My home state of Kansas is discussing
the place of cursive handwriting in the education curriculum. That they are
also discussing the place of evolution (as well as science in general) in the
curriculum should be a clue to the perspective of those leading the discussion.
One state board member, Walt Chappell (consider his name is “Walt”), argues
that students should learn to write longhand because “We’ve got to be able to
communicate with each other in written form. . . . Technology is great, but it
doesn’t always work.” Well, yes, but pencil and pen – two other technologies –
don’t always work either.
Not that it has for a long time. I suffered through cursive during my elementary years at Adams Elementary, all the swirls and squiggles and connectives (how do you make a “z”?). But by the 7th grade (this is 50 years ago) I had turned to hand printing my notes and papers, unless required to employ cursive by some coprolite teacher (which was thankfully not often (except for the blue-haired Miss Gates in 8th grade English who regularly confused penmanship with good writing)). Over my junior high and high school days, my printing evolved into what I took to be a personal style with a certain amount of panache. It took me several years going through two or three versions to come up with an “a” that I thought was worthy.
But cursive writing is the buggy whip of communication. It came about at a time when almost all written communication, personal and business, was by hand, and it was important that everyone could read everyone else’s handwriting. So a standardized style wad needed. But that was before typewriters were common, let alone computers. If we have to write anything by hand anymore it’s almost always for ourselves, so it doesn’t matter if we’re the only ones who can decipher it. And today printing by hand is generally more easily read by others if need be (rarely) than cursive (which few of us can do legibly anymore).
Handwriting should still be taught in elementary school. But printing, not cursive. And along with it, keyboarding. No, technology doesn’t always work. But when all else fails, we could just talk with each other for a while. Or enjoy the silence.
I was in a writing assessment workshop a couple of years ago
where we read about 20 papers written in class by college students. Bored by
the papers and the workshop, I noticed at one point that all of the 20 papers –
all of them – were printed by hand, not cursive. After that, I started paying
attention to my own students’ in-class writing, and found very few of them used
cursive. It just isn’t a skill that is taught – or needed – anymore.
Not that it has for a long time. I suffered through cursive during my elementary years at Adams Elementary, all the swirls and squiggles and connectives (how do you make a “z”?). But by the 7th grade (this is 50 years ago) I had turned to hand printing my notes and papers, unless required to employ cursive by some coprolite teacher (which was thankfully not often (except for the blue-haired Miss Gates in 8th grade English who regularly confused penmanship with good writing)). Over my junior high and high school days, my printing evolved into what I took to be a personal style with a certain amount of panache. It took me several years going through two or three versions to come up with an “a” that I thought was worthy.
But cursive writing is the buggy whip of communication. It came about at a time when almost all written communication, personal and business, was by hand, and it was important that everyone could read everyone else’s handwriting. So a standardized style wad needed. But that was before typewriters were common, let alone computers. If we have to write anything by hand anymore it’s almost always for ourselves, so it doesn’t matter if we’re the only ones who can decipher it. And today printing by hand is generally more easily read by others if need be (rarely) than cursive (which few of us can do legibly anymore).
Handwriting should still be taught in elementary school. But printing, not cursive. And along with it, keyboarding. No, technology doesn’t always work. But when all else fails, we could just talk with each other for a while. Or enjoy the silence.
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