: 5235 | From: a prefecture | Registered: Jul 2008
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
posted by Cliffdweller:
quote:
Not teaching cursive is normal.
Really?! I find that a bit depressing to be honest. That some (maybe even most) cannot do it well seems like a very weird reason to stop teaching people altogether.
They're not teaching it because in today's world, it's not deemed necessary or important, especially compared to learning to use computers. I can't really argue with that. I honestly haven't seen any ill-effects among my univ. students who haven't learned cursive. There are all sorts of other things I find my students haven't learned in high school that I would have liked or expected them to learn that do effect their ability to do university level work. Writing in cursive, not so much.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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St Deird
Shipmate
# 7631
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Posted
I had to learn cursive in primary school, and had horrible, messy handwriting until I finally gave up and developed my own, neat, non-cursive style.
IMO, a lack of teaching cursive won't be the end of the world.
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They're not hobbies; they're a robust post-apocalyptic skill-set.
Posts: 319 | From: the other side of nowhere | Registered: Jun 2004
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
I certainly can't say I miss trying to decipher cryptic scribbles on messy lined paper. Computers were not just a godsend to students!
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
Not quite as good.
quote:
Cursive writing, compared to printing, is even more beneficial because the movement tasks are more demanding, the letters are less stereotypical, and the visual recognition requirements create a broader repertoire of letter representation. Cursive is also faster and more likely to engage students by providing a better sense of personal style and ownership.
Italics and bold, mine.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Don't know about speed. I can take notes in writing usually verbatim depending on speech speed . I think it depends on how and what you learned to do. Can't type very well.
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Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Knopwood
Shipmate
# 11596
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Posted
I did learn to write cursive in school - in late-90s Ontario, no less, when the educational apparatus was pretty much collapsing around us. All I remember was the tapes of twee instrumental music they played (supposedly reflecting the movement of the strokes) to inspire the work of our hands. It's a skill I seldom use now, though I can trot it out when needed. Reading others' can be a bugger though.
Posts: 6806 | From: Tio'tia:ke | Registered: Jun 2006
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Uncle Pete
Loyaute me lie
# 10422
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Posted
Sixty years ago, I learnt cursive. Ball point pens create sloppy cursive - the cursive I do best is with a fountain pen. Nowadays I do a mix of print capitals (hate cursive capitals) followed by cursive script.
I find it interesting that over the years, though my handwriting has undergone many changes, my signature at 20 is recognisably my signature now. Even my initials - with which I signed many a memo or instruction to my staff has not greatly varied.
I vote for cursive. I haven't the dexterity to write with a fine italic hand that is my favourite script.
Aside: I once had a medical doctor who wrote beautiful italic. Even his prescription forms. I think he was unique.
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Even more so than I was before
Posts: 20466 | From: No longer where I was | Registered: Sep 2005
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mark_in_manchester
not waving, but...
# 15978
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Posted
When I was lecturing engineering (up to last year), I very strongly favoured a 'let's talk about it' approach, generating figures, maths and note-form text on the board which students were strongly encouraged to write down. It was well received, but some students struggled to write.
Rather like 'making notes' from a text book or the web, making notes in a lecture does something useful (IME) to most people in terms of improving recall and some kind of nebulous but useful 'possession / ownership' of the info. One had to fight against the 'anyway, it's all on the web' idea - because if it stays on the web and not in your head, there's no way you're going to synthesise anything novel, interesting or just plain useful out of it when you bump into it in context, in RL.
My 9 year old girl appears to have sussed-out 'joined up' writing of a sort on her own, because it looks fancy. It's neat and appears faster than printing, so I guess she's there - not sure her younger sis will be ars*d, but we'll see.
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"We are punished by our sins, not for them" - Elbert Hubbard
(so good, I wanted to see it after my posts and not only after those of shipmate JBohn from whom I stole it)
Posts: 1596 | Registered: Oct 2010
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Galilit
Shipmate
# 16470
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Posted
Hebrew does not lend itself to cursive.
