The end of the line for cursive writing

[Josh]

The handwriting may be on the wall for cursive.

At least that's what some people fear as schools across the country continue to drop cursive handwriting from their curricula.

Forty-one states have so far adopted the new Common Core State Standards for English, which does not require cursive. Set by the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and the National Governors Association (NGA), the standards provide a general framework for what students are expected to learn before college.

States are allowed the option of re-including cursive if they so choose, which is what Massachusetts and California have done.

But the latest to contemplate abandoning the script is Georgia, where teachers and administrators will meet in March to discuss erasing the longhand style from its lesson plans, says Georgia Department of Education spokesman Matt Cardoza.

The argument is that cursive is time-consuming and not as useful as the keyboard skills students will need as they move on to junior high and high school, he says.

As it happens, cursive is also not on the tests that rate schools under the No Child Left Behind law, and increasingly schools gear their curricula to excel at those tests, says Kathleen Wright, a national project manager for Zaner-Bloser, a publisher of education writing materials.

"It's just not being assessed. That's the biggie," she says. "If it's not assessed, it tends to fall by a little because people are teaching to the test."

Source

[Deozaan]

I never liked cursive and I never use it except for my signature.

But I hope it's covered enough that students at least know how to read cursive, which can be difficult anyway depending on the writer's penmanship.

[40hz]

It was bound to happen eventually.

I'm surprised it took this long, even though it saddens me to see cursive 'longhand' begin its journey into memory.  

Too bad it's that moronic No Child Left Behind Act that seems to be precipitating it. Talk about twisting the knife!  

[rjbull]

Don't worry about cursive disappearing.  As soon as the oil runs out so no plastics and much less energy, rare earths run out so no semiconductors, copper at a premium, etc., meaning NO COMPUTERS, they'll have to reinvent quill pens and iron gall inks to record anything.

[Renegade]

Don't worry about cursive disappearing.  As soon as the oil runs out so no plastics and much less energy, rare earths run out so no semiconductors, copper at a premium, etc., meaning NO COMPUTERS, they'll have to reinvent quill pens and iron gall inks to record anything.

That's December 21st next year. Either the Zombie Apocalypse or Skype.Net...

Cursive is good for motor-skill development, so I think they're kind of losing out there.

[Carol Haynes]

It reminds me of a UK education minister back in the 80s saying we don't need to teach kids to do sums any more as they all have calculators. He had a point but where is the understanding and ability to estimate. Working on the principle that kids don't have to use cursive writing is really limiting them when they have to write exam papers as cursive is designed to be much quicker and less stressful on tendons.

Watch out RSI and CTS ?

[Renegade]

It reminds me of a UK education minister back in the 80s saying we don't need to teach kids to do sums any more as they all have calculators. He had a point but where is the understanding and ability to estimate.

I distantly remember something like that. But it entirely misses the point -- that being that the ability to do math is a general logic and thinking skill. The skill in itself leads to others. Like a gateway drug.

[skwire]

My oldest daughter (age 11) can read and write very well in cursive.  As for our youngest daughter (age 7), we'll be teaching her cursive at home if it's out of the curriculum by the time she should be learning it.  I think it's a skill that one should have.  For one thing, I can't imagine block-printing a signature.

[Carol Haynes]

It reminds me of a UK education minister back in the 80s saying we don't need to teach kids to do sums any more as they all have calculators. He had a point but where is the understanding and ability to estimate.

I distantly remember something like that. But it entirely misses the point -- that being that the ability to do math is a general logic and thinking skill. The skill in itself leads to others. Like a gateway drug.

I think that is pretty much what I was saying (sort of). However, how many of us honestly work out long division without recourse to a calculator in the real world, or to add up a long list of financial transactions. So Keith Joseph had a point - but without understanding there can be no extension and development of learning.

Having said that, as an ex-mathematics teacher, the chorus of "it must be right because the calculator says so ..." used to drive me to distraction - especially when it was out by a factor of 10000 and they were working out the price of sprouts.

Sums are only one part of mathematics (I never understand why Americans do math in the singular?? Do you only do one sum and then stop) but sums do form the basis of all sorts of pattern recognition and are a brilliant tool fr training kids to by systematic and critical.

In the same way writing skills are enhanced by being able to use all forms of writing - and fast fluid writing frees the thought processes. Until exams allow the use of laptops (And presumably the day is coming) kids have to learn to write efficiently and cursive script is the way to do that. Dropping cursive writing is almost issuing kids with a learning disability!

[40hz]

For one thing, I can't imagine block-printing a signature.

