"Stop Teaching Handwriting"

[Quiver0f10]

http://www.good.is/?p=8133&GT1=34127

 

I admit I had been tossing around the idea of stopping the handwriting practice books and just working on typing, but after reading this article and the comments below it I am rethinking my plans. What do you think?

 

Warning: Some of the comments have profanity.

[PariSarah]

But I don't think one can entirely dispense with handwriting. One is not permanently connected to a computer and printer, and neat writing is still an expectation in some circles. Since you can't be sure that your kids will be in the sort of circles where handwriting has completely disappeared (those are RARE circles, I suspect--ones where people can afford virtually unlimited techno-baubles), you can't know whether you're doing them a disservice by failing to teach them how to do it.

 

I recently had occasion to write two or three thank-you notes to prospective employers. I could simply have dashed off an email, or typed up and then printed out the thank you note. But I assure you, the hand-written thank-you note was much better received.

 

The other thing I sense in her article is that she is under the common misapprehension that any form of struggle is worthless if you can find a way to avoid it. Her son has to work hard to be "average" in handwriting, so she thinks eliminating handwriting is the solution. I think that's a sad, unhelpful way of approaching education and child-rearing. Some struggles that you could avoid are best struggled through anyway.

 

ETA: If she intends her kids to go to college, they will need some form of neat writing, even if they don't have to master Palmer Cursive or whatever. There are in-class tests and quizzes that aren't computerized, and graders get very testy over illegible handwriting. And students are only allowed to petition for computer use during these tests and quizzes when there's a documented disability. "I didn't feel like teaching my son to write neatly" isn't a documented disability.

Edited December 28, 2008 by PariSarah

[Peela]

I think there is a place for handwriting and I suspect it is also good for brain development.

However torturing a child who has bad fine motor skills to produce perfect letters seems unecessary- not to mention impossible if you have one of those kids. Mine is 13 and can finally write legibly. I don't think there's anything I could have done to speed up that development- just the small amounts of daily practice that he has always done. Typing is a great skill in this day and age. Even if handwriting eventually gets relegated to the "art" catagory rather than a fucntional necessity, it is still a wonderful thing to learn to do. Many people including me actually enjoy the act of handwriting.

As always, a nice balanced approach is probably best, no need to go to either extreme.

I don't think the person who wrote the article is very balanced though- she is in reaction. As homeschoolers, we don't need to be.

[Quiver0f10]

 

The other thing I sense in her article is that she is under the common misapprehension that any form of struggle is worthless if you can find a way to avoid it. Her son has to work hard to be "average" in handwriting, so she thinks eliminating handwriting is the solution. I think that's a sad, unhelpful way of approaching education and child-rearing. Some struggles that you could avoid are best struggled through anyway.

 

I think this is what bothered most of the people commenting and what got to me too. The whole attitude that if it's too hard just give up. I think that is what we are seeing with schools no longer giving grades or failing kids. What are we actually teaching them?

 

I am thinking her son could use OT to help with his fine motor skills and it would really help his handwriting. I have a 12 yo 7th grader with horrible handwriting and he was the one I was going to just teach typing to, but your edit @ needing to write for inclass essays makes sense. I am going keep working on handwriting with him.

[C_l_e_0..Q_c]

My son also has horrible handwriting. I sorta gave up on it after a while. Now he's 11, and taking long distance classes. Homework has to be posted in, and not done on the computer. It has to be handwritten because it comes in special paper. A4 size, and double sheets that fold. It's lined too, which makes it near impossible to print on them.

My son *has* to write. Everyone of his teachers has complained of his handwriting, and he's now losing points. I regret having given up on his handwriting practise.

[Blessedfamily]

I think there is a place for handwriting and I suspect it is also good for brain development.

However torturing a child who has bad fine motor skills to produce perfect letters seems unecessary- not to mention impossible if you have one of those kids. Mine is 13 and can finally write legibly. I don't think there's anything I could have done to speed up that development- just the small amounts of daily practice that he has always done. Typing is a great skill in this day and age. Even if handwriting eventually gets relegated to the "art" catagory rather than a fucntional necessity, it is still a wonderful thing to learn to do. Many people including me actually enjoy the act of handwriting.

As always, a nice balanced approach is probably best, no need to go to either extreme.

I don't think the person who wrote the article is very balanced though- she is in reaction. As homeschoolers, we don't need to be.

