Lack of Practice

[rebapuck]

Over Christmas, my sister made a surprising discovery. Her daughter had a scavenger hunt for the kids. All three, including the college freshman A-student, could not read the clues. Why? Because they were written in script!

The younger generations do not write script. They do not read script. They do no see script. But this is important for them to do. So, when ever you communicate by letter or email with your kids or grandkids, use a script font. They need the practice.

[Bubba]

Your right and that's not all. Some of them can't do simple math without using their fingers and many of them can't read very well. I don't have any idea where we now stand on education but I do know the Asian kids and some other foreign country's are leaving us in the dust. Well heck, I am no prize and you can probably pick apart my sentence structure and spelling but since I am so darn old I can criticize with authority without anyone taking me seriously especially the politicians. I am about to get started so I will quit now. Bubba

[Woodbutcher]

Without script, how do the sign their names?

[Shadow Catcher]

Cursive is not being taught in may schools, it is in ours. The only thing I do in cursive now is my signature.

[absolutsnwbrdr]

Cursive was taught and required when I was in elementary and middle school. Then in high school I started drafting and studying architecture. My handwriting no longer even includes lower case letters.

I can at least still recognize and read cursive though.

[Catherine+twins]

My daughter (11) has practiced her signature in cursive, and signs her withdrawal slips at the bank that way. But dear son (remember, twins, same school system) prints everything. I don't think they can read cursive.

Yup, I think we'll practice more at home.

Catherine

[Corwin C]

Good handwriting is a big deal to me. I have tried to impress this upon my kids as well. I taught my son (Gage) how to correctly write a cursive capital G. One of his teachers in high school tried to make him print his name because they couldn't read it. Gage's writing isn't up to my standard, but it is very legible and all the characters are correctly formed. Needless to say I went ballistic. I told my son (and the &*#^% teacher) that his signature is legible (better than most) and something that is distinctly his for his lifetime. He will sign his name in cursive and the teacher will learn to read it.

I also, on occasion, have the task of hiring high school graduates for summer employment at my work. I can't emphasize enough the need for everyone to be able to fill out a job application legibly. I have thrown dozens of applications in the shredder because they were either illegible, incomplete, or filled out by someone other than the applicant. Our federally managed school systems are failing our children.

[D.J.]

My peeve when teaching computer class was the lack of capital or upper case letters used (including first and last names) and the total lack of punctuation . The internet doesn't require them to use capital letters or proper punctuation , so they don't . Punctuation is considered to be old-fashioned . .... D.J.

[asianflava]

Didn't know what the OP was talking about until I read the other comments. To me "Script" is print block letters and Cursive is the connected letters. I stopped writing cursive when I had to take notes in class. I stopped because when I wrote in cursive, I couldn't read me notes when I had to refer back to them. I've tried to write in cursive and find myself reverting back every other word.

Friends were talking about this and one of their kids was actually being taught cursive. Much to our surprise, the Z and z were not the one that looks like the cursive y, but one that looks like a flowy script Z.

[S. Heisley]

Friends were talking about this and one of their kids was actually being taught cursive. Much to our surprise, the Z and z were not the one that looks like the cursive y, but one that looks like a flowy script Z.

I never liked the old fashioned cursive 'Z'; so, I'm glad that it's been changed.

[wagondude]

Without script, how do the sign their names?

My son (almost 17) prints his like a 4 year old. As do most of his classmates. They did one unit of cursive for like two weeks in the third grade. When they thought he wasn't completing his work because of his writing, they just told him to do it on the computer. With everything going electronic, all the schools are handing out tablets. Soon they won't bother teaching any writing at all. Nobody will know what to do when the grid fails.

[wagondude]

Cursive was taught and required when I was in elementary and middle school. Then in high school I started drafting and studying architecture. My handwriting no longer even includes lower case letters.

I can at least still recognize and read cursive though.

I did the same thing. Large caps and small caps for non- drafting stuff. Now I switch back and forth between print and cursive (sometimes in the same word). My dad (an electrical engineer) prints everything except his signature.

[mezmo]

This is touching one of my Pet Peeves !

If you can't READ AND WRITE, then you are ILLITERATE. And if
you are illiterate, you are then set up to be IGNORANT for life.
A situation that is totally unnecessary and dangerous for the self,
our democracy and our freedoms.

Not teaching cursive writing is the stupidist thing some school districts
are now doing - and totally Appalling ! That is shutting students off
from, and denying them, vast amounts of relevant information for,
and over, a lifetime.

Cursive writing came about as it is easier and faster than printing.
I find hand printing to be tedious, slow and very annoying. Cursive
writing is so much better.

Typing is a handy skill to have, but it is a secondary skill. Technology
is great, but it is also a secondary thing. Dead batteries, power outages,
EMT bursts - natural and manmade - make electronic devices useless. Look
at the aftermaths of natural disasters. Modern life instantly returns to
pre-technological times. Can you cope ? Even just basic reading and writing
skills aid you in doing so.

Pen and paper [and books] are always immediately accessable and have
negligible cost in time and additional energy after their initial production.
A handwritten letter is a fantastic thing. The person who sent it actually
spent the time to physically record their thoughts, in their own hand,
and sent it/them to You. It is instantly accessable by just unfolding/opening
the pages and rereading them. They can transport you back through time.
It is not lost in/on some server somewhere out there 'in the cloud' [A nice
double meaning in that word/term if you think about it].

I am in the process of transcribing some handwritten diaries of one of my
GreatGrandmothers from when she was @ ages 10-11 and also @ ages 15-16.
These are from the late 1800s time frame. They were found in the rafters
of the old family homestead when it was being remodeled by a cousin back
in the 1970s. Can that be done with an e-mail ?

They are, and the process is, very interesting and informative of how life
was lived back then, and lived by her family, both in general, and as well as for our
family related history. I was able to share in her enthusiasm and happiness at one
Christmas-time, well over 120 years after it occurred ! They also recorded
historical occurrances - an independent verification of events that I had
learned/read about in history classes; e.g, she told of how the whole community
held a memorial service when President Garfield was assassinated. It has
changed my whole perspective of what times were like back then. And it
was also very revealing of how much she had changed and matured, both in
outlook and language use skills - and penmanship - from the late childhood
ages of 10-11 into her teen/young adult ages of 15-16. If I did not know how to
read cursive writing, I would have been denied this wonderful experience.

I think we need to have education emphasize the basics first. If one can't read,
write [mastering cursive writing after mastering printing], think effectively
[And think for themselves.], do basic math effectively, and also express themselves,
both verbally and with the written word [by hand and otherwise], then their schooling
has not served them well [To say the least.]. One can educate themselves in/about
anything if they have those basics well in hand. Everyone should have the opportunity
to gain these first basic skills, and do so. Then bring on the technology.

Boy, my feet are clean by now - standing in all these bubbles from the
soap box...

Cheers,
Norm/mezmo

[wagondude]

I couldn't agree more, Norm.

[CarlLaFong]

I'm 65 years old. We were taught cursive in school, though I never heard the term until much later, We just called it "handwriting". Once I left school and was discharged from the service, my need for cursive diminished. Most of the jobs that I held didn't require a lot of writing. As a result, I lost it. To write in cursive now, for me, is ponderous. I use a chicken scratch printing method with a few semi cursive letters here and there. The only time, it seems, that I write anything, is to do crosswords and leave myself notes. I did manage to work to retirement age, in spite of dire warnings from my teachers that perfect handwriting and the ability to diagram a sentence was the only thing that would keep me from ruin and the miserable death of an illiterate on Skid Row.
I do wish that I had payed more attention in math classes