All bundled up in a drawer at my house are some very old letters. They were written at the beginning of the last century, in the early 1900s, by my ancestors. Some were written by my great-great-grandfather; some were written by my great-great-great-grandmother to my great-great-grandfather.
To tell the truth, it takes a little bit of work to read the letters. The handwriting is very flowery with lots of flourishes. They were obviously written with a fountain pen and are just beautiful, but the 100-year-old writing is quite a bit different from what I learned.
And, I did learn to write cursive. I don't remember when...third grade or so, it seems. I remember it was a big deal. For so many years (and to a 9-year-old, one or two years is a long time!), we kids had been forced to write in the babyish "print." We couldn't wait to learn to write — and read — cursive. Finally! We'd be able to figure out what our parents were writing.
From the looks of it, I learned to write cursive in the D'Nealian style. Although, I never was very good at slanting my letters. And, as I got older, I started adjusting the standard handwriting I was first taught, morphing it into something with my own style. Now, I'm not saying it was artistic or anything like that, but back in high school, we thought our way of writing was much more "cool" than the standard way. Nowadays, I suppose I write in some hybrid of cursive and print, a simplified handwriting that uses a print-style Q and S, for example.
Within the past few years, there have been several articles and studies done about how today's youth isn't learning how to write cursive. One Associated Press article in the past few months details the decline in cursive writing and explains some of the reasons and discusses the potential future of handwriting.
I've read such articles but never really thought the topic had much of an effect on my life. I know how to read and write cursive, and my 9-year-old daughter practices her handwriting at home, no matter whether or not they teach it at her school. But, earlier this week, I received a letter from a young, high school-age pen pal I met online through one of the letter writing blogs. She commented that she had some trouble reading some of my last letter to her — because she doesn't read cursive handwriting very well.
Wow. That kind of jolted me a little bit. I didn't expect my way of communicating to be obsolete so quickly. I do write some letters in print, especially to pen pals whose first language isn't English, in an effort to make sure my words are readable. Maybe I should write them all that way...
I do wonder what the future of handwriting is. I used to be a "Star Trek" fan, especially the "Next Generation" episodes of the sci-fi TV series, and I don't remember much handwriting going on there. It will be an interesting experience to witness first-hand the rapid evolution of written communication.
12 comments:
Oh no! Don't sacrifice your handwriting for the sake of my generation's ability to read it! We just need more practice, that's all. ;]
When I was in fourth grade, I *hated* learning cursive. Why use it when we had print? But I'm starting to come around to the idea now. Well, just starting to. I still don't get why we have to have both.
I think our schools have failed our children miserably . I attended catholic school and we were taught how to write with real ink and real fountain pens . never a ball point was to be seen in sister Mary agnes s handwriting class . Oh boy would we have gotten our knuckles rapped on in other words hit with a ruler across the knuckles .I still think they had the right idea .
Oh wow, I feel sob ad making you consider all of this. I don't want you to think that this whole generation's bad! The reason I was having trouble is because I skipped 3rd grade which is the grade that we were forced to write purely in cursive so I had to pick up on it along the way.
I'm so sorry. >.<
I still write in cursive, and I don't really understand the movement away from really teaching cursive in a meaningful way.
Even though the bulk of my time at work is spent on the computer, I still take notes in meetings and stuff like that by hand, and printing is so *slow*.
Melody, I certainly didn't mean to make you fell bad! I don't really know if it would matter if you'd been in third grade or not...from the sound of it, schools just don't put an emphasis on cursive writing these days. And, the weird thing is, I'm not sure whether or not it matters or not. There are lots of things we don't do anymore, so maybe cursive writing will just be relegated to artistic ventures in the future. ;-) I'm sure if you're really interested in cursive writing, you can find lots of books for studying it. Kind of like calligraphy.
Cursive writing - the lost art, like calligraphy. LOL.
I didn't mean to make you feel bad, either, Melody - I'm just frustrated myself that cursive writing is harder to read, but that means we need practice.
But that's just the thing, I'm agreeing with you. I love to write cursive whenever I can but I don't often get the oppurtunity. I think schools should continue it, not just teach it for half a year in 3rd grade and never bring it up again. It made me really sad to have missed the lessons and because of that, I occasionally need to take a double take on cursive writing. But I still enjoying reading AND writing it. :D
When we learnt cursive writing at school we weren't allowed ball point pens either. The richer kids had fountain or cartridge pens, but the rest of us had to use horrible scratchy-nibbed pens provided by the school. We had to dip them in the ink well every few letters to pick up more ink and they dripped blobs everywhere! This is the style of cursive writing that I was taught.