 

 

From what I've read, writing is good for brain development- also typing, drawing, even when young toddlers make marks on paper.

 

I agree that balance is best- it's partially developmental. We don't rush them to get tall or lose baby teeth. On the other hand a "relative"(for that child) amount of practice helps.

[CalicoKat]

Handwriting is the one absolutely consistent 100% of the time subject my ADHDer needs. She hates it. But if we do it first it kinda sets the mood for the rest of her subject work--that her work must be done neatly and carefully.

 

We do the practice workbooks for Getty Dubay. My 9 yo is finishing up the program this year. She's a lefty and her handwriting is beautiful. Unlike he daddy's lefty scrawl.

[abbeyej]

It seems to me that this woman is choosing to throw out a *subject* based on a poor *teacher*. And the poor teaching isn't so much a matter of instructional skill, but of relational skill -- this teacher (perhaps because she's just not good at dealing with children to begin with, or perhaps also due to the stressor of having to face these state assessments at the end of the year) has made a child feel badly because of his struggle. That's wrong. She has made him believe that handwriting and writing are the same skill. Clearly they are not.

 

And I suspect from reading the article that perhaps this woman had a similar experience herself. I find it highly unusual that she's a writer and a professor who uses a pen only when she signs her credit card receipts. Unless, of course, she too struggled mightily to learn to form letters on paper, and has found ways to avoid that as an adult.

 

But in this case she should be reacting to a teacher who, instead of finding ways to strengthen this child's fine motor skills and directionality, is creating anxiety and a dislike of a basic academic skill. Instead, she wants to throw out the skill all together? It's bizarre.

 

Yes, some children struggle to learn to write. They may need more time, more exercises in motor skills (gross as well as fine, in some cases, since weak large muscle control can make fine muscle control near impossible), work on directionality, and lots and lots of encouragement. And again, more time. And since we're here on SWB's board, I'll mention again her notion of "nibbled to death by ducks" -- constant, tiny chunks of practice, over and over and over and over again...

 

Handwriting doesn't have to be beautiful. But I know precious few people for whom illegible handwriting would not be a handicap. And learning to put words on paper in an efficient manner with*out* the use of technological bypasses is an enormously useful skill for anyone.

 

I'm sorry this woman spent her time and energy writing this article rather than finding ways to encourage her son, show him that writing and handwriting *are* different, introduce him to fun games and activities that would help him with fine motor control, give his teacher what for... So many other, more productive uses of her time than maligning the teaching of this basic skill.

[Lakeside]

Here are a few links to some articles on research on the importance of handwriting. The original article I read had additional information about the links between thinking time and writing time, but I can't find that article.

 

 

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/526642/?sc=dwhr

 

http://www.vanderbilt.edu/news/releases/2007/1/18/tipsheet-vanderbilt-expert-can-comment-on-why-handwriting-still-counts-national-handwriting-day-to-be-recognized-jan-23

[swellmomma]

I haven't read your link yet, will do that later when I am done feeding the kids, but wanted to chime in.

 

I decided to teach my kids handwriting not necessarily with the thought of development, or that they would use is exclusively once they were grown. In all honesty one the main thoughts I had on why I enforce handwriting is because I want my kids to be able to read it well. I want them to be able to read the old letters my grandparents wrote to them, or the ones that my mom or myself write to them now, the journal entries, the scrapbooks etc. I don't want them to miss out on peices of their past because they could not read the writing due to me only teaching typing not cursive.

 

I am sure there is very good developmental reasons to teach it, I am also sure there is good reasons to focus on keyboarding more than cursive, but I have always taught it for the above reason, especially since my cursive is aweful and my nana had the fanciest cursive I ever saw, they need to know it really well to read it all.

[Rosie_0801]

I think it's important to be able to write reasonably well, if not prettily. I went to school with a lad who's handwriting ability never progressed past about grade 1 or 2 standard. Anyone reading it assumed he hadn't intellectually matured past grade 1 or 2 level, which of course wasn't the case. That must have become a handicap later in life...

Rosie

[siloam]

Oh she would hate it here, LOL!

 

We do everything to mastery around here, including handwriting. NONE of my kids are good at handwriting. But they all continue to practice. They have also been told that when we run out of handwriting books they will just do copywork from their literature-all the way through 12th grade if they still haven't mastered it. :glare:

 

Heather