Kevin's Watch

My daughter is 8 and I'm 39.
She's learning cursive writing at school.
The other night I was trying to help her when I realized....I have no idea how to write in cursive anymore!
Apparently......my writing skills have mutated or devolved into some kind of bastardized cursive writing style: a few fragments of cursive letters tossed into a sloppy printing vomitous shorthand thing that even I can't read.

Has anyone else lost their penmanship skills to the age of the keyboard?

I know what you mean. The way I write cursive ain't really the way I learned it in school.

But I think I could reconstruct it.

well the longer you do it, the more you refine your process of doing it, so
you end up with a bastardized version. the curse of the ball point pen.

AND...
if you don't do it a lot, your hand gets lazy.
when was the last time you actually wrote a letter to someone?

so...yeah. everybody's handwriting mutates.

I never learned to write english cursive, except for the three letters I need to scribble my name, doctor fashion.

Seriously. We're not using quills or fountain pens. What is the point of curse again?

So you can write when your computer doesn't work?

Lucimay wrote: when was the last time you actually wrote a letter to someone?

Huh?
What is this "letter" that you speak of?

MsMary wrote:So you can write when your computer doesn't work?

That's what print is for. There's this thing called 'legibility' that I highly prize.

I never cared for cursive. I struggled with it in grade school, and some letters in particular gave me trouble (z and f). Ironically, I prefer to write all my lower-case s's in cursive.

My grandmother, on the other hand, writers everything in cursive--even checks. It looks like Thomas Jefferson is paying our bills or something. I can't read it, and I assume the people who get the checks can only read it because they deal with so much handwriting. I suppose it's something they ingrained in her in the 40s: "Women have to have a neat, dainty hand, as well as good typing skills."

Emotional Leper wrote:

MsMary wrote:So you can write when your computer doesn't work?

That's what print is for. There's this thing called 'legibility' that I highly prize.

My cursive writing is legible.

MsMary wrote:

Emotional Leper wrote:

MsMary wrote:So you can write when your computer doesn't work?

That's what print is for. There's this thing called 'legibility' that I highly prize.

My cursive writing is legible.

It is easier to make legible block print than it is to make legible cursive.

Therefore, human nature being what it is, it's better to write in block print.

Emotional Leper wrote:

MsMary wrote:

Emotional Leper wrote: That's what print is for. There's this thing called 'legibility' that I highly prize.

My cursive writing is legible.

It is easier to make legible block print than it is to make legible cursive.

Therefore, human nature being what it is, it's better to write in block print.

*serious disagreement here*

Beorn has had occupational therapy from 1st grade on. We never forced him to choose handedness, and he wrote equally well (poorly) with both. The OT chose a hand for him (of course, she chose right. being a southpaw myself, and seeing how much he still does with his left hand, I always questioned that decision), and while his legibility improved, his printing was still terrible.

Then, they started cursive in third grade.

Now, Beorn had difficulty with remembering the form of the individual letters, but we helped that by taping a manuscript chart with upper and lower case letters to the top of his desk. And, even though he now has the use of an alpha-smart in his IEP, due to low muscle tone affecting the longevity of how long he can hand write, when he does handwrite his cursive is gorgeous.

We have found the flowing of the cursive letters, instead of lifting the writing implement between each letter, is far less exhausting to his hands. Hence the legibility is clearer and lasts far longer.

So, your premise is flawed. Cursive is far easier on the hand than block print.

I never said it was easier on the hand.

I said that from a legibility perspective, Block was superior to Cursive.

Cursive started, not strictly because it was faster than print, but because the less you have to lift your quill, the less chance of ink spatter.

I only print myself. Of course, that doesn't mean my printing is necessarily legible, but I only print...much faster than I can write script either. Dunno bout there, but as soon as you hit highschool here, you no longer have to write cursive if you choose not to. Because of the appaling nature of my handwriting, I immediately switched back to print.

--A

I can still write in cursive mode and pretty darn neatly too

Vain wrote:I can still write in cursive mode and pretty darn neatly too

Cursive Mode?

Vain's a MACHINE!

BURN HIM!

HE'S MADE OF WOOD!

My writing consists of a combination of cursive and printed letters (upper case letters are print, lower case are cursive, etc.) My penmanship used to be decent, but not so much now. I'm always in such a hurry!

Emotional Leper wrote:

Vain wrote:I can still write in cursive mode and pretty darn neatly too

Cursive Mode?

Vain's a MACHINE!

BURN HIM!

HE'S MADE OF WOOD!

What part of Deus Ex Machina did you NOT understand ?

::double post::

High Lord Tolkien wrote:My daughter is 8 and I'm 39.
She's learning cursive writing at school.
The other night I was trying to help her when I realized....I have no idea how to write in cursive anymore!
Apparently......my writing skills have mutated or devolved into some kind of bastardized cursive writing style: a few fragments of cursive letters tossed into a sloppy printing vomitous shorthand thing that even I can't read.

Has anyone else lost their penmanship skills to the age of the keyboard?

I couldn't have put it better. From my mind, through your hand, apparently. Anyway, I'm 19 and it's the same for me.

i don't get stopping children from printing and continuing with that to start learning an outdated style. i write a lot and it is all in print. most of my writing is done long hand, not on the computer. my signature? i use it so much at work (the initials mostly) that it barely qualifies as writing. seems our schools should just drop cursive. save it for an elective course sometime later in life.