I'm amazed at the number of people I know who do block print their "signature."

Which seems to be another thing that's losing significance as time goes on.

As an experiment, I've actually signed government forms and some bank paperwork with an "X" or an indecipherable 'scribble.' Nobody has ever challenged me for doing that provided my name was printed below it with the date. As long as that was there, you could apparently put anything you wanted on the signature line.

To be honest, I think the only thing they actually do check for is a date and a printed name.  

[Kamel]

i hate cursive hand writing and would have been my best day in school had they said they were going to give up on it.

I find cursive writing much more difficult than regular printing, maybe the issue is unique to me, but i do see very little practical application to the skill.

[Josh]

Kamel, you are not alone. I completely agree. As I said on facebook, I have not used cursive writing, minus a signature, since I left high school.

Even in my military class, where we are forced to hand write memorandums, we had to use print and only signed our names. Outside of literary writings (poetry, etc), I see little use for cursive.

[zridling]

I learned cursive in the 2nd grade; took less than a full hour of instruction over the week. Are schools so gobsmack stupid now that we can't take a hour or a week to teach cursive as part of penmanship? And what about diaries? Future fontographers? Unbelievable.

[Renegade]

I learned cursive in the 2nd grade; took less than a full hour of instruction over the week. Are schools so gobsmack stupid now that we can't take a hour or a week to teach cursive as part of penmanship? And what about diaries? Future fontographers? Unbelievable.

I wonder if getting really really drunk/high then standing on my head would help things like this make sense... I know a full lobotomy would work.

Are schools so gobsmack stupid?

Yes. And don't forget the students.

No child left behind! Teach them nothing and none of them will go anywhere, guaranteeing no child gets left behind...

If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.

Give 'em School House Rock, and let 'em sink.

Want to start a war? Try introducing a modest amount of "discipline" in schools. Let the blood letting begin~!

My education was clearly inferior, as proven by my mistaken belief that education and educational principles should improve and advance. Man... Was I wrong...

[Stoic Joker]

Are schools so gobsmack stupid?

Yes. And don't forget the students.

No child left behind! Teach them nothing and none of them will go anywhere, guaranteeing no child gets left behind...

If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.

Give 'em School House Rock, and let 'em sink.

Want to start a war? Try introducing a modest amount of "discipline" in schools. Let the blood letting begin~!

My education was clearly inferior, as proven by my mistaken belief that education and educational principles should improve and advance. Man... Was I wrong...

+1 "Studying" for a test is not educating, it's running the kids through a cattle-chute in the hopes of hitting high numbers.

[kyrathaba]

If we're getting rid of cursive, why not go a step further and make English more efficient?  I like the famous bit that Dolton Edward wrote, years ago: "Meihem In Ce Klasrum"

Because we are still bearing some of the scars of our brief skirmish with II-B English, it is natural that we should be enchanted by Mr. George Bernard Shaw's current campaign for a simplified alphabet.

Obviously, as Mr. Shaw points out, English spelling is in need of a general overhauling and streamlining. However, our own resistance to any changes requiring a large expenditure of mental effort in the near future would cause us to view with some apprehension the possibility of some day receiving a morning paper printed in - to us - Greek.

Our own plan would achieve the same end as the legislation proposed by Mr. Shaw, but in a much less shocking manner, as it consists of merely an acceleration of the normal processes by which the language is continually modernized.

As a catalytic agent, we would suggest that a "National Easy Language Week" be proclaimed, which the President would inaugurate, outlining some short cut to concentrate on during the week, and to be adopted during the ensuing year. All school children would be given a holiday, the lost time being the equivalent of that gained by the spelling short cut.

In 1946, for example, we would urge the elimination of the soft "c," for which we would substitute "s." Sertainly, such an improvement would be selebrated in all sivic-minded sircles as being suffisiently worth the trouble, and students in all sities in the land would be reseptive toward any change eliminating the nesessity of learning the differense between the two letters.

In 1947, sinse only the hard "c" would be left, it would be possible to substitute "k" for it, both letters being pronounsed identikally. Imagine how greatly only two years of this prosess would klarify the konfusion in the minds of students. Already we would have eliminated an entire letter from the alphabet. Typewriters and linotypes kould all be built with one less letter, and all the manpower and materials previously devoted to making "c's" kould be turned toward raising the national standard of living.

In the fase of so many notable improvements, it is easy to foresee that by 1948, "National Easy Language Week" would be a pronounsed sukses. All skhool tshildren would be looking forward with konsiderable exsitement to the holiday, and in a blaze of national publisity it would be announsed that the double konsonant "ph" no longer existed, and that the sound would henseforth be written "f" in all words. This would make sutsh words as "fonograf" twenty persent shorter in print.