Teacher-aide-ing in English classes, though, I have found here and there a student who is in love with English cursive. They will ask me to write their name and they practice it endlessly (as high-school students the world over will get into "grooves")
To them it is like bringing back a lost world.
The only one I have met who can actually do it is self-taught and an art major - not surprisingly.
Digression: As for myself - my Parker Urban and I are inseparable. The nib construction allows me to write equally well in Hebrew or English - ie left to right and right to left and in cursive, capitals or print. Anyone feel like starting a fountain pen thread?
[ 10. October 2014, 05:10: Message edited by: Galilit ]
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She who does Her Son's will in all things can rely on me to do Hers.
Posts: 624 | From: a Galilee far, far away | Registered: Jun 2011
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
Handwriting is still explicitly in the new English National Curriculum together with spelling. (And cursive writing as a way of teaching spelling is reasonably well known). There are statutory requirements to teach handwriting in each year from year 1 to 6 (age 5-11)*. The requirement is that pupils should be taught to quote:
"write legibly, fluently and with increasing speed by ... deciding whether or not to join specific letters."
(Year 5-6 statutory advice).
Cursive is not mentioned but the previous statutory advice would be met by teaching cursive.
* this isn't a surprise. The new NC explicitly lays out KS1 and KS2 words to spell and books to read with nitpicking detail, but becomes exceeding vague for KS3 and KS4 (by which time the students I work with have fallen by the wayside years before).
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
I think I'd rather give children complex art to do though.
I would as well.
quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
The way I see it, cursive is harder to read than print and slower than typing.
Well, the harder to read is part of why it helps in development. The brain must use more regions.
But, part of the difficulty in reading might arise from lax standards? My cursive, and printing, is atrocious. Lack of uniformity, consistency and angle. But my calligraphy was quite nice. With the other forms of writing, I was never pushed to develop better skill. With calligraphy, beauty is the point.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
I'm unable to write cursive.
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Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
If you teach handwriting as cursive from the start - so you teach the letter and how to join it to the common joining letters - it helps children form that letter correctly to flow across the page and it also helps to wire the spelling patterns in too and it saves teaching two forms of writing:
quote:
The reasons for teaching cursive writing are particularly relevant to students with handwriting coordination difficulties (developmental dysgraphia) unless their problems are severe when other strategies may need to be implemented. Specialist dyslexia programmes of Gillingham and Stillman (1956); Hickey (1977); Cowdery and Montgomery et al., (1994) all base their remediation on it in a multisensory training system. The reasons are it:
- aids left to right movement through words across the page
- stops reversals and inversions of letters
- induces greater fluency in writing so enables greater speed without loss of legibility
- more can be written in the time
- speed and fluency can make a difference of a grade at GCSE, A level or in degree programmes
- the motor programmes for spelling words, their bases and affixes are stored together (Kuczaj, 1979)
- space between letters and between words is orderly and automatic
- a more efficient fluent and personal style can be developed
- pupils with handwriting coordination difficulties experience less pain and difficulty
- legibility of writing is improved
- reinforces multisensory learning linking spelling, writing and speaking.
In addition, if taught from the outset it eliminates the need to relearn a whole new set of
motor programmes after the infant stage and there is a more efficient use of movement because of cursive’s flow. source (pdf)
Although John Holt and a few other writers who can print at speed cannot see the point of teaching cursive. But it really does help students who struggle to spell and write.
[ 10. October 2014, 06:38: Message edited by: Curiosity killed ... ]
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
I am old enough to remember being taught to write with pen and a well of ink into which the pen was dipped. Fountain pens were banned until Senior School. We were taught cursive and I still write in what is basically a cursive hand, clear and neat. It is strange to note that women of my mother's generation, emerged from their schooling with a hand different to the men. Even now, if I see writing in that hand, I can say that it was done by a woman of a certain age, that now being in their mid-eighties on.
