Cursive?

[dragon_nerd]

It depends on what I'm writing, shopping lists are in block writing but anything that requires more than 3 words in a row is cursive, mostly because I can write in cursive quicker. And I'm kinda sad that it's dying out, if done well it can look really beautiful (needless to say my handwriting is a mess, not at all pretty but I can appreciate someone else's writing) 

[Goonie]

I know how to write and read cursive. 

 

I was in a 4 hours of interviews the other day. HR still has paper for the answers which can mean writing notes the entire time. Everyone there went to cursive for writing or some type of cursive. It was faster and reduced hand cramps. But, the youngest person in there is mid 30s so I'm not sure that's a valid sampling.

[everywhere and nowhere]

Maybe it's faster - but still it doesn't matter whether I write normal or cursive letters, Latin or Cyrillic - it doesn't become readable to anyone but me. And, actually, when I write something down very quickly, it can very well become illegible even for myself.

[XYZ96]

1. I write in print with little bits of cursive sometimes thrown in

2. I find it hard to read, but not impossible 

3. I don't think people need to be able to read cursive, it's a useful skill, but, meh...

4. yeah, slowly though, it'll take a long while for it to completely die 

5. yes, not because everyone should be able to write cursive or read cursive, or because it better then print or anything like that, but from my own experience, it was enormously helpful. I hated cursive growing up, I was slow when writing it, and I couldn't read it and I thought my handwriting looked terrible in it. So I only ever wrote cursive when it was required. In sixth grade, we had writing class, and every once in a while the teacher would make us write in cursive. Back then there were a few letters I still wrote backwards (like J for some reason...) and half the time my b's were d's and vice versa. My writing teacher, amazed at my written work void of reversals when I wrote in cursive, showed another teacher of mine, and they thought it would be great to make me always write my longer written assignments in cursive... for the rest of the  year, every text I wrote in writing class had to be in cursive  ... but because of that, it corrected the problem, I rarely write letters backwards anymore, all because of cursive, because you have to write it the correct direction or the letter doesn't swing into the next letter, and you can't continue writing the word, anyways, because of that, I since have decided to be pro torturing teaching children cursive, and haven't seen good enough reason to change my position  

[Pramana]

I'm a huge advocate for cursive writing. Probably the biggest advantage is the ability to take notes by hand, which facilitates paying attention in class and memorizing the material. I find that people who take notes by computer are liable to spend more time surfing the web than paying attention, or copying everything from the lecture verbatim without really thinking about the material, or becoming distracted by spellcheck and formatting.

[The Terrible Travis]

We were taught how to write in cursive during fourth grade. I never understood it or learned how to do it properly. I remember being super worried about that because our teacher had told us that it was absolutely vital that we learn how to do it because we'd be required to write in it starting the next year. To my relief, that turned out not to be true. I've actually had several teachers since then instruct us *not* to write in cursive.

 

I do think they should stop teaching cursive in schools because - it's a complete waste of time. There's no point in learning how to write in a style that's barely legible to begin with. The world would be a much better place if o one bothered with this fucking cursive shit and everyone just wrote in print.

[LadyWallflower]

I love writing in cursive. I find it very soothing. Something about print is urgent and fast. But cursive is calm. When I journal I write in cursive, and I will sometimes try to meditate a bit when I write in cursive. I also send all my cards to my family and penpals in cursive.

 

I don't write cursive at work. At the moment I live in a country where English is not spoken by many people. Also, I always do math in print.

 

I remember learning cursive in school in elementary school. But after elementary school, I never needed to use it at all besides signing my name. I don't think my younger cousins studied it. I think I was the last generation.

 

I think people should still learn cursive. It is not difficult to learn. After all, there are only so many letters in the alphabet.  

[everywhere and nowhere]

11 hours ago, The Terrible Travis said:

There's no point in learning how to write in a style that's barely legible to begin with.

