Pentime Cursive for Pre-K/Kindy?

[happynurse]

So, I ordered Logic of English Foundations A (and B, FWIW). Thus far my son is flying through A at break-neck speed. I chose the manuscript option because I don't like their cursive font and I'll also have two more kiddos coming down the line, and *they* may not be ready for cursive at the beginning. My plan with my current 4 1/2 year old has been to teach the LoE handwriting in manuscript and when he's older move to Pentime cursive (the font that I much prefer). 

 

That being said, my son LOVES handwriting, and wants to learn all the cursive letters in LoE (did I mention I hate their cursive font?) After we write the manuscript letter in the lesson, he insists on doing the cursive. He even gets the marker and whiteboard out and writes 'cursive' on his own (which is just a series of loops and twirls). He seems to really want to write the letters though.

 

Since I don't care for the LoE cursive font, I'm wondering if I can move on to Pentime cursive with him? I know it's designed for a child much older than him, and I'm not sure how it would pan out with a child his age, even though he loves writing, has strong fine motor skills and actually wants to do cursive. Would Pentime be too advanced?

Thoughts? Opinions? He doesn't even care about all the fun sensory writing stuff, he just wants to put the marker to the board and write letters. Thanks for your advice!

[Syllieann]

My ds is doing Pentime 3 this summer. He is slightly ahead in fine motor and wants to learn. He worked on Spencerian last summer, but over the school year I dropped the ball on practicing. For the most part, Pentime 3 is a good fit for him, but there are several pages where they are supposed to copy a poem or proverb and the spacing and sizing of the paper provided was insufficient. I just skipped those. It is maybe 5 pages in the whole book. The other issue you might have is that there are whole words and sentences at a typical 3rd grade reading level. If your ds is a beginning reader he won't get those. That's pretty much the entire book. Personally, I would choose something else or delay it until he can at least read at that level. If he is learning phonograms via loe, you could just write the phonograms yourself and have him copy those. There is also a handwriting book from barefoot ragamuffin you could check out. I think there is one that is written for a spell to read with a kindy kid.

[happynurse]

My ds is doing Pentime 3 this summer. He is slightly ahead in fine motor and wants to learn. He worked on Spencerian last summer, but over the school year I dropped the ball on practicing. For the most part, Pentime 3 is a good fit for him, but there are several pages where they are supposed to copy a poem or proverb and the spacing and sizing of the paper provided was insufficient. I just skipped those. It is maybe 5 pages in the whole book. The other issue you might have is that there are whole words and sentences at a typical 3rd grade reading level. If your ds is a beginning reader he won't get those. That's pretty much the entire book. Personally, I would choose something else or delay it until he can at least read at that level. If he is learning phonograms via loe, you could just write the phonograms yourself and have him copy those. There is also a handwriting book from barefoot ragamuffin you could check out. I think there is one that is written for a spell to read with a kindy kid.

 

That was what I was afraid of. He's nowhere near ready for that. Thanks for your input! I'll check out Barefoot Ragamuffin.