Posted on 07/18/2013 7:16:56 PM PDT by Morgana
I have been computer-less at home for five weeks.
My brand-new laptop went belly up and had to be sent back. During the frustrating wait (which I suspect will lead to a later column), I have returned to writing with a pen and spiral notebook. It's been a flash to the past, reminding me of my younger days when every assignment, story and poem were handwritten. Are the days of writing by hand on their way out?
Having beautiful, cursive handwriting used to be a source of immense pride. Handwriting skills were taught right alongside reading and math. Prizes were awarded in school to the students with the best penmanship.
But that is changing. Common Core State Standards omit cursive writing as a requirement, which means schools are no longer required to teach it. With so much emphasis going to other skills, learning to write in cursive is not a priority.
Morgan Polikoff, assistant professor of education at the University of Southern California's Rossier School of Education, told The New York Times, "Cursive should be allowed to die. In fact, it's already dying despite having been taught for decades."
There is opposition. A 2010 study of preschool students found young children who wrote out letters rather than simply seeing them had changes in their brain activity when they later reviewed the letters. Karin Harman Janel of Indiana University said Motor System Augmenting Visual Processing leads to better learning. In other words, the actual writing process boosts brain activity.
(Excerpt) Read more at mywebtimes.com ...
Cursive won’t die, it will merely move from the english department to the history department.
Typing and boolean algebra are both far more important skills today and need to be taught starting in first grade.
What I found interesting was that this feral city animal knew the word ‘cursive’, but then I remembered that philistines of all kinds usually know the words to describe the things they won’t ever do or know!
The best thing I ever did and the best advice my mother ever gave me was to take a typing class in high school.
Manual typewriter, return arm and all, but the skills remain and have served me well.
That picture is perfect for this thread. Thanks for the laugh.
I think it’s foolish. I must be ol’ skul.
Cursive is a form of racial oppression and class distinction!
No justice! No peace!
I remember the shame in the 4th grade of being in sent to special ed for my lousy handwriting. I am left handed, write “curved over”, and to this day can feel my hand tense up instantly if I have to write an extended cursive piece. Good riddance to cursive....
Cursive, or as us creepy ass crackers call it, “code words”.
They taught us cursive in third grade.
In fourth grade, I went back to printing, and have printed ever since. It ain’t worth it.
I write things by hand all the time. It’s just the nature of my work. I find it unimaginable that I could one day have to print to have coworkers understand my writing. Printing tires my hand much faster then cursive.
Then thank heavens for the death of one superficial standard that people are judged by!
Some of us have hand-eye coordination issues that make our writing less than perfect but don't affect us in other areas that we can be productive in.
I had to go to summer school as a child for my writing problems and even as an adult its somewhat sub-standard. However my grades allowed me to graduate near the top of the class.
I don’t have much opportunity to hand-write things out these days, mostly lists, or fire inspection information, or Bible study notes. Just about everything needs to be inputted on a keyboard now. But a couple of years ago, I realized I was forgetting how to write in cursive and thought what a shame it would be to lose that skill. Now I try to write the few things I do write in cursive. It actually feels good to do sometimes; like a little mental exercise to work my brain in other than the usual ways.
Contrary to the contrarians here, actual WRITING needs to be maintained. That includes cursive, which is just a shorthand faster way of writing.
Don’t count on having your precious computers always available. And do we always need to have them for stupid stuff such as simple quick notes to each other? Some fools seem to think so. Much easier to write a few words than whip out your I-thing and type it.
Actually handwriting is a lost art. I don’t want to quibble over semantics but the idea I’m trying to get across is that handwriting or penmanship was a style of writing that was taught back in the pen and ink days. The difference between handwriting/penmanship and cursive is that penmanship requires you to use the large muscles in your arm (vs just wrist and fingers as is usually done in teaching cursive). Your hand and wrist stay more firm and your arm moves more or the most. Most good Calligraphers still use this approach in writing decorative text. Though it is initially more difficult when starting out this way, one big advantage is that your hand fatigues less due to using the bigger muscles and over time you have more control and consistency of letter formation. I used to do some calligraphy when I was younger and this approach will help you get consistent letters without cramps or fatigue. It isn’t that people can’t have nice handwriting when learning cursive it’s that most will not. The disadvantage of the penmanship style is that it truly takes practice and patience. In our world of text messaging I think I know which one will win out ;- ) Recent research has also shown that students remember things better when they are handwritten (cursive, manuscript, whatever) as opposed to keyboarding as different regions of the brain are required that have more links to language formation than the more mechanical regions required for typing/keyboarding.
Yep, because something has to be, whether one likes it or not. And penmanship tells much more about you than the color of your socks, as some would prefer.
I had a 5th grade teacher who did not appreciate my artistic talent for putting circles to dot my i’s and tails on my y’s and G’s. Show me one 11 year old girl in the western hemisphere who doesn’t use circles to dot her I’d. But, I digress. I spent that summer at schools end to teach myself to print... in caps too, rather than cursive. Guess I showed her!!
When doing historical research, it helps to be able to read cursive. I never would have been able to get through all the documents at the National Archives, historical societies, libraries, etc., if I hadn’t been able to read cursive.
Wait until the first EMP. Then that which the leftists tell us is “dying” will suddenly spring back to life once more. Kinda like the Kremlin and manual typewriters . . .
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