The biro is the enemy of clear and neat handwriting. Even in a hearing, perhaps essentially in a hearing, I take my notes with a pen the better to read them.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
I had great difficulty writing in cursive script at school. It brought me into conflict with teachers, made me feel I was irredeemably messy, sloppy and scruffy, and fear that I wouldn't be able to get very far in education or life.
When I was about sixteen I tried writing a little larger, and that made all the difference. I now get compliments on my writing and requests to write joint birthday cards.
I have a strong suspicion that things come out differently depending whether I hand write or type them. Hand written sermons seem to have more structure, more drama and space in them than the verbose flood that comes out of the bubble jet printer.
Hand writing is harder to read, but typing makes a worse script because it's so regular and therefore easy to lose your place when you look away.
I also find fountain pens well worth the extra trouble.
I wonder if it's different for left and right handed people. I write with my right hand and therefore with that part of my left brain that controls it. Does that affect how the thinking of the two halves reaches the paper?
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
If you teach handwriting as cursive from the start - so you teach the letter and how to join it to the common joining letters - it helps children form that letter correctly to flow across the page and it also helps to wire the spelling patterns in too and it saves teaching two forms of writing:
I couldn't agree more.
But fewer and fewer schools are even teaching joined writing ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
Well, they teach it, but then they let the children choose how to write so, of course, they revert.
My husband can hardly write at all now, he uses the computer so much!
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Schroedinger's cat
Ship's cool cat
# 64
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Posted
Actually, I find cursive harder to read, even when it is done beautifully.
However, I can write in cursive - but my writing is utterly appalling. so I mostly use a computer. My children can write in cursive, but they also use the computer for most stuff. I am not sure they are losing that much by not writing.
I suppose the priority of writing as a life skill is the reason. When I was growing up, you had to be able to write - even when I started working, reports etc would be hand-written, and typed by a secretary. These days, the necessity write is very substantially reduced in all fields of life. I think that has far bigger implications than just not teaching cursive in schools.
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Blog
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Posts: 18859 | From: At the bottom of a deep dark well. | Registered: May 2001
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
I was taught a Copperplate hand (executed with a dip pen). Style though varied with teacher - one year we had to make all loops and connections rounded, next year, very pointed, to the extent of making loops triangular. However, when you went up to secondary school, handwriting no longer had to conform to a particular model, so I went into a mad adolescent spree of inventing my own script - until eventually captivated by the beauty of Italic. Which is still my basic hand, albeit I sometime have to think for a moment when called upon unexpectedly to sign my name, how exactly it is you do this writing thing. But then I still have that model alphabet in my head from 50 years ago.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Twangist
Shipmate
# 16208
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Posted
Twanglets are now 11 and 9, they go/went (eldest is in secondary now) to a state primary in an a very not middle class area and learnt joined up writing at the bottom end of KS2 (age 7ish)the school made a big deal of kids getting their "pen licence".
Fountain pens, it seems, are very much becoming a thing of the past, which is very sad.
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JJ
SDG
blog
Posts: 604 | From: Devon | Registered: Feb 2011
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
I for one, if my children are anything like I was, will not miss hands covered in inky blots, not to mention school books. Fountain pens are horrible things; I've never been able to use one without getting ink all over my fingers. YMMV, naturally, but handwriting was the bane of my school life. Despite being given the impression that writing neatly was more important than virtually anything else in life, I still write like a drunk spider.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Komensky
Shipmate
# 8675
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Posted
There are some pond differences. I was in the USA over the summer and didn't meet any parents whose children learned cursive/joined-up writing. Whereas all children in the UK are learning it (to the best of my knowledge). It's a very big mistake to drop it and I am surprised that it has happened in the USA whose school system(s) are generally pretty good.
K.
Posts: 1784 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2004
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I for one, if my children are anything like I was, will not miss hands covered in inky blots, not to mention school books. Fountain pens are horrible things; I've never been able to use one without getting ink all over my fingers. YMMV, naturally, but handwriting was the bane of my school life. Despite being given the impression that writing neatly was more important than virtually anything else in life, I still write like a drunk spider.
