Kansas may halt cursive education

[Dimitriov]

Okay this thread is simply rife with what I find to be a particularly terrifying form of ignorance.

Writing things by hand is important. No it really is. I simply cannot understand why so many young people don't seem to understand this. You actually learn better when you write something out by hand, it engages your various motor skills and affects your brain differently than simply hitting buttons on a keyboard.

And if handwriting is important then writing clearly, legibly, and efficiently is obviously a good idea. You will still have to write by hand throughout school and university for tests if nothing else, and I honestly don't know how teachers are even able to make sense of some of the crap I have seen some people produce. Learning penmanship is a basic motor skill that people can absolutely make use of for the rest of their lives.

Here's some food for thought.

http://www.healthenclave.com/news/writing-hand-makes-you-smarter-1019.html
http://www.rd.com/advice/parenting/why-handwriting-makes-you-smarter/


So many people seem to like to forget that we aren't actually just brains that happen to use a body to get around. In point of fact we (as in all lifeforms) were effectively bodies first, that evolved more complex nerve centres over time. You're brain is designed to work with your body, and that simple truth can manifest in various ways.

 

[Gardenia]

Was only taught cursive in elementary school, as the last year to have mandatory cursive. Now I cannot write efficiently in any other way, and no one bloody understands it. Good on Kansas, I say.

 

[Zeren]

I was taught cursive, but I only ever use it to sign legal documents and even then it looks like a scribble.

 

[NeutralDrow]

Okay this thread is simply rife with what I find to be a particularly terrifying form of ignorance.

...what? No one's been disparaging learning to write things by hand. Only learning to write things in a joined-letter form that's supposedly faster and more efficient, but tends to be slower and harder to read afterward.

 

[Strazdas]

I will laugh at the day when people are so used to computer typing for written work that when in some strange situation, they are force to use cursive writing, their hand writing will be awful!

While I do agree that cursive are being less these days but I do feel they hold some important heritage wise.

hey you, bastard. i write cursive every day, many pages, and my writing is so awful 90% of people i know cant even read it. how nice you write has nothing to do with how much you do it.

i use cursive extensively. when i want to write up some note i pick up a peace of papepr and pencil, not notepad. this kind of thinking brings up crying kids that "this site does not have thread bookmark therefore its impossible to use it"....


But really, do people ahve sepeerate classed of HOW to write and HOW to type? what kind of stupidity is this? thats kinda first graders thing at best. it becomes obviuos to me that american schools got nothing left to teach if they go to teach "Typing skills"....

 

[Lizardon]

Wow, I didn't realise people felt so strongly about whether or not kids are taught to join up their letters.

Here in Australia, it was taught when I was 8 or 9, but it was never mandatory for any work to be submitted in cursive or print. We just did which ever we preferred. Personally I don't print because I find it slower. In Year 12 English we were required to write about a page every 15 minutes in our examines. I wouldn't have been able to do that while printing.

Does anyone really use cursive anymore? It was taught to us in primary school, and for like a year or two it was demanded for major assignments. Then dropped entirely. I can't remember the last time anyone used it for something more lengthy than their signature.

I use cursive.

However, it is from habit from being HAMMERED the stuff into me as a child. It is a habit I want to break so bad. >_<

So, yeah, I think this will free up a LOT of time that can be focused on actually useful skills.

Like Latin!

Or under water basket weaving! :3

Just out of curiosity, how long is spent on teaching cursive in the US? We only spent a few weeks of English classes tops. I mean it's not like it's a difficult skill to learn.

"When writing, instead of lifting your pen after each letter, leave it on the page to join your letters up"

There I basically just taught you all how to write cursive. Your welcome. =P

Also I agree, there isn't nearly enough under water basket weaving taught in schools. How can we expect kids to function in society if that can't even do this.

 

[Dimitriov]

Okay this thread is simply rife with what I find to be a particularly terrifying form of ignorance.

...what? No one's been disparaging learning to write things by hand. Only learning to write things in a joined-letter form that's supposedly faster and more efficient, but tends to be slower and harder to read afterward.

Well all the posts talking about things like:

I hate cursive handwriting and in this day and age of typing why do you even need cursive anyway?

Seem to suggest otherwise, but refer to the point I made here:

And if handwriting is important then writing clearly, legibly, and efficiently is obviously a good idea.

