Why do we still teach cursive to kids?!

[HighwayDragon]

Why oh why are children taught cursive handwriting? Especially from a young age where their handwriting is poor anyway, it's a massive waste of time and effort! My dd will be heading into year1 in September wibu to say that I don't think it's necessary at all, and completely archaic?

Add - I'm a TA in her school, most staff think it's ridiculous but we've got to teach them.

Personally, I think we push children to write far too early anyway. But that's for another thread.

Cursive teaches correct formation (develops physical/muscle memory, less reversals such as b/d) and it improves speed...eventually

I actually feel sorry for children who have to re-learn how to write in cursive after they spent a good few years being taught print. Instead, why not teach pre-cursive right away - at least it's a gentle lead in to cursive.

Sianilaa Glad to hear that some schools are getting it right. I have been in schools where they taught cursive from reception and by year 2, they have beautiful handwriting and the content of their written work is fantastic because they can concentrate on their ideas instead of their handwriting.

Yabu

My DS now in year 1 has beautiful joined up writing and so does his class.

YABU cursive is much faster and doesn't make my hand ache!

I used to doubt the usefulness of it, until my son was diagnosed with disgraphia.
Much better for those with additional needs like dyslexia too.
We lived in the US for a long time. You should see their cursive. To make it worse, the spelling tests were expected to be completed in it. If you spelt it correctly, yet your 'loop' was wrong - instant black mark.
My youngest two attend a village primary, the work on the wall looks exactly like my handwriting at the same age. I left in 1983.
So in the most lighthearted way, yabu

Ours don't join up in yr1... they start joining up sometime in yr2-3. They do flicks on the letters before that to get ready for joined up.

And your point about them not doing it in Ks1 makes no sense. All they do is add an extra bit of a flick - much easier when they get older. You probably haven't seen the benefits yet? I suppose you imagine it'd look neater? It doesn't really in my experience.

My 4 year old is in reception and they start learning it at the start of reception. The thinking being that you only have to learn handwriting once. We all find it very confusing and she struggles to make the link between the 'f' that she writes and the pronted one she sees in a book or on a sign for example. Also they don't really learn the flow at the age so most of the time she writes a word then goes back to add some little curls and flounces as if for decoration!

Because it is quicker and they will need to be able to read other people's handwriting.

TBF though I didn't learn until KS2. Year 1 seems a bit silly.

We are in France where they don't learn script at all - it's cursive from the start.

It seems to work well for a lot of kids. My DD's writing is attractive, legible and very, very fast

For a minority it does seem to cause issues. I can't work out if it's a problem caused by poor teaching or whether it's just that cursive doesn't suit all students. My 12 year old/ Y8 son has very spidery writing and I'm trying to get him to print some letters for better legibility. He has no particular fine motor issues that could be the cause of his difficulties.

YABU

In France they do cursive writing from a very young age. I'm not sure what you're suggesting as an alternative. Block writing is slow and messy.

Can anyone point me to some evidence of this spelling link with cursive? Thanks.

I was never taught cursive and my handwriting is horrible and I can't try and be neat as end up going back to being messy.

It would be nice if they teach it in schools, the only time I ever saw cursive was in art class in template form in high school.

I would have thought it was easier to teach cursive right from the off, DD's in year 2 and her handwriting's beautiful.

I agree. Cursive is so ugly. They should be taught Elizabethan secretary hand, italics and half-uncial. Now those are scripts worth writing.

I didn't know they still teach cursive. I used to write in cursive but have stopped. I'm 40. I find not everyone can consistently read what I write. And I have very tidy cursive writing. I just print block letters now.

And mostly I use computer for everything. I don't write notes at work. I don't write notes at home either.

YANBU cursive is dreadful.
My 2 youngest are both left handed and both have hypermobility.
Where they both previously printed very neat even sized letters that were completely legible they both now, after 3 years of cursive, have dreadful illegible writing and they have both figured out they can omit letters in words because you just cannot see clearly formed letters to know if all the letters are there.

My DD also pointed out that not one single book/text she has ever read was in written in cursive so she doesn't see any link between what she reads and what she writes. It's as though for her writing has no correlation to anything else she does in literacy.

I just don't understand how a child can go from loving writing stories and winning awards at school (in print) to hating writing stories and point blank refusing to produce more than the basics (cursive) and the staff just say 'she will get used to it and start writing again'. 3 years later and I'm certain she isn't going to start writing again any time soon.

Why not just let the children write how they find it easiest? It doesn't matter if they take a bit longer to write a paragraph what matters is that they can write a paragraph and that its legible. Pretty swirly bits are unnecessary just pretty.

I don't think we should bother much with handwriting at all in KS1. But I think teaching printing then teaching joined up later is a bit of a waste of time.

Cursive is a particularly ugly style of joined up writing though.

My DD also pointed out that not one single book/text she has ever read was in written in cursive

That's why I think cursive is obsoleted. And that many struggled to read perfectly well formed cursive writings. No one writes with pen and paper anymore.

I mean for a child, they won't grow up in a world where hand writing is common at all. I only ever use a pen for signatures. And that's ever rare now with chip and pin.

I taught college students in America who had never been taught to write in cursive. I felt so sorry for them - it's so much slower and more labourious. I don't think it's a good idea not to teach children something just because they find it hard or are not good at it at first!

Are you allowed to type in academic exams / A levels/ undergrad final exams?

There is no way anyone can print fast enough to hand write essays under exam conditions and get any sort of decent grade...

As to the age at which it's taught - I'm abroad so not in touch with the UK system but age 5 sounds too young due to fine motor skills.

In Germany they learn to print in the first half of the first year of school, then learn cursive in the second half of the year (which is all a bit daft as they are basically constantly learning their letters, but aren't allowed to use the cursive in their general work until they've learnt all the letter - so they are using cursive on cursive worksheets but printing the answers to reading comprehensions and project work etc.)

Then of course from year two on they use fountain pen for everything but maths

DD has the most beautiful hand writing in fountain pen - you could frame it (not biased at all actually 90% of her class write identically ) and although DS1'S horrible teacher constantly drew red lines through hiswork and made him do it again and aagain when he learnt printing, he's actually finding it much easier not to press too hard (his cardinal sin) with cursive, so it's a good thing for him.

They start school at 6 here, so most are nearly 7 when they learn cursive and 8 when they start with fountain pens.

The thinking behind is is that you put up with a few years of messy writing and then reap the rewards, which are being able to write faster, fewer children getting their d/b and p/q mixed up, and a greater ability to read cursive writing.

Montessori schools do it, I don't know many normal state primaries which do though.

I think that it's good that joined up writing is taught at some point, I don't really mind at what stage but definitely at primary school. Sometimes people need to be able to write quickly, such as when they are taking exams or notes in lessons - I think of it as a life skill.

• obviously it's not actually cursive in Germany... It's Schreibschrift...