You're not a doctor, are you?
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Lucia
Looking for light
# 15201
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Posted
Our kids are in the French school system although not in France. Learning cursive writing is still a major thing in the French system and they learn the French cursive style of writing from the beginning of primary school.
My daughter learnt to write beautifully in this style but sadly as she has gone into secondary school and has to write much faster to get everything down in class her neatness has diminished! What I find really interesting is that when she writes in English she reverts to printing her letters. She's never been specifically taught to write in English and somehow the cursive script is identified in her mind with writing French!
Our son, who is left handed and not very dextrous sadly has fairly atrocious and difficult to read writing both in French cursive and in English. (If anyone can point me towards online resources for helping left-handers develop good writing please let me know!)
Posts: 1075 | From: Nigh golden stone and spires | Registered: Oct 2009
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lucia:
Our kids are in the French school system although not in France. Learning cursive writing is still a major thing in the French system and they learn the French cursive style of writing from the beginning of primary school.
My daughter learnt to write beautifully in this style but sadly as she has gone into secondary school and has to write much faster to get everything down in class her neatness has diminished! What I find really interesting is that when she writes in English she reverts to printing her letters. She's never been specifically taught to write in English and somehow the cursive script is identified in her mind with writing French!
Our son, who is left handed and not very dextrous sadly has fairly atrocious and difficult to read writing both in French cursive and in English. (If anyone can point me towards online resources for helping left-handers develop good writing please let me know!)
Laptop.
Seriously, though, in the real world I can manage perfectly well these days because the need to handwrite anything for reading by anyone else is pretty much limited to greetings cards. It doesn't matter any more.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Lucia
Looking for light
# 15201
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Posted
I think that is true in the UK. However my understanding is that the ability to write well is much more prized in French culture. When I was studying in France in 2006 our class was told that job applications and official letters should be hand written, not word processed. Apparently the dark art of hand writing analysis is still considered a useful tool in assessing people's suitability for jobs in France. See this BBC article from last year.
[ 10. October 2014, 12:08: Message edited by: Lucia ]
Posts: 1075 | From: Nigh golden stone and spires | Registered: Oct 2009
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la vie en rouge
Parisienne
# 10688
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lucia:
I think that is true in the UK. However my understanding is that the ability to write well is much more prized in French culture. When I was studying in France in 2006 our class was told that job applications and official letters should be hand written, not word processed. Apparently the dark art of hand writing analysis is still considered a useful tool in assessing people's suitability for jobs in France. See this BBC article from last year.
Not sure. Handwriting is used more in France, I think, but I’m not sure you actually have to be good at it.
I work for lawyers, who still write a lot of things by hand – they usually find it quicker to mark up documents by hand and then get a secretary to type the modifications. Some of them have legible handwriting, and others of them, as the French would say, write comme des cochons*.
*Like pigs. I use this expression because I find it entertaining, although I’ve never understood quite how the pig is supposed to hold the pen in its trotter ![[Biased]](wink.gif) .
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Rent my holiday home in the South of France
Posts: 3696 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
I think I would find it difficult to take speed notes using only manuscript printing. There are times when it is inappropriate or unacceptable to use a recording device, in which case one has to take notes by hand. Over the years I developed an idiosyncratic shorthand and abbreviations for note-taking. Some of these might be taken down in manuscript letters just as fast as in cursive, but other times it is quicker to write in joined-up (cursive) letters.
My ordinary writing is a mix of cursive and manuscript. As someone else here noted of themselves, I tend to use manuscript caps but cursive letters within words. The exception is my own signature, which has cursivised first and middle initials and an entirely cursive surname -- more of a joined-up scribble, actually.
Oh, and yes I know that some people take a tablet or laptop everywhere and type notes on those devices, but I find the practice cumbersome and space consuming.
