Why is cursive writing so important?

[Soubriquet]

My dc get their homework marked down if it isn’t in cursive (year 2 and 4).

I hate it. I can’t read what they are trying to say and I don’t know anyone who still uses cursive after primary school.

So why is cursive so important for children to learn?

It hasn't been done to death. The general standard of handwriting among young people is shockingly bad. Their grammar is atrocious and their spelling even worse.

I write very quickly, which I find useful.

Writing something is different to typing something

I was taught cursive and, like most of the kids I teach, it slowly dropped off as time went on in secondary where we're much more interested in what they're writing than how they're doing it. Most kids by year 9 do what many adults do, keep the obvious and easy joins and ditch the twiddly bits like the little circle on a K for example.

I still write in cursive now and I'm in early 50's. I was taught at primary school and it has just stuck with me through school, uni and working life. I am actually quite proud of my writing regardless of what people may think

Most people I know write in some form of cursive. It is quicker than printing and looks far nicer.

The loops show you which way to go with your pen. Once you know which way to go, they may not be visible in the writing.

My DH prints, it looks dreadful.

It helps muscle memory , so aids spelling, as a PP said.
It’s quicker
Most people use a form of cursive writing, even if they don’t join absolutely every letter.
It’s easier on the hand than printing if there’s a lot of writing to do.

There’s no reason why left handed people shouldn’t have as good writing as right handed folk. With the correct paper orientation, there’s no need to hook or smudge the writing. I’m a left handed with decent writing.

My kids y1 and y4 don’t seem to be taught cursive (Wales) with much rigour. Not sure if it is a Welsh area thing or a specific county/school thing? All friends in England seem very hot on it!

Kids seem to learn letters with a tail on, so I expected to move to cursive at some point but so far it’s not been introduced. They acted surprised when I showed them handwriting guide lines when we were setting out homemade cards (so a line to write on then a line below for g and j etc and a line above for h, l etc. ).

I’m a secondary teacher and find it really hard to read cursive by some students and I think it has a negative impact on their progress. I just don’t have the time to spend hours deciphering pages of writing so there is a chance I miss mistakes. I wish these students would print instead.

I also do exam marking and if I can’t read it I click for it to go to a second marker, if they can’t read it either then it’s a 0 for that question. I always encourage students to print in exams,

My dsd can’t read her writing when cursive but daren’t change because of the pressure from her teacher

A year 2 child having homework is bad enough but getting marked down on it is awful!

I knew a kid who started with connected writing from first year of school. It was a school that charged 1000 GBP a month.

I also used to mark exam essays, and it was clear that those with more expensive education were more likely to know how to efficiently connect letters, in a way that reduces effort and increases speed.

I learned to write in Germany. There, we started with cursive, not even with letters but just drawing long lines of loops to start with. Then learning to form letters, connected from the start.

F**k knows why they start with printing in Anglophone countries. It tends to result in cramped writing with tall and short letters all one height. And, see above, it's slow.

Just another way in which money buys opportunity in the UK. Dreary...

Very few children will grow up to do writing with a pen or pencil of any type except for for very occasional form-filling, etc. They should be taught neat printing/handwriting for schoolwork, then taught to type properly and quickly before the end of primary.

ThreeLocusts that's really interesting. Doing loops sounds really sensible when I think about it.

@Soubriquet what's being left handed got to with it?

Mine learned to put tails on from the start and they joined them after a couple of years and then moved to pen. I wouldn’t consider their style of writing to be either print or cursive. They struggle to read my handwriting.

Theirs was easier to learn but not as fast and flowing as cursive.

I'm in my 40s and we were all made to cursive write also, I'm really glad now as my job involves quite a lot of note taking so it's much quicker.

It hasn't got anything to do with the SATs as writing is not assessed in the SATs.
Check out the KS1 and KS2 Teacher Assessment Framework though and you'll see why teachers are forced to push cursive. FWIW I hate the emphasis on handwriting and I'm a teacher but I have to do it or so many of my kids wouldn't meet expected levels. Crazy!

I'm so upset about cursive. My kids went to a school with a French curriculum and they had to start to learn cursive in grade 1/2, when they still hadn't figured out printing properly yet. As a result my DS especially has ridiculous penmanship, both cursive AND printing, at the age of 14 and I don't know how it will ever change now. They do so much work on keyboards now it is just so pointless - and they print their handwritten thank-you notes. I know it may be different in other countries re exams etc but here so much is done on computer it seems pointless.

I’m a teacher. Sometimes I want to tell children to stop with all the flourishy stuff and just write the letters. I can’t quickly read the work of about one third of the kids who do joined up.

And now my school are pushing me to write joined up in books or on the board. No.

I will say I learnt to write in Mandarin before English, so joining up doesn’t come naturally. Also dyspraxia and left handed. My normal writing is lovely, but when someone tried to get me to join up, it took ages and looked awful.

Whole primary school policy to write joined up here so certainly juniors all joined up on the board, and the kids letters the teacher does are in a handwriting font.

Both minen would be neater printing, or selectively joining. It is so so messy. The way cursive is taught and insisted upon doesnt work at all.

It's faster to write in cursive.

Ds finally mastered writing and they made him learn cursive - it was a disaster, he got constantly criticised for his awful writing - secondary school teachers came down hard on him. I had words with the teachers, who backed off but his writing was still hard to read so at age 13 I encouraged him to drop cursive and go back to printing - his writing improved enormously - as did his self esteem. He can type pretty damn quickly so I don’t think it’ll hold him back much at Uni or work.

Mid 70's here (age) .Cursive at primary school ,mainly print with a few joined up letters ever since .
No problem with speed or writing in exams ( degree + professional quals post degree) or legibility .

Here (America) a lot of schools have dropped it and I don't see it's done much good--kids just don't have good handwriting at all, and they don't get other activities to work on fine motor skills. I taught one of mine because his printing was that bad, and it massively improved his writing. Everyone says "they'll just type" but they don't take the time to teach touch-typing either!

There are different styles of cursive writing though--the style taught here in the 1980s (which I don't use but had to learn to read) has a lot of extra loops and the Q looks like a 2. Some areas teach a more italic style where not all the letters are joined up.

I have friends in France who have told me about how their kids are drilled on cursive writing with special paper.