[Reader-list] Cursive being phased out of U.S. schools

[Ujwala Samarth]

No cursive writing, or no handwriting at all? I don't quite get that answer
from the article.

While I firmly believe that handwriting is a skill (and an important
brain/motor coordination exercise) that is important enough to be continued
in primary schools, I personally wouldn't mind if cursive writing itself was
offered as an art form to those who felt so inclined and not insisted upon
as a requirement. Being able to print clearly and regularly is more than
enough as a form of handwriting isn't it?

Far too many of us have miserable memories of not being able to form those
damn cursive loops and what-not easily, and of being castigated as dunces
for the same. It didn't really matter WHAT we wrote -- what mattered was the
CURSIVE. While things may have changed now to some extent -- and they have
-- I suspect that the tyranny of cursive handwriting continues -- the child
with the 'beautiful' pages, no matter that she has written a page full of
unoriginal drivel, will always receive more praise/validity/recognition than
the child with the untidy handwriting and interesting ideas. In a country
where good cursive writing (like the parrot-like reciting of tables) is an
immediate mark of a 'bright' student, where children are often taught to
write cursive before they enter first grade, one has to question this
obsession with handwriting.

As a teacher with very bad handwriting (and memories of tearful handwriting
classes)  who has formed my own legible semi-print/cursive writing style, I
feel completely liberated by the keyboard. And so do many students who
simply don't have the motor skills that others have -- finally, their
teachers may actually READ what they have to say.

I do feel handwriting is a skill to be learned -- like skipping rope and
riding a bicycle -- and I do appreciate a beautiful flowing handwriting the
way I appreciate a fine painting or a piece of embroidery. Let's just
remember what writing is all about in its essence -- communication.

Ujwala

On Wed, Jul 13, 2011 at 12:20 PM, geeta seshu <geetaseshu at gmail.com> wrote:

> very interesting chintan...thanks for the post.
>
> apart from all the implications of right/left brain development, cultural
> issues and whatnot, I was trying to recall when - and what - I last wrote
> by
> hand...
>
> but to give up on teaching a skill completely?
>
> On Mon, Jul 11, 2011 at 8:53 PM, Chintan Girish Modi <
> chintan.backups at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > From
> >
> >
> http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/07/07/cursive-finally-being-phased-out-of-u-s-schools/
> > Cursive being phased out of U.S. schoolsJul 7, 2011 – 8:04 PM ET |
> >
> > By Laura Baziuk
> >
> > Forget the looping Ls and curving Gs.
> >
> > Students in Indiana’s public schools will no longer have to learn cursive
> > writing starting this fall.
> >
> > The state is one among 48 others transitioning to new state-led national
> > learning guides, the Common Core State Standard Initiatives, which no
> > longer
> > require children to learn handwriting. They do, however, have to sharpen
> > their typing skills.
> >
> > An Indiana Department of Education memo last spring said teachers can
> still
> > choose to teach cursive writing, or can stop altogether.
> >
> > “State standards themselves, they’re just supposed to be a guide for what
> > students must know before moving on to the next grade,” said department
> > spokeswoman Stephanie Sample. “And there are lots of little details that
> > aren’t in those standards that kids learn.”
> >
> > Sample said she has not heard any feedback from parents who are concerned
> > their children will no longer learn a basic, yet fading, skill.
> >
> > How often does one write in cursive every day? Much of our daily personal
> > and business correspondence is done by a quick e-mail or text message.
> > Note-taking and composing essays or statements are done almost entirely
> on
> > the computer.
> >
> > Indiana father Mark Shoup said he wouldn’t be concerned if his children,
> > though now grown, had not learned cursive.
> >
> > “There are much more important skills I think they take into this century
> > than whether or not they write cursively,” the former teacher said,
> listing
> > critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork and literacy.
> >
> > “Maybe it’s something we should not give up on, but keep it in
> perspective
> > of its relative importance in the scheme of things,” Shoup said. “How
> long
> > we really have children in school and what are our real goals for them?”
> >
> > Perry Klein, a professor of literacy education at the University of
> Western
> > Ontario, said a child’s ability to compose depends on whether she can
> form
> > letters clearly and accurately.
> >
> > “If students can form letters fluently, then that frees up their
> attention
> > to focus on the content and language of what they’re writing,” Klein
> said.
> >
> > Research has yet to be published, he said, on whether forming those
> letters
> > works best on a page with a pen or on a computer screen. But as long as
> > they
> > can read what they compose, they will develop the right skills.
> >
> > “The important thing is that for kids to learn [printing)]and cursive
> > accurately and fluently, and if they have that, then they’ll be able to
> do
> > written composition in a whole variety of situations,” Klein said.
> >
> > Marie Picard, a penmanship workbook dealer in London, Ont., said cursive
> > might be fading away, but still exists in letters, envelopes, signatures
> > and
> > signs.
> >
> > “Handwriting shows some sort of style and flair and how you are as a
> > person,” she said. “I just think that it’s (becoming) a lost art.”
> >
> > Sonja Semion, with the Colorado branch of Stand for Children, an
> education
> > advocacy organization, said with limited resources in classrooms, it’s
> time
> > to focus not on what has always been taught, but what’s best for children
> > for when they become adults.
> >
> > “I think schools have to toe a line right now where they have to really
> > prepare kids for the careers of the future,” she said. “We still need
> > writing, some kind of penmanship, but I think the keyboard is really the
> > way
> > it’s going to go. The technology is the future.”
> >
> > *Postmedia News*
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Ujwala Samarth
(Programme Coordinator, Open Space)

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