Have I been writing f wrong my whole life?

[KeepOnPushingOn]

I write my lowercase fs so the tail but goes below the line - so similar to a lower case y. I'm sure this must have been how I was taught but my dc seem to be being taught that they sit on the line - so are tall letters like t or h. Wtf, is this me doing it wrong my whole life or their school teaching a very odd way of writing. Looking at this text I'm typing though the f is tall so maybe it is me? It looks horrible to handwrite it like that though.

No, I write mine below the line too.

As it happens my 5yo DS has been writing his lower case 'f' like in this image, which he must have learnt from school because I write it to sit above the line!

Yes my f's go below the line.

When you say sit above the line what does that look like? Mine sit so the cross line sits on the line with the tail below

I was taught that a lower-case cursive f goes below the line, likewise g, j, p, q and z

and y!

Joined up 'f' tail below. Printed 'f' on the line. At least that's how I was taught and how dc were taught.

The bottom of my f finishes just below the line in a straight line down. My children's f also goes below the line but with a fancy curvy tail.

I think I was taught that it goes down 3/4 of the length of a g, y or q.

My daughter does hers tall too, but she’s only 7 and started school in 2020 so missed loads of school (central belt of Scotland so our school closed for longer than anywhere else; plus she had to miss 6 extra consecutive weeks of school when covid went through our entire house one by one)

Yeah, mine go below the line too

I was taught that the bar of the f is on the line of the paper for lower case if printed. For upper case, the bar would be the same height as the top of a lower case letter.

However, if I'm writing a letter to my grandson then all bets are off and it comes out whatever way it likes 🤣🤣

Me too. As per the example below from a 19th century primer.

Sorry ment to say tail definitely below the line as well.

When we were taught how to write a letter using a ruler instead of lines, you had to go back through and put the tails on - this also helped you to proof read it and correct any mistakes.

Having just looked back at my work notepad I can see that if I'm writing in cursive I have a small tail of the lower case f under the line, but if I'm printing it all sits on the line.

Not really very helpful at all I'm afraid!

Hmm, maybe they are half doing it right with top of f at the same height as letters like d (shown in some of the photos) but then they have it sitting on line with nothing going under. I do top of f inline with letters like r, across bit on the line and bottom in line with bottom of y etc.

When writing in capitals it sits on line with all other capital letters (is that what people mean by printing?) When not doing joined up but still lower case I still have f going under line

Mine are a few years older and still write weird fs!

F is unusual in being above and below, in cursive.

o between
t above
g below
f is printed on the line but in cursive has a tail as well.

In fact, proper old style, the tail goes the opposite way to a g. It's formed like a cursive l but the downstroke continues below the line and back round to the middle of the letter.

Oh well, I think I'm too old to change my ways now!

She still writes 5’s backwards every single time so probably not the handwriting expert we need in here 😅

Takes me back! Excuse the iPhone scrawl...

I think there's no one single way to write letters.

Even computers have letters styled differently in different fonts, e.g. look at the letter "g" in some books, or the differences between letter "a" in various styles. And that's ignoring serifs!

It's just style. That's not to say there's no right or wrong way to write letters, just that there are a broad range of ways that are all fine and the main thing is to ensure it's readable.

Is this a generational change - is the teacher young? From what you're describing, they are writing the letter f in the same style as it appears when typed! The f on screen when I'm typing here is taller above and finishes at the bottom in line with other letters. Whereas when I was at school, before we used screens, I was taught to write f (and still do) with the tail going below the line. My handwriting is quite arty in style too so I curl the tail around on itself.

Below here but now I’ve thought about it for a little while I’m questioning whether the letter exists haha. Just looking at the text on screen and very few letters go below the line and I’d never noticed that before!

So your fs are short letters? No that's weird!!!! Look at the typed fs here. Whether the tail goes below or on the line is flexible but the top should be in line with the tall letters like l, t, d

No, it can’t be both! If you do it your way, the letter F is double the size of the others! It can’t be tall AND go below the line.