Wow! I remember learning cursive in the third grade and I was so excited to be able to write like an adult. I would practice and practice because I wanted my handwriting to be the prettiest. My handwriting isn't so great anymore, but I still try to write neat.
I have two divergent thoughts on this.
First, some handwriting is easier to read than others, be it cursive or print. The more handwriting of different types you read, the better you become at deciphering any of it. It just takes practice, and I think it's good for the brain to become flexible enough to read so many different styles.
On the other hand, cursive is inherently less readable. One of the many "demise of cursive" articles I've read recently did an analysis of how much more difficult it was for our brains to process cursive handwriting - all those loops and extra humps and such really make it difficult to tell letters apart. Some letters are harder to read than others, but I have about three or four correspondents - all of whom write exclusively in cursive - that I just have to give up and skip a word every now and again. And it's not about practice in those few cases... one of them is my mother, and I've been reading her handwriting for nearly 30 years now!
i remember learning cursive and it was hard in the beginning. i thought some of the letters i was trying to write were ugly. like Q looked like a boat or something...but i was so proud when i finally made pretty cursive and i still write in cursive, though not as much. it comes pretty easily to me because i don't really like to type on the computer, i'd rather write in a notebook.
Handwriting matters — does cursive? Research shows that legible cursive writing averages no faster than printed handwriting of equal or greater legibility. (Sources for all research are available on request.) Further research shows that the fastest, clearest handwriters avoid cursive. They join only the most easily joined letter-combinations, leaving others unjoined, using print-like shapes for letters whose printed and cursive shapes disagree.
(Many people who think that they “print” actually write in this practical way without realizing that they do so. The handwriting of many teachers comes close: even though, often, those teachers have never noticed that they are not at all writing in the same 100% print or 100% cursive that they demand that their students should write.)
Teaching material for such practical handwriting abounds — especially in much of the UK and Europe, where such practical handwriting is taught at least as often as the accident-prone cursive that too many North American educators venerate. (Again, sources are available on request.)
For what it’s worth, there are some parts of various countries (parts of the UK, for instance, despite their mostly sensible handwriting ) where governmental mandates for 100% joined cursive handwriting have been increasingly enforced, without regard for handwriting practicality and handwriting research, In those parts of the world, there are rapidly growing concerns on the increasingly observed harmful educational/literacy effects (including bad effects on handwriting quality) seen when 100% joined cursive requirements are complied with: http://morrellshandwriting.co.uk/blog/
Reading cursive, of course, remains important —and this is much easier and quicker to master than writing cursive. Reading cursive can be mastered in just 30 to 60 minutes, even by kids who print. Given the importance of reading cursive, why not teach it explicitly and quickly, once children can read print, instead of leaving this vital skill to depend upon learning to write in cursive?
Educated adults increasingly quit cursive. In 2012, handwriting teachers were surveyed at a conference hosted by cursive textbook publisher Zaner-Bloser.. Only 37% wrote in cursive; another 8% printed. Most — 55% — wrote with some elements resembling print-writing, others resembling cursive. When even most handwriting teachers do not follow cursive, why glorify it? Cursive’s cheerleaders allege that cursive has benefits justifying absolutely anything said or done to promote it.
Cheerleaders for cursive repeatedly allege research support — repeatedly citing studies that were misquoted or otherwise misrepresented by the claimant or by some other, earlier misrepresenter whom the claimant innocently trusts.
What about cursive and signatures? Brace yourself: in state and federal law, cursive signatures have no special legal validity over any other kind. (Hard to believe? Ask any attorney!)
Questioned document examiners (specialists in the identification of signatures, verification of documents, etc.) find that the least forgeable signatures are the plainest. Most cursive signatures are loose scrawls: the rest, if following cursive’s rules at all, are fairly complicated: easing forgery.
All handwriting, not just cursive, is individual. That is how any first-grade teacher immediately discerns (from print-writing on unsigned work) which child produced it.
Mandating cursive to save handwriting resembles mandating stovepipe hats and crinolines to save clothing.
Kate Gladstone
DIRECTOR, the World Handwriting Contest
CEO, Handwriting Repair/Handwriting That Works
http://www.HandwritingThatWorks.com
handwritingrepair+media@gmail.com
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