cursive writing

[mythic]

hi all, I know this has probably been covered before but I an old parent with a new son lol,
he is in year 1 at school and has to do cursive writing, the homework the teacher sets is not grammatically correct and often not spelt right, many parents have said the same, I accept children need to be able to write correctly and it must be legible, the style of cursive they are teaching would not join up without the word changing for example one of the homework sheets he got had the word over, now to join the o to the v would come from the top of the o, but no the way the school have taught it has come from the bottom and changed the word to oner, many of the parents are concerned about this style, once children have done sats they have chosen their own styles,
so my concern is this, should cursive writing be taught to year one children when they are just learning the letters.

sorry after they have done sats it should have read it does not matter how they write, as long as it is legible, I have spoken to year 10 teachers where my older children go and they say as long as they can write joined up and it is readable and tidy its ok, so why the non joined style

Daft.

I think my summer born daughter was still writing a lot of her letters back to front in year 1. She was taught cursive writing when she was in year 3 (didn't suit her - looked like like a spider having a heart attack) so she has a more legible style now.

yes when I write it looks like a spider has ran through the inkwell lol

I have (hopefully) attached 2 screenshots. The first, from pg 23 of the Primary National Curriculum, shows that ch'n in y1 should be practising and beginning to form letters correctly.
The second, from pg 30 of the Primary National Curriculum, shows that ch'n in y2 should be able to correctly form lower case letters and be beginning to join them together.

The third image shows the style of handwriting usually taught in schools.

I would be concerned about the spelling and grammar not being correct on the homework sheets and be raising that with either the class teacher or, if you're not satisfied, with the head.

It also says that ch'n should only move onto joining up their handwriting once they're able to correctly form their letters. I would go in and speak to the teacher and talk about your concerns.

thank you for that, most helpful

I teach cursive from reception, so I teach the individual letters like the picture then we move to actually joining them up, otherwise they learn to write then have to learn to join up, its policy in quite a few schools. In your example though, why would the o be joining from the bottom? o always joins from the top, so I would be worried about that.

Spelling and grammar mistakes on worksheets is really bad, I make the odd mistake in contact books etc because I'm human and usually trying to write while doing other things and I have to admit my rushed handwriting is not perfect but actual work should be being double checked.

They teach cursive from reception in my girls school too.

We teach cursive from Reception, the same style as Menolly. I would ask for a copy of the handwriting policy. Joining the o from the bottom sounds incorrect.

It is pointless teaching children that all letters start on the line because you then have to spend time knocking their confidence and getting them to unlearn when they are joining.I have always taught the correct letter formation with the flick out from the letter. The join is from the previous letter and that determines where the new letter starts.

Menolly, because that's how the children have been taught to do the letter so they always go back to the line. So w o ends up looking very odd. I just don't get it, and with my dyslexic head on it makes no sense either.

I teach cursive too and specifically teach that the join from the o doesn't go back to the line. Your son may have misunderstood - speak to the teacher.

wentmadinthecountry I agree with you. As you can see in the picture I posted, most of the schools I teach in (as a supply teacher) show the children to join from the letter and have abandoned the lead-in joins and that it's better to not join from some letters (b g j p s y). They start with individual letters with a lead-out line in reception and then move on to joining in yr 2.