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Original poster

Berol pens ..... why?

130 replies

aristocat · 22/08/2012 13:16

At my DCs school they progress from pencil to Berol pens. The pupils are only allowed to use blue (not black) berol for their work.

Is this something that only our school does? We use all sorts of pens at home (have a pen fetish myself Blush)

DS will be in yr 6 in a few weeks and I hope that when he moves to Secondary they will be thankful if he has a pen at all Grin

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mrz · 21/05/2013 21:01

Some schools issue an actual licence but many just "give permission" for the child to write with a pen when their handwriting is good enough.

I don't know anyone who actually likes the Berol pens

Abra1d · 21/05/2013 21:01

At my children's schools, Lamy seem to be the fashionable pen brand for both fountain and rollerball. This is secondary school

EleanorFarjeon · 21/05/2013 21:06

I have beautiful handwriting, sounds awful but I do, unless I write with one of those Berol feckers.

Wiifitmama · 21/05/2013 21:11

So what should left handlers use? I home school so can choose any brand and issue my kids pen licences whenever I like Grin

My eldest (12) likes stabilo fineliners. He is right handed. My 9 year old leftie only uses pencil. His handwriting is terrible. What should I buy for him?

Interestingly, I have found (through my tutoring work) that the children in the French school system (in London) write in pen from a very early age and have beautiful penmanship.

weblette · 21/05/2013 21:16

wiifit have a look here

Wiifitmama · 21/05/2013 21:20

Thanks. We already do all the positioning stuff and his hand is not hooked. I just wondered if there was a pen people recommend fir lefties but maybe we will just have to experiment.

weblette · 21/05/2013 21:48

In the class I work with, all three lefties use Stabilo pens.

musu · 21/05/2013 22:17

Ds moved schools at the beginning of year 4. He went from using a fountain pen (no licence required) at his old school to having to apply for a pen licence at his new school. I tried to explain it to ds but he just started laughing and asked if it was the same sort of thing as a driving licence. He uses a Berol pen. I'm not sure he has his pen licence yet and he is not at all interested in acquiring it.

I hate Berol pens.

LauraPashley · 22/05/2013 21:23

Another hinging open gub here Grin!

We never used pens! Ever! Maybe for our own study notes for standard grades, but never before that.

You'd get a serious rollicking at any school I've taught at if you did jotter work with a pen!!

Finding this very bizarre in fact! Are we missing something crucial north of the border? You English teachers must love not having pencils to sharpen?

Kichererbse · 23/05/2013 20:39

Well I know what the 'pen licence' includes in Germany, but I find it a schame that we need it at all and that parents hardly practice with their children. When I started to go to school, I always got extra exercises from my parents and these included copying texts with a fountain pen. At those times there was no 'pen licence'. It was the parents' duty to make sure their children are able to handle a fountain pen. Gosh, I seem to get old...

@Lonecatwithkidden I wrote with a fountain pen in school and at university (about six years) and even today I daily write with a fountain pen. Since I left school I am only writing with fountain pens that have a golden nib. The lumb on my finger belongs to me like my fountain pen. :-)

crazeelaydee · 23/05/2013 23:41

Same for my DS's school, but he doesn't have a licence either. I personally seem to write like a different person when I use a Bic?? really neat and tidy....if I use any other especially a Berol (fat, slippery, smudgy, pants Grin) it looks like a spider has crawled through the ink! I'm guessing my Ds will be the same when he has to use them. Don't think I will ever get my head around some school's ways of thinking...

mrz · 24/05/2013 21:50

(shows ignorance) and asks what's "jotter work"?

LauraPashley · 25/05/2013 01:10

Jotter work = any work you do in a jotter! As opposed to on a whiteboard, or worksheet, etc! Is jotter a Scottish word then? I feel like I am living in a foreign land! Jotter = exercise book I think?

mrz · 25/05/2013 07:19

No jotter isn't a Scottish word but in England our children work in exercise books jotters are where you "jot" not where you do your work.
"Noun 1. jotter - a small notebook for rough notes"

lljkk · 25/05/2013 08:03

Frixion pens are good, my lefties get on fine with them.

Nothing I've read has ever explained adequately what's wrong with Biros. For some reason Berols are the approved pen in DC school, too.

then I had a long thread on MN asking what was the difference between a Biro and a non-Biro, and came up with the conclusion that THERE IS NO WAY TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE. Berols are a form of ball-point pen, too.

However, if DC use the one with the brand name "Berol" on it, that's okay by the school, so that's what we usually do.

Fuzzymum1 · 25/05/2013 19:01

I remember doing the 'ink pen test' and when I passed I was presented with a fountain pen to use at school - I still remember the pride I felt when Miss Kay presented my pen in 1979 when I was 10 and my handwriting was neat enough for a pen.

TheBuskersDog · 25/05/2013 23:29

At my primary school in the seventies we were given blue ballpoint pens that had a blue tapered body, and at the nib end there was a white sort of dome that screwed into it, also available in black and red for teachers.
Sorry the description is a bit crap, I have been trying to find a picture, just wondered if anyone else remembered them?

middlesqueezed · 25/05/2013 23:55

Wiifitmama and others looking for left-handed stuff, I've found this site very good. They used to have a shop in London but sadly it closed, their mail order is fast though.
www.anythinglefthanded.co.uk/index.html

TheWave · 26/05/2013 01:23

Kichererbsen it is interesting to hear experiences from Germany as I think teaching seems much more formal there anyway from what I've heard. Are parents expected to be so involved in handwriting and how early does this start?

heirraising · 28/05/2013 15:45

Haven't read the whole thread but some of the posts took me back to when we used dip pens and ink at school. A responsible least cack-handed child would go around the room in the morning pouring Quink blue permanent ink into the white porcelain containers set into the desk.

Midnightgang24 · 10/06/2020 15:18

I love berol hand writing pens and I have been writing in fountain pens because I am left handed but my teahers said as they smudge only use them for homework or for stuff you are doing with your family but I told them that I have some quick drying fountain pen cartriges at home they said bring them in after lockdown then we can see. the only reason why I like berols so much is because I was using them since I got my pen licence in year 4 and they have helped my handwriting the nly trouble is that I have fractured my writing hand

Midnightgang24 · 10/06/2020 15:20

sorry my bad have fractured my right arm which isn't my writing arm thank goodness

Midnightgang24 · 10/06/2020 15:22

@Wiifitmama

Thanks. We already do all the positioning stuff and his hand is not hooked. I just wondered if there was a pen people recommend fir lefties but maybe we will just have to experiment.
why? this is a load od nonsence
Norestformrz · 11/06/2020 10:23

.

Berol pens ..... why?
wasgoingmadinthecountry · 11/06/2020 17:29

Berol pens are scratchy and horrid. Guaranteed to put children off handwriting.

www.anythinglefthanded.co.uk has lots of useful tips.

Are any teachers still using Pen Licences? I've never thought they were a good idea for so many reasons so I've never used them. My dyslexic son would never have earned one!