Cursive writing

[cjt110]

DS has just started school. As per his school's guidelines, he will learn cursive writing.

I don't even do this myself - a mix of joined up and not.

And his name has R's in it, shich don't look remotely like an "r" which he will read when joined up...

Any helpful suggestions?

What suggestions are you looking for? How to teach him, how to get him out of learning??

What’s the issue? I have Rs in my name and I still learned cursive. He’ll be fine.

I think most schools do this now - if they start with cursive, it means they don't have to effectively re-learn to write later on. It looks awful, but my DD's writing (yr2) is actually beginning to look ok now, and she's writing some sequences of letters quite fluently. She also has two Rs in her name, it doesn't look good at the moment!

Get him to practice writing the letters with the leaders and joiners in the air or in sand with his finger.

I'm trying to get my head around how to teach him to write in that style as I myself don't do it... Also, on the sheet provided it's an "r" with a whoosh before... as the school call it but the joined up r is more like an up, across and a down.

I can't see in my head how he would write it. Would I be daft asking school to print out his name in cursive so I know I'll be showing him correctly?

Is this where tracing paper could come in handy for learning?

MissSueFlay Yes, I believe they need cursive writing for later on but as you say, teach it now so they aren't having to re-learn which I think is great.

I remember we had to write in pencil until we could write joined up and then... we got a fountain pen! blue stained fingers for many years after that!

I think this is how I would write it in my son's name? (up and down r?)

The final picture is of how the r is written on his letters sheet

My DD writes her Rs like the ones on your son's letters sheet, but they aren't joined up to anything (or each other!) at the moment. The ones you've written are more like how the French write their Rs.
Ask the school for whatever you think would help you support your son's learning. It's better for him that what you do at home is consistent with what they are doing at school, I'm sure his teacher would be happy to help.

I don't think young children should learn cursive unless they have excellent non-joined up writing.

Ds's handwriting is dire (year 2) and his new teacher suggested he doesn't do cursive for the time being. I don't use cursive myself.

think I wish we had a choice...

Cursive writing is quicker to do, and useful for later on in juniors/senior schools when kids are ‘writing to learn’ rather than ‘learning to write’.

So I won't look like a dimwit asking his teachers to write his name cursive style for us?

Also thinking this through this week. My reception starter has been furious that the letters she's worked so hard on getting right at nursery are now wrong. Never mind that she's left handed and will be pushing her pen to form lead strokes. It was notable that the hand written certificate she received for good effort with her writing last week wasn't written in cursive by her teacher....

They'll be happy to help you help your child.
By the end of Y2 kids have to be able to write to a decent standard in cursive to reach the 'expected' level.

No you’d be a good parent asking them to show you the preferred style for writing his name. They’ll be pleased you want to support the school.

I'll do whatever it takes to help my son learn and I'd hate to do anything that goes against what they are teaching - even if it means I have a learning curve myself!

He gets his letters this week so I'll wait and see if we see anything with his name on in the required style - if not, I'll ask.

At least they’re starting I reception. At my DD’s school they don’t start cursive until year 1 and she’s been pretty upset that she can’t do her old handwriting anymore especially as concentrating on cursive makes her slower and it looks messier. She’s angry that she worked really hard for the last year to have nice, neat handwriting and now it’s been messed up.

She’s got a point to be honest so I’ve not challenged her, just reassured her it’ll all work out and we can practice at home (they don’t get handwriting homework).

I think you’re doing the right thing by towing the line set out by the school. I’ll be doing the same even though it grates...

Dont agree with this at all, surely it impedes reading skills?

longwayoff They are to write in cursive but anything they read is in normal, unjoined letters.

So, their reading books are font, like I am typing in. Their sound books, which have handwritten words/letters are written like this too.

Kids are still being taught this? What's the point?

I understand but suggest there may be cognitive difficulties reconciling the 2 - to a young child - completely different patterns and acknowledging they are the same. But different. Confusion.

I did think it might lead to confusion but I'm not the teacher so they must know whats works. I'm just following their lead

The point is that cursive writing is faster and more "fluid" than printing. Handwriting notes helps students remember more than typing their notes and also, because they're more likely to put their notes into their own words and paraphrase what the teacher is saying rather than just type it out word for word, it helps them learn and understand the subject in a greater depth. Learning to form a letter or a phoneme helps the child remember the sound it makes which then helps with their reading and spelling.

Anyway, op I don't know what your child's name is but I'm assuming it'd look something like this written in joined-up handwriting.

I cannot read my youngest Yr 2s writing in cursive, the teacher apparently can because she writes lots of comments in the workbooks we see at teachers evening

My dd started in a primary school that taught cursive from reception. They also only let them read books and word lists with cursive writing in and asked us not to read with them at home unless we had cursive books.

I moved her to a different primary in April (they started in Jan at that point). She learnt to read 60 three and four letter words from April to July at the second primary and learnt to write reasonably clearly for a 5 year old by the end of Rec. The DC that she was in primary with at the first school most really struggled with learning to write and their writing is very difficult to read. My DD learnt cursive in year 2 and it is perfectly easy to read and very neat.

I am not saying you should move your DS, I moved my DD because of other issues at the school as well but the cursive was the icing on the cake.