By 1949, publik interest in a fonetik alfabet kan be expekted to have inkreased to the point where a more radikal step forward kan be taken without fear of undue kritisism. We would therefore urge the elimination at that time of al unesesary double leters, whitsh, although quite harmles, have always ben a nuisanse in the language and a desided deterent to akurate speling. Try it yourself in the next leter you write, and se if both writing and reading are not fasilitated.

With so mutsh progres already made, it might be posible in 1950 to delve further into the posibilities of fonetik speling. After due konsideration of the reseption aforded the previous steps, it should be expedient by this time to spel al difthongs fonetikaly. Most students do not realize that the long "i" and "y," as in "time" and "by," are aktualy the difthong "ai," as it is writen in "aisle," and that the long "a" in "fate" is in reality the difthong "ei" as in "rein." Although perhaps not imediately aparent, the seiving in taime and efort wil be tremendous when we leiter elimineite the sailent "e," as meide posible bai this last tsheinge.

For, as is wel known, the horible mes of "e's" apearing in our writen language is kaused prinsipaly bai the present nesesity of indekeiting whether a vowel is long or short. Therefore, in 1951 we kould simply elimineite al sailent "e's" and kontinu to read and wrait merily along as though we wer in an atomik eig of edukation.

In 1952 we would urg a greit step forward. Sins bai this taim it would hav ben four years sins anywun had usd the leter "c," we would sugest that the "National Easy Languag Wek" for 1952 be devoted to substitution of "c" for "th." To be sur, it would be som taim befor peopl would bekom akustomd to reading ceir newspapers and buks wic sutsh sentenses in cem as "Ceodor caught he had cre cousand cistls crust crough ce cik of his cumb."

In ce seim maner, bai meiking eatsh leter hav its own sound and cat sound only, we kould shorten ce languag stil mor. In 1953 we would eliminait ce "y"; cen in 1954 we kould us ce leter to indekeit ce "sh" sound, cerbai klarifaiing words laik yugar and yur, as wel as redusing bai wun mor leter al words laik "yut," "yor," and so forc. Cink, cen, of al ce benefits to be geind bai ce distinktion whitsh wil cen be meid between words laik:

ocean now writen oyean
machine now writen mayin
racial now writen reyial

Al sutsh divers weis of wraiting wun sound would no longer exist, and whenever wun keim akros a "y" sound he would know exaktli what to wrait.

Kontinuing cis proses, eeir after eeir we would eventuali hav a reali sensibl writen langug. Bai 1969, wi ventyur tu sei, cer wud bi no mor uv ces teribli trublsum difikultis, wic no tu leters usd to indikeit ce seim nois, and laikwais no tu noises riten wic ce seim leter. Even Mr. Yaw, wi beliv, wud be hapi in ce noleg cat his drims fainali keim tru.

[Ath]

[skwire]

If we're getting rid of cursive, why not go a step further and make English more efficient?  I like the famous bit that Dolton Edward wrote, years ago: "Meihem In Ce Klasrum"

Ironically enough, I think it bears a resemblance to the lolcat language, lolspeak.   

[Renegade]

@kyrathaba - Cat wuz ekselint!

[40hz]

The Hungarian language is spelled phonetically. They have a few 'extra' letters in their alphabet. But each letter has one (and only one) sound associated with it. So once you know how to properly pronounce a Hungarian word (and have "larned yer letters") you automatically know how to spell it correctly.

FWIW, it didn't seem to cure any of the societal ills advocates for spelling reform claim 'fixing' American English would other than to negate the justification for spelling bee competitions in Hungarian schools.

Hmm...maybe not such a bad thing if all spelling "reform" would do is get rid of those.  

[cranioscopical]

negate the justification for spelling bee competitions

After all, how hard can it be to spell bee?

[Renegade]

The Hungarian language is spelled phonetically.

Korean is like that. If you can pronounce it, you can spell it, provided you know the pronunciations for the letters, their rules, and you know multiple ways to use the word. It's quite a good system. Works well for Korean anyways.

[skwire]

After all, how hard can it be to spell bee?

Aunt Bea would someday like be a bee but it's just not possible. 

[40hz]

negate the justification for spelling bee competitions

After all, how hard can it be to spell bee?

Leigh says: Don't you mean 'beigh'? 

[40hz]

After all, how hard can it be to spell bee?

Aunt Bea would someday like be a bee but it's just not possible.  

Well, at least she can still be a WASP.