[ 10. October 2014, 12:59: Message edited by: Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras ]
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
I write daily notes on everything in handwriting (never have called it cursive, perhaps this is a new or regionalism or I use a regionalism). My notes get scanned into PDF files at the office and are available on the computer server when I need to read them. I go to meetings with paper. I tag my pens like migratory birds so I can see where they've migrated to.
I wrote both my MA thesis and PhD dissertation in notebooks by hand, which I still have, with revisions on the facing page, until I gave them to a typist to put into computer files (it was the 1980s, the MA ended up on the mainframe and the PhD on a microcomputer). Except for the minor revisions after the defences (viva voce), they can be read in handwriting. So I am very strongly on the side of handwriting.
There is something to the ritual of buying a new notebook and selecting the pen to use. It is one that I continue with the journals I keep when travelling or canoe tripping. I have no idea how I'd insert the water colour sketches and paintings into a computer file.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Heavenly Anarchist
Shipmate
# 13313
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Posted
My 10 year old has been taught to write in cursive in Key Stage 2. He loves learning it, he seems to find it very grown up, but he is generally lazy about anything handwritten and would prefer to type his homework.
I was a nurse for almost 20 years and can decipher most doctors' handwriting. I myself write a very untidy cursive script and I'm glad for my students sake that I now do all my university marking on the computer ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Dog Activity Monitor
My shop
Posts: 2831 | From: Trumpington | Registered: Jan 2008
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Gwai
Shipmate
# 11076
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Posted
Re speed, according to wikipedia the average person can write 31 wpm with handwriting (not shorthand, but one could type shorthand too) so definitely a fast typist is faster than a fast writer.
I accept though that the beauty of a computer page is nothing compared to the beauty of nicely written letters. I would though, I'm one of those who asked my mom for a fountain pen for Christmas one year so I could play with big swooping curves in my letters. I don't think such writing is bad to teach, but at least in my culture and world, I don't think it's any more useful to teach than any other kind of art. Art in itself is very necessary to teach, mind!
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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.
Posts: 11914 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
I have a calligraphy 'O' level.
It was great fun to learn
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Yes, I took calligraphy courses in college, from one of the premier calligraphers of the time!
I find that handwriting, preferably in pencil on lined pads, taps a different strain of creativity in my brain. If the fiction is going well I need the keyboard, so that I can crank thousands of words out per day. But if it is sticky, if it is not going well, then it is helpful to switch to the ancient methods.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
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Amorya
Ship's tame galoot
# 2652
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Posted
I made some handwritten invitations recently. When doing a practice run, I tried out both printed and joined-up writing, and eventually went with the former: it's easier to be neat! I associate joined-up writing with trying to scribble things down at high speed when taking notes in school, whereas printed writing is more likely to be for something someone else is going to read.
Having to hand-write that many invitations was interesting, because it does show how out of practice I am: it took a long time!
Posts: 2383 | From: Coventry | Registered: Apr 2002
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Belle Ringer
Shipmate
# 13379
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Posted
My mother's generation had penmanship classes every year. My schools never breathed a word about formation of letters after 2nd grade. As a result, we almost all have poor writing - literally I cannot read my own well, sometimes have to give up on a word or phrase. Not surprising my mother said "your generation had better learn typing" long before home computers were invented.
I'm not surprised if schools teach computers instead of cursive. They have only so much time. A weekly half hour penmanship class would do wonders for readability - but how many words do we keyboard vs how many write?
(A friend who studied calligraphy has visually lovely handwriting but I find it hard to read.)
(I gave upon script capital letters while still in school. Never did get the ridiculous capital Q that looks nothing like the letter Q in real life!)
Posts: 5830 | From: Texas | Registered: Jan 2008
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IconiumBound
Shipmate
# 754
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Posted
If children aren't taught cursive writing, are they taught touch typing in its place?
And what will happen to signatures as required on most important documents? Will that word be relegated to the bottom of SOF posts?
Posts: 1318 | From: Philadelphia, PA, USA | Registered: Jul 2001
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IconiumBound:
What will happen to signatures as required on most important documents?