The main point I am making is that in the era where writing by hand was at its most ubiquitous they developed "cursive writing" because it was a more efficient way of writing by hand. All the complaints about how useless handwriting is in this thread could equally be responded to with "then they should probably go back to teaching it more, not less."

 

[Signa]

I will laugh at the day when people are so used to computer typing for written work that when in some strange situation, they are force to use cursive writing, their hand writing will be awful!

While I do agree that cursive are being less these days but I do feel they hold some important heritage wise.

In my experience, that's not how things went. I was one of the weird ones that kept cursive writing after it was necessary. The thing is, I only recently went back to manuscript, and my handwriting looked like a kid's. I never developed my personal style in writing those letters, so they stayed looking neat far longer than anyone else my age. Now that I've been doing more manuscript writing, my own style is starting to show through.

So, if kids actually learned and remembered cursive, I bet their handwriting would stay neat if they never used it.

OT: Reading the headline sent mixed feelings to me. 1) It's a skill that should be a basic part of education 2) It's fucking useless in day-to-day life.

and finally 3) was the clincher: typing class. I had to learn typing from doing lots of IM chats. I'm in fully support of teaching that far more useful skill as long as they aren't over obsessive about which finger hits what key. My mom got my a typing program when I was a kid, and I learned nothing from it. It was far too structured to be of use to me.

Damn you Mavis Beacon, I hate you so much!

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

Does anyone really use cursive anymore? It was taught to us in primary school, and for like a year or two it was demanded for major assignments. Then dropped entirely. I can't remember the last time anyone used it for something more lengthy than their signature.

I use cursive.

However, it is from habit from being HAMMERED the stuff into me as a child. It is a habit I want to break so bad. >_<

So, yeah, I think this will free up a LOT of time that can be focused on actually useful skills.

Like Latin!

Or under water basket weaving! :3

Just out of curiosity, how long is spent on teaching cursive in the US? We only spent a few weeks of English classes tops. I mean it's not like it's a difficult skill to learn.

"When writing, instead of lifting your pen after each letter, leave it on the page to join your letters up"

There I basically just taught you all how to write cursive. Your welcome. =P

Also I agree, there isn't nearly enough under water basket weaving taught in schools. How can we expect kids to function in society if that can't even do this.

I went to a specialized private elementary school do to a learning disability (long story) so my experience is far from typical and I am not sure for most normal people, but we spent several years learning it. :/

 

[Fiad]

Past signing your name, cursive was one of the most useless things I ever learned. All through elementary I was told, "You will be using this every day for the rest of your life!" Enter middle school, "Cursive? I guess if you want to. They told you it was required?" Enter High School, "Don't use cursive."

I mean seriously, all forms say PLEASE PRINT. What else is it used for besides signing your name?

 

[necromanzer52]

I'm not sure I believe these people claiming in the UK everyone writes in cursive. Here in Ireland, what we call "joined up writing" Is only ever used by old people.
They taught it to us in primary school, but nobody continued it into secondary school, and I don't know anyone my age who still uses it.

 

[NeutralDrow]

Okay this thread is simply rife with what I find to be a particularly terrifying form of ignorance.

...what? No one's been disparaging learning to write things by hand. Only learning to write things in a joined-letter form that's supposedly faster and more efficient, but tends to be slower and harder to read afterward.

Well all the posts talking about things like:

I hate cursive handwriting and in this day and age of typing why do you even need cursive anyway?

Seem to suggest other wise

Ah. I interpreted that as being "what's the point of having cursive writing when typecast print is the norm." It's a bit confusing when people use "writing," "printing," and "typing" almost interchangeably or with conflicting meanings.

but refer to the point I made here:

And if handwriting is important then writing clearly, legibly, and efficiently is obviously a good idea.

The main point I am making is that in the era where writing by hand was at its most ubiquitous they developed "cursive writing" because it was a more efficient way of writing by hand. All the complaints about how useless handwriting is in this thread could equally be responded to with "then they should probably go back to teaching it more, not less."

No one (but maybe one or two people) is arguing that handwriting is useless, just that cursive handwriting is (unless you're using it specifically to mean cursive handwriting; see above confusion of terms). And the other side of the equation is that printed handwriting is much more useful, on account of being faster to learn and more readily clear and legible. Cursive handwriting may hold an edge in efficiency assuming you use it more-or-less exclusively, but people who exclusively use printing still learn to write quickly, so it's not an especially necessary edge...unless you wanted to go whole hog and learn stenographic shorthand.