In my case any piece of my handwriting is illegible to others. It doesn't matter whether it's straight letters or cursive, Latin or Cyrillic - I just can't write in a way which would be possible to read. I'm not a computer victim - I still write my diary by hand, all the time until university I wrote all essays by hand because I just didn't realise that I could type them, I started using computers several years after I learned how to write...

I hold a pen in a different way than most people. It looks most similar to variant F on this schematic, however, in my case the pen rests between the index and the middle finger and is stabilised by the thumb - what remains very similar is that the thumb rests much lower on the pen than other fingers. I started writing at pre-school age, nobody corrected my way of holding pen and then it was just too late to switch without a lot of discomfort. Anyway, I suspect it could have something to do with my extremely bad handwriting.

[everywhere and nowhere]

Here's something which looks yet more similar. Leftmost column, bottom row. Or, yet closer - rightmost column, top row, flipped horizontally to match the right hand.

I still think that calling it "incorrect" is a bit stigmatising. It's a matter of what works for an individual. Too bad it actually doesn't work for me... But still, after 30+ years of writing this way, the most typical way of holding a pen feels extremely uncomfortable to me. I've made a few attempts to hold a pen like this (top row, for example) in my life - and I couldn't keep writing like this for more than two minutes.

[Rhaenys]

I learnt cursive and it is still a part of my handwriting today.

I'm not sure if they teach it back home.

I don't think it's important because everything is going digital and technical but I think it's important to read stuff from the past.

[LenaLuthor]

On 7/24/2018 at 11:54 PM, RodFire8181 said:

(Ranting) Also I am sick and tired of when we have an assignment in class and we're suppose to get a classmate to read over our work, because most people in my class can't even read cursive so I have to wait until some comes along that can. 

That is one thing that always pissed me off about school.

[Rodsie8181]

7 hours ago, AliceAbernathy said:

On 7/24/2018 at 11:54 PM, RodFire8181 said:

(Ranting) Also I am sick and tired of when we have an assignment in class and we're suppose to get a classmate to read over our work, because most people in my class can't even read cursive so I have to wait until some comes along that can. 

That is one thing that always pissed me off about school.

Good. Someone else knows my pain.

[Alejandrogynous]

I've always loved cursive. To this day, one of my favorite idle doodles is the lowercase cursive F. It just feels so good coming off my pen/pencil, my margins are always filled with them.

[Blomdor]

My handwriting is almost completely incomprehensible regardless of whether it is in print or otherwise. Cursive was taught to me during primary school, and I memorized how the individual letters of the English alphabet are generally supposed to be written in that form well enough, but my attempts at producing any actual writing in cursive were even more illegible than my printed writing, and the strain on my hands was if anything greater.

 

The dexterity of my hands and fingers has been tested in a professional setting as lying at the bottom 1% of all human beings. The reasons for this are not known to me in full, but I presume that it's tied to nerve damage in some way or another. They simply are not steady or graceful in any way, shape, or form, and trying to force them to be only leads to pain and frustration. So it takes me a very long time to write anything even in print if I need anyone on this green Earth besides myself to be able to decipher it at all. The very best effort I can manage resembles that of a roughly five year old child. Cursive is right out; it never has and never will resemble anything other than demented, chaotic tangles of lines on paper. I can read it only if it's written very clearly, but I have to admit that I'm very far out of practice and am not sure how well I would do if one were to actually test me on it.

 

Eventually, I was mercifully allowed to use a computer to type my assignments out in school whenever possible, because it took me far too long to write anything legibly as other kids did and even my very best was not always decipherable. But there was a period when I was still young and computers were not nearly as ubiquitous as they are today, and that frankly sucked.

[Ms. Carolynne]

I learned cursive when I was in the 4th grade. I wrote in cursive almost exclusively up until highschool. I find cursive to be much more efficient for myself, and that's why I became accustomed to it. My handwriting is neat too, at least by others' accounts. The problem was that others struggled to read cursive, thus over the course of Highschool I trained myself to print more effectively.

 

Personally I find cursive to be elegant, and everyone's cursive seems to have it's own touch, so I can appreciate it as an art of sorts. I also find it practical in it's efficiency, for those of us who benefit from it anyway.

