Rip cursive: RIP cursive: keyboarding is king Writing

RIP cursive: keyboarding is king Writing

“Mommy, your handwriting is so good. How did you do that?”

A 10-year-old’s comment about her mother’s handwriting doesn’t seem like something to make one pause. But pause I did. You see, my daughter wasn’t looking at my current handwriting, but the curlicued script created in another educational era, from an assignment I’d penned when I was 8.

Cursive has been a matter of debate for decades, but it’s with the implementation of the Common Core Standards that children like my daughter — who finds cursive as mystifying and unattainable as cuneiform — may become the norm.

Under the Common Core Standards, adopted by 41 states and the District of Columbia, third and fourth graders are no longer required to curl over their dotted lines and scrawl loopy letters in exchange for scribbled stars in the margins. Instead, they will be expected to learn keyboarding in elementary school, a skill once relegated to the vaguely vocational sixth grade elective known as typing class.

The pen, not mightier than the keyboard?

Cursive advocates have raised cries of concern about losing the art that brought us the Declaration of Independence and our best Valentine’s Day missives. Plus, how will kids read their parents’ writing? What’s more, there’s science behind the scrawl: research suggests that the small motor skills required of handwriting support neurological development better than typing on a keyboard.

Some states have responded to the consternation. Many states, including Texas, California, Louisiana, and North Carolina, have moved to preserve cursive in their Common Core recipe as a part of the 15 percent rule (for adopting states, it’s understood that the Common Core will be 85 percent of the subject matter standards, leaving each state room to adopt up to 15 percent additional standards). And although Common Core doesn’t require cursive, many teachers dedicated to the practice will no doubt continue to teach it.

But with the new emphasis on keyboard skills, one shouldn’t be surprised to notice a slackening of expectations in children mastering those crazy capital I’s and the majestic G’s. The problem is that although formal cursive training may not be necessary in the cultivation of an educated human being, having bad, tortured, and slow penmanship is a real deficit. Children will be expected to write more than ever under Common Core — whether that means penning an in-class explanation of how you arrived at a math problem or taking detailed notes on a reading assignment — and much of this will not happen on a computer unless your child’s school has a specific 1-to-1 computer program or your child has an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) that allows them to use a device for everything.

Pen in hand, at home

Handwriting remains a relevant skill in many settings. But if clear, legible, fast handwriting is the ultimate goal, the cursive controversy can be somewhat misleading. After all, research suggests that print writing — a mixture of cursive or linked letters and printing — is actually the fastest, most efficient kind of handwriting there is. So if you see your child not getting enough dedicated practice to develop handwriting competency, then it might be worth helping them with some at-home drills like these or an app like this.

Finally, if your child’s penmanship skills are not getting as much attention, this does not mean they are slacking off. The new keyboard-related standards are nothing if not rigorous. By the end of fourth grade, students should be able to type a minimum of one page in a single sitting, and by fifth grade it jumps to two full pages in one sitting — something my eighth grader has just mastered this year. For many kids, these keyboarding standards may be quite challenging. Despite her passion for writing and technology, my fourth grader isn’t close to meeting this standard, so I can imagine she has plenty of company.

In the end, cursive — a technological skill that facilitated the use of two of the most important technological tools, the pen and paper — may live on more as art than praxis. This isn’t to diminish its beauty or historical value, but to read the writing on the wall: our children will no doubt occupy a world where writing continues to evolve and holding on to one way of writing over all the others won’t serve them. Who knows? Maybe our children will one day debate Common Core 200.0 as it drops keyboarding in favor of writing using thought-recognition software.

R.I.P. Cursive Writing | WordStream Publishing

I need to rant . . .

Last week, I saw a news report that many school systems are doing away with required cursive writing courses.  I grabbed my laptop and browsed for more news about it.  [I typed into a search bar].

I quickly found that emotions are running high on this topic.  You would think that schools were deciding to take math out of the curriculum.  [I wonder if they format the curriculum in a nice Arial font].  Many people politicized the topic, and some said this was evidence of the great dumbing down of America.  [Most comments were in a Times New Roman font, I think].

While I agree that cursive writing was something I needed to learn when I was growing up and that I did use it to write term papers in the 80s, it has been a while since I used it last, except to write my name or to list things on my grocery list.  I admit that even my “thank you” notes tend to be fun Hallmark card videos featuring “Hoops and Yoyo” or a flowing mountain stream and sound effects.

No, I am not a total non-traditionalist; I do occasionally send cards and notes and letters.  I do treasure old handwritten letters I have saved through the years, and I think that personalized notes and communications are very valuable.  It is just that I don’t think that the skill of handwriting in cursive is nearly as high of a priority as many other things that are needed in the modern world, and I certainly don’t think THIS is the great evidence of the dumbing down of our Nation.  [Oh, by the way, you are currently reading approximately pt. 10 or 12 text, depending on how your computer view is set].  Cursive is a lost art, not a skill that will help grow our economy.