Signing one's name with an X is an ancient and noble tradition.
I never learned to write properly, as my family moved to a new house when I was in the 3rd grade. My class at the old school was just about to learn, and my class at the new school had already learned. I remember having to stay in during noonday recess and copy exercises that the teacher set for me so that I could teach myself.
As a result, my penmanship is a curious mixture of printing, cursive and made-up. But I can read it, and I expect most other people can as well.
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
If you're using the internet a lot, especially messaging programmes (eg Facebook chat), you kind of learn to touch-type automatically. I never had formal touch-typing lessons but am pretty reasonable at it from long hours spent on MSN Messenger in the early 00s.
I was taught 'joined-up writing' in primary school (late 90s) and couldn't use a pen until I had good enough handwriting, though not a fountain pen. Now I tend to join up some letters but not others, and my handwriting is pretty untidy but legible. Untidy print is much easier to read than untidy cursive.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Amorya
Ship's tame galoot
# 2652
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IconiumBound:
If children aren't taught cursive writing, are they taught touch typing in its place?
I don't think you have to be taught touch typing these days. People use computers so often that they just pick it up.
Posts: 2383 | From: Coventry | Registered: Apr 2002
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Justinian
Shipmate
# 5357
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I for one, if my children are anything like I was, will not miss hands covered in inky blots, not to mention school books. Fountain pens are horrible things; I've never been able to use one without getting ink all over my fingers. YMMV, naturally, but handwriting was the bane of my school life. Despite being given the impression that writing neatly was more important than virtually anything else in life, I still write like a drunk spider.
You're not a doctor, are you?
Karl: Heartily seconded.
Ad Orientem, there are two groups of people known for their poor handwriting in my experience. Doctors and teachers. They also have one thing in common. I can't think of a single other profession that actually needs to write things by hand for information rather than occasionally write them as a piece of art.
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My real name consists of just four letters, but in billions of combinations.
Eudaimonaic Laughter - my blog.
Posts: 3926 | From: The Sea Coast of Bohemia | Registered: Dec 2003
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
Like all Ontario students I was taught the Zaner Bloser method and was bad at the handwriting. I went through until 3rd Year University with poor handwriting, then I found the light. ![[Angel]](graemlins/angel.gif)
Zaner-Bloser, like its predecessor the Palmer Method is just a simplified form of Spencerian Script, which in itself is not very legible. The lower case b's are terrible and so are the r's.
So I jumped ship to Cursive Italic handwriting, which is semi-cursive and much, much neater as a font. As a result I now write much more clearly and I can even make my handwriting beautiful with a little concentration. I find my hand just does cursive italic much better than it did Zaner-Bloser.
At the same time I discovered gel pens, which have much less friction and make a thicker line, and the two combined are what I use now to write. I'll never go back.
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NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.
Posts: 7646 | From: Peterborough, Upper Canada | Registered: Jun 2007
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Gwai
Shipmate
# 11076
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IconiumBound:
If children aren't taught cursive writing, are they taught touch typing in its place?
And what will happen to signatures as required on most important documents? Will that word be relegated to the bottom of SOF posts?
In my experience, they are indeed taught touch typing. And knowing cursive enough to sign one's name isn't much. I know people my own age or within a few years of it who don't know any cursive letters besides those in their own name. Heck, I know someone else who doesn't know any cursive. She just does a big flowing letter for her first letter then scribbles of about the right shape for the rest of her first name, and then a line for all but the first letter of her last name.
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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.
Posts: 11914 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
I suspect cursive will soon become a specialty heirloom skill like knitting or hand embroidery. Something of a niche market. Some people will continue to enjoy learning & using it, and may even be sought after to use their skills either for calligraphy or for taking extensive notes in a setting where a laptop is inappropriate or unworkable. Some may learn and use it as an adjunct to creativity. But it will no longer be seen as a skill that is essential for the entire population.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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