Looking for cursive handwriting recommendations

[Homeschooling mama]

Hi, I'm looking for cursive handwriting recommendations.

I really dislike the ones where the capital A is a large lowercase a.

I was looking at the 5 spencerian books, although I'm worried it might be too hard? I know it used to be used in schools, does anyone know what age? If children first grade ish used to manage it, I'm sure mine will with practice.

If it was used for older children, does anyone have any recommendations?  

[ScoutTN]

New American Cursive

[nwahomeschoolmom]

Pentime Cursive!  Very inexpensive and works great, plus each grade level focuses on animal facts, geography facts - really great stuff.  It is available on Milestone Books.

[Green Bean]

Italics, McRuffy, HWT, BJU

Joined UK writing. No letters change shape, just connect the lowercase letters up. Capitals do not change at all. Super simple. Easy to read.

I like this to practice.

https://www.soundfoundations.co.uk/product/handwriting-tracing-sheets/

[J-rap]

My kids learned with Zaner-Bloser: 

https://www.zaner-bloser.com/image/samples/HW_3_NA_SE_WM.pdf

It seems like their website has gotten more complicated, but we only ever ordered the student workbooks.

[Ellie]

Another fan of Zaner Bloser, even though I think the upper case A looks like a big lower case a. Sorry. Because that's how, traditionally, upper case A was written. 🙂 It is a traditional hand; and ZB teaches the strokes first, then the letters that use each stroke.

[J-rap]

12 hours ago, Ellie said:

Another fan of Zaner Bloser, even though I think the upper case A looks like a big lower case a. Sorry. Because that's how, traditionally, upper case A was written. 🙂 It is a traditional hand; and ZB teaches the strokes first, then the letters that use each stroke.

Yes, I was kind of wondering how else would you write a cursive upper case A?

[domestic_engineer]

2 hours ago, J-rap said:

Yes, I was kind of wondering how else would you write a cursive upper case A?

Like a printed uppercase “A” but with a curly bottom on the left slant. I think Microsoft Word has a font called “Amelie” that does this.  Or you can see some like this when you do a Google search for ”Amelie font” and look at images.   I think Spencerian teaches it this way. 

[domestic_engineer]

OP - I taught my firstborn NAC hand using NAC materials. For subsequent kids, I’ve taught the NAC hand using Don Potter’s free materials. After mastering cursive, I gave one child the 5 Spencerian books to do independently as more of an arts-and-crafts activity.  This resulted in the child switching from a NAC/ZB capital A to a more Spencerian capital A. 
 

I was looking for the most efficient way to teach it and to get the kids using cursive. (And it couldn’t have a ZB capital Q, and preferably not a ZB capital F or T. I was also looking for efficient cursive strokes. 😛). I don’t think those 5 Spencerian books are very efficient based on a quick glance at them.  But if the Look of capital A means a lot to you, it may be your only option.   (Says someone who apparently has strong opinions on cursive hands/styles. 😂)

[Resilient]

I liked Getty-Dubay.  It's basically "connecting the printed letters" and it teaches the student to do short ascenders and descenders (the line of a "d", the tail of a "y" for example). This does SO MUCH to disentangle the lines of writing and makes it a lot easier to read.  I changed my own handwriting based on what they taught and it was an improvement. 

And it has the "A" shape for the capital!!  

I have come to believe that for the most part, you can use ZB and sub out the "A" shape if you want.  No one is going to call the penmanship police on you and by the time the kid is in junior high, the handwriting is all his/her own anyway.  I DO think neatness counts...more than the actual shape.