Posted on 06/02/2014 9:24:43 PM PDT by windcliff
Does handwriting matter?
Not very much, according to many educators. The Common Core standards, which have been adopted in most states, call for teaching legible writing, but only in kindergarten and first grade. After that, the emphasis quickly shifts to proficiency on the keyboard.
But psychologists and neuroscientists say it is far too soon to declare handwriting a relic of the past. New evidence suggests that the links between handwriting and broader educational development run deep.
Children not only learn to read more quickly when they first learn to write by hand, but they also remain better able to generate ideas and retain information. In other words, it’s not just what we write that matters — but how.
“When we write, a unique neural circuit is automatically activated,” said Stanislas Dehaene, a psychologist at the Collège de France in Paris. “There is a core recognition of the gesture in the written word, a sort of recognition by mental simulation in your brain.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
They only teach handwriting in kindergarten and 1st grade nowadays? Really? Otherwise, we’re having kids do things on computer keyboards? I guess I’m out of it as far as what is going on in school. It seems we’re losing something that doesn’t need to be lost, if kids don’t learn how to write, not type things.
Remember that friend of Trayvon Martin, who couldn’t read cursive? How will people sign their names in the future; you can’t do that on a computer keyboard. Or will they print their name in block letters as a signature, not do so in cursive?
Engraving used to be a big deal.
Your battery is running low.
We were real men and women back then!
I guess all the rug rodents from now on will sign their name with an x if they can even figure that out!
The practice of activating the fine motor skills of a 27 degree-of-freedom manipulator and coordinating them with both visual and conceptual thinking might just have something to do with it. I would suspect that learning drawing skills would go along with it.
Which is why it is unimportant in Common Core.
Just make your mark...X
I have been experimenting with stylish marks on electronic card machines.
Handwriting...who knew it would become one of the finer things in life?
Block letters.
I would like to take calligraphy ... as a hobby.
If I hadn’t been taught long-hand years ago, I never would have been able to read historical documents at the National Archives, libraries, historical societies, etc.
They will not be able to read many of the original documents like the Constitution and items like John Adam’s letters to his wife, etc. without cursive. They will have to have them typed-—by a Howard Zinn type. That is the point-—to control all the ideas any child can have and keep them from seeing original documents (so they can be rewritten)—to reshape history (just like in the book, 1984). They will not be able to read letters written by their grandfathers or grandmothers.
They have done massive studies on brain development and tactile memory—using all the senses is essential to integration of both sides of a brain. Like if a baby does not crawl—they have trouble learning to read. They have to have crawling lessons for the 6 year olds to help them “read”.
The body is designed to work correctly with use of all the senses.....in young children and learning includes touch. Even reading, Beck was stating the other day that he had no tactile memory when he “read” books on kindle or whatever, and that he couldn’t remember anything. It was not like when he read hard copies and would know if he read something at the end or beginning, etc.
Pressing buttons does not use as much of the brain as picking up a pencil and shaping letters...etc. That integrates the brain more and stimulates more neuron growth. Computers teach instant gratification and destroy Virtue (Fortitude) and make children lazy and shuts down more of the brain. I just read a book on how technology use literally is reshaping the brain...and not in a “good” way. There is actually less interaction between left and right sides of the brain which eliminates critical thinking.
Kids who are three and been using ipads are incapable of stacking blocks....it is bizarre. Their coordination is not what it should be. Their “Reality” is both dehumanized and denaturalized.
There is a reason why Fortitude is a Virtue and so necessary in overcoming hardships in life. Without Virtue, children will not flourish as they should. All computers and watching TV minimizes the actions in the brain-—where old fashioned “learning” maximizes the neurological growth of the brain and makes people into unique “thinkers” who can deal with the real world and human beings. All of that takes much practice—and interactions with human beings and manipulating small and large muscles. Sitting still is anathema to a young child and unnatural as is staring at machines. It dehumanizes.
It is why Waldorf schools charge $26,000 a year and CEOs of Google send their kids there-—where they have to sign an agreement NOT to allow their children the use of any computers or watch TV until after 13 years or so. There is a huge waiting list for those schools and they are very expensive.
Why are they forcing these addictive machines on the masses even in kindergarten when elite schools don’t allow them? I know why.....and it is to make useful idiots who are lazy and have every idea fed to them so their Worldview is shaped by the Satanists/Atheists. Constant stimulation-—to destroy the reflection needed for Wisdom, and fill the head with White Noise so the kids literally will never be able to process information and be too frustrated to deal with the Great Books and real Knowledge so they are incapable of being brilliant like the Founders and a Free people.
Good point.
“Remember that friend of Trayvon Martin, who couldn’t read cursive?”
No. She was so stupid she couldn’t read anything.
You had it easy! Stones are everywhere.
We had to first peel the skins off of onions, garlics, and other plants, and then beat them to a pulp and then bake them into thin sheets.
Then, and only then, could we write on them. And woe to the person who made a mistake!
-PJ
This is a very sad future faced by our children, from not learning to write cursive, and develop their skills in that area.
Sad to think we are dumbing down our society. I think you are right.
“Engraving used to be a big deal.”
As well as setting type by hand, and even WAY cooler was the operation of those massive Linotype machines!
But quite frankly, I’m VERY happy not to have to have a Linotype operator format something for me when I can do it myself exactly like I want it in a few minutes and print it out myself or email it to a printer who gets it back in a day or two.
I for one won’t miss cursive writing. It’s hard to do, hard to read, and nearly useless in today’s society. Perhaps it could join the ranks of Chinese calligraphy fans.
Good post. Nice tagline too.
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