That's part of why it's fallen into disuse here as more than a formality. The other part being simply, of course, that no one here uses it anyway. At least not enough people to justify spending an already good chunk of education time, and certainly not enough to devote even more time to it.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

Kansas is far from the first to do it. Aside from my signature, I haven't written anything in cursive since the third grade. Back when, you know, I was learning it. It is completely useless in this day and age. I'll never forget when my middle school math teacher told us that in high school, we would be *required* to use cursive. Yep, went through the entirety of high school and never had to use it a single time. Ever.

And I'm really not understanding some of the people in this thread. You guys are aware that cursive isn't the only form of handwriting, right? You can certainly use print without doing the whole loopy, joined letters thing. If that's how it is in your country, so be it, but there's no need to get ethnocentric about it.

 

[Shocksplicer]

I live in Australia, we were taught both cursive and non-cursive (Or whatever the world for that would be) in school, and were allowed to do whichever we chose. Pretty sure all the people my age that I know don't use cursive in their everyday lives.

 

[Gatx]

My sister writes in cursive but I don't. I used to, but now it takes longer for me to figure out cursive that it would if I just printed so I don't bother. I can see where it would be more efficient than print obviously, but I think the time you save is negligible, and you're better off using what you're used to.

Also you people from the UK, so condescending.

I think cursive should carry on (wayward son). Writing in cursive is faster and more efficient than printing when it comes to expressing what's on your mind, and it looks fine so long as you don't have wacky spaz hands. Many a magnum opus has been penned in cursive, and it was used to answer many questions of my childhood without any real problems. Cursive is one of those miracles out of nowhere, and it should be preserved.

If speed and efficiency were really so important, you might as well just go all the way and learn to write in shorthand.

 

[Gavmando]

Wow.

Just wow.

I'm amazed and appalled by this thread. Are you people serious? You still use printing to write? If you cant write in cursive in Australia by the age of 10, then the teachers start looking at you like there's something wrong with you.

I...
I just...

I cant type any more. I have to leave the computer. This is just so brain exploding.

 

[Andrew Drake]

proper handwritting is an art! Silly America

I prefer the term "Efficient", as in not expanding school-days and freeing up time for things that actually matter (math [or maths for those of you across the pond], sciences, history, grammar and spelling [WE REALLY NEED THOSE], and if the stars are properly aligned and the right words are screamed from the top of the capitol building's dome by the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, computer sciences). At the end of the day, our culture prefers practical skills to artistic ones.

Art does enrich people's lives, that I won't dispute. But you can't really TEACH an art. People can LEARN a art, if they are receptive, have some degree of natural talent, and have a teacher who both knows and enjoys their subject. But you can't teach an art to someone who isn't receptive any more than you can grow plants on the moon without proper equipment.

Unrelated Note: You also can't TEACH appreciation of art. That kind-of misses the point of art. Art exists as commentary on a culture, or as a way to express ideas in a different way. Just to prove my point, think of what makes the Mona Lisa such a big deal, or why "Commander Shepard" by Gavin (Miracle of Sound) is such a good song. If you don't like "Commander Shepard" then substitute something you do like. You might get a few pieces of it that you like, but you can't figure out exactly how that particular mixture of elements comes out as something GOOD.

USEFUL EDIT: I DO NOT IN ANY WAY CONDONE REMOVING HOW TO WRITE BY HAND FROM ANY SCHOOL CURRICULUM. SHOULD YOU HAVE GLEAMED THAT IDEA FROM WHAT I WROTE SOMEHOW... well my opinion of you is in line with Jim Sterling's opinion of you. Namely that you are a idiot who made a idiotic assumption. Should you maintain that posture after reading this statement... you are seriously clueless. I only state that teaching a second method that will be discarded by the majority of students and that is difficult to read compared to the alternative from the curriculum is pointless.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

Wow.

Just wow.

I'm amazed and appalled by this thread. Are you people serious? You still use printing to write? If you cant write in cursive in Australia by the age of 10, then the teachers start looking at you like there's something wrong with you.

I...
I just...

I cant type any more. I have to leave the computer. This is just so brain exploding.

Well, Kansas isn't in Australia, now is it? Really, no one uses it in America. Ever. School boards all across the country have been dropping it for a while now. I really don't see why the Europeans and Australians in this thread are so shocked that a different country might actually do things differently.

This thread would seriously be a great basis to start a sociology paper on.