[Rosendust]

I learned cursive in the 2nd grade & still use it to this day. I love using it because it makes my handwriting look elegant, even though my print writing suffers. It's also really fun to do while using fountain pens!

[Morgenrot]

In school we have to learn how to write cursive and in years 3 and 4 we actually gave to write in cursive. Afterwards it's our own choice. I personally like writing in print, but I am able to write cursive as well.

[Zhuangzi]

Cursive should actually be taught first in school, because the part of the brain associated with fine motor skills isn't well developed when kids are first taught to write.

[Dreamer23]

Can read and write it, but definitely never use it in real life. (Had to use it throughout most of school, but that's about it)

Non-cursive is just so much easier to read if your handwriting isn't all that legible in the first place - doing everyone a favor by not using it xD

[elmrain]

I never learnt 'proper' cursive at school, in year 3 (so about 7 years old) we did 'joining-up', which whilst similar wasn't taught exactly the same. We weren't taught to join 'b' or 'p' to the next letter, for example and never learnt the fancy cursive 'r' or 'Q'. I think it's required for children to be using 'joining-up' for everything by the time they leave primary school (11 y/o) - the school my Mum works at does at least.

 

I use a mixture of that and print (or just good old ALL CAPS!) depending on how I feel on any particular day. But as to should it be learned... eh... could be useful now and then, I suppose.

[cathernyan]

my K-8 (small, private, & Lutheran) school made learning to write and read in cursive mandatory starting at grade 3. after that we had to write in cursive and with pen until we graduated. they would always tell us that in high school and college, the teachers will require you to always write in pen (and in cursive I think idr), so this is just to ~prepare us~ for it.

I haven't written in cursive since 8th grade, but I did transfer connecting (some) letters into my print. probably the only redeeming quality of my handwriting :'>

 

edit: the pen thing actually started in 6th grade oops lol

[Marrow]

For me cursive has always been for special occasions (letters and such), but it does like people don't write cursive any more. Maybe it will become so obscure that we can use it as a code language.

[thunder14]

I think its unnecessary to have a separate writing system that offers nothing of significance that the main writing system doesn't already offer, and that there are much more important things to teach in schools. Kids already are kept in school longer than they should (in my country and many others), and I disagree with a lot of the choices made regarding curriculum. There are a lot of important things to learn, so its important to prioritize. I have nothing against it being used by choice as a hobby or interest, I just don't think it should be required in schools or anywhere else.

[MollyDMA]

I remember being taught cursive in elementary school them learning that kids don't learn it anymore since they are more likely to use technology in stead of writing

[Member131995]

I taught myself cursive in middle school. Honestly, I don't have strong feelings about whether people should learn it or not or whether they should at least be able to read it. I just think, if you can't, you can't, if you can, you can. Either way, it's cool.

[Lunala]

My brain works really fast, and that's why I write REALLY fast - however, my handwriting is messy because my brain works too quickly to the point where the writing is very sloppy and messy. Writing slowly/neatly hurts my hand a lot and makes my brain feel all weird, so I always HATED cursive. Thank god they stopped teaching it (in my personal opinion)

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

My mother had beautiful cursive handwriting. It's a shame it's dying out.

[LonesomeCrow]

I like writing in cursive and prefer it over print. My print looks very sloppy and I just find it easier to write in cursive.  I think it should still be taught.

[Guest]

Can read it, can write it if I wished to (but haven't done so in what may well be more than two decades by now).

 

I think it's definitely dying, and the more it dies out, the less of a reason there will be to spend further time teaching it to kids. Right now, I'd say at least the skill to read it is still clinging on to the "somewhat useful" level... barely.

[Sage Raven Domino]

My handwriting is awfully cryptic, so I've been often using printing instead since childhood and especially after graduation.

 

During my university lectures in the late 2000s, only a few most advanced students were using laptops to take notes (which required an expert knowledge of the TeX typesetting software due to the complexity of math formulas); the vast majority were writing notes by pen and only using TeX to write formal papers.