I have seen many kids “peck” on a keyboard, because they don’t know how to type, and I think that should bring more outrage from parents.  I think cursive writing could be a great elective for artistic students or those simply interested in the skill, and I am a little nostalgic and sad that things are changing so much from what I knew as a kid.  I also admire the few people I have ever known who are really good at writing in cursive.  But, I am realistic that if we want our children to be equipped for real jobs in the future, we should be teaching them to type more than “LOL” and “OMG,” and not worry quite as much about training them to use cursive.  We should teach them to communicate well, but cursive isn’t really the most effective way to communicate these days.

As a publisher, I have to admit, I won’t accept manuscripts sent to me in cursive.  And, no editor I work with hand writes their edits on a manuscript.  I have never been to a job interview where they ask me to show that I can write in cursive.  I have, however, been tested on my ability to articulate a thought.  I have been tested on my ability to use a computer and word processing programs.

It is sad when things change, and I get nostalgic too, but the reality is that the dumbing down of America is not about students not learning cursive anymore; dumbing down happens when people are not taught to focus on the important things, real life skills.  Learning cursive is not the same as learning grammar or math or science.

I am sadder when kids aren’t taught to build things, use computers, question, investigate, ponder, and create.  I know that many of my friends have no clue how to check the oil or tire pressure of their car.  We should be more upset that schools don’t require shop and home economics (for both genders, I might add).

For full disclosure, I made a “D” in third grade in cursive.

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Ancient Japan. Heian era

As a result, Japan decided to break off relations with China. Find out why and how she began to form her own culture.

This is part of the interactive lessons prepared by the Level One educational platform in collaboration
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Author of the lesson

Alexander Raevsky

Historian-Japanese, translator and associate professor of psychology faculty of Moscow State University

After an attempt to seize power by Buddhists, Japanese aristocrats move the capital to Heian-kyo (Kyoto) and decide to close themselves from external influence. Thus begins the Heian era (from 794 to 1185).

👑 The emperor has practically no power, the Fujiwara family rules, who gave his daughters in marriage to princes of the blood. Despite the fact that many believed that Fujiwara had usurped power, it was largely thanks to this family that the country was able to forget about wars for four centuries and live in peace and tranquility.
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💥 In the 10th century, Japan decides to break off relations with China. At this point, the Japanese believed that they needed to stop absorbing foreign culture and start forming their own traditions.

❗️ It is important to understand that when we talk about the culture of the Heian era, we are talking about the culture of a narrow circle of aristocrats who lived in Kyoto. The rest of the population had a rather low level of development and was mainly engaged in agriculture. The aristocracy practically did not interact with the people, they only collected taxes with rice.
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1 – Map of Heian-kyo

2 – Heian-kyo city model

3 – Palace in Heian-kyo

4 – Fujiwara no Yoshifusa

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During the Heian era, the Japanese language and Japanese poetry are formed.
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✍️ Before that, only Chinese characters existed, which were used by aristocrats. At that time, representatives of the upper class practically did not go anywhere, since walking was not respectable, and going on trips was long and boring. Therefore, they corresponded a lot with each other.

💁‍♀️ In the Heian era, the wives of aristocrats begin to write in cursive, because of which Chinese characters become more simplified, and later converted into the first Japanese hiragana alphabet. They mostly wrote love letters to men, and they had to reply in Japanese instead of Chinese.
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📜 In the same period, the Japanese begin to write five lines. Poetry becomes the most important way not only to please the woman you love, but also to move up the career ladder. Therefore, in the Heian era, the key to success was belonging to a noble family and the ability to compose poetry.

🌺 Writing poems turned into a real cult – it was necessary to take a special paper, spray it with perfume.

💑 Japanese people have unusual romantic relationships – first, the couple exchanges letters, then meets and immediately spends the night together. This also had a special ritual – the man had to leave with the first roosters and write a poem to the woman.

👥 At the same time, polygamy was widespread in Heian society, and it was honorable for a man to have several wives.

💜 Love was the leitmotif of the Heian era – since there was no foreign policy or economy, there was nothing else to do. Thanks to love, Japanese poetry and Japanese art developed.
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1 – Hiragana

2 – Heian Era Manuscript

In Japanese culture, there were clear canons that regulated everything down to what poetry should be written about and what kind of kimono to wear. For a long time, the Japanese did not have a culture of individualism, and those that corresponded to the established rules as much as possible were considered talented works.

🍃 Another important value for Heian society was nature. nine0022 The aristocrats admired her, watched the change of seasons – feeling that everything was fleeting. The feeling of the frailty of this world – “mujokan” – is a very important feeling in the Japanese tradition.