Teaching cursive is dying?

[Chris]

Weirdly, I go through this same discussion every few months. I've been a writer for many years now and it comes up repeatedly.


Personally, I don't see a point to cursive. I've never understood the point - and I remember even when I was first taught it in handwriting class in P4 (age 8-9) I thought my writing looked neater when it wasn't joined up.

I just looked over the notepad I've been writing in for the past month. Apparently I write in cursive when I'm trying to write quickly and/or really into what I'm working on. I still think my writing looks neatest when each character is printed individually. Cursive feels lazy to me, because I just think of it as a form of speedwriting rather than taking my time to make the writing look fully legible / pretty.

 

[ForgottenT]

When I write I always write in cursive it?s so much faster.
But my handwriting sucks, thank goodness computers are taking over lol.

 

[Superpenguin]

I was taught cursive in 3rd and 4th grade, and had to use it on a few essays in 6th grade. I still know the letters. Honestly, though, cursive only benefits you in teaching you how to sign your name and gets you in the habit of writing faster.

Plus, my penmanship is much neater and legible in cursive.

 

[SecondSider]

I still write in cursive...

 

[EpicGamer12]

I learned cursive in Grade 3 and I just can't do Z, mainly because I don't remember it.
I think it's important in order for you to do your own signature for cheques and such.

 

[Touko]

I learned cursive in Grade 3 as well, then it just stopped. But I can still do cursive since it's faster to write for me but it's too messy so I just stopped cursive.

 

[FiFi]

There was a lot of emphasis on it when I was in year 3-6 so I did it because we were literally forced to (if work wasn't written in cursive, we had to do the whole thing again) Then when I got to secondary school, no one cared. My handwriting it pretty neat but it's not cursive.

 

[Caius]

 

[beffa]

i was taught cursive when i was very young, we were practically forced to but i didn't most of the time. it made my work look messy most of the time. most of the people i went to primary school with still write joined, but i prefer to just write without joining. makes it 10x easier and neater for me.

 

[DJStarstryker]

Cursive has been irrelevant for years now. I *do* think it's useful to learn for reading purposes. There are some fonts that are cursive. There are also some people who do occasionally write in cursive.

I haven't used cursive for writing purposes since maybe middle school*. Even when I was in high school (in the late 90s) most teachers preferred you to type up papers if you had access to a computer at home. My handwriting has always been terrible, but it has just gotten worse over the years thanks to doing so little writing by hand.

*My signature started as cursive but has evolved over the years. It now looks like a doctor's signature and is completely unreadable as my actual name. However, this is actually the signature recognized by my bank as my signature, so changing it to be more legible would make it look like a forgery, ironically.

 

[beebs]

I'm kind of stunned that there are so many people that don't know cursive! I feel like I'm part of a secret society. o(｀ω?*)o

 

[Ashtot]

I can write my name in cursive...

 

[puppy]

i was taught cursive 3rd-4th grade but i dont use it any more
i can still use it. just takes me longer than print

i will say that reading someone else's cursive is a pain.

 

[GOAT]

I didn't even know there were people who still didn't know cursive. I learned it when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade, at my elementary school. Now I'm a tutor back at my elementary school, and they're still using the same packets they used for me way back when!

 

[Redlatios]

I love cursive! But yeah, they are not teaching it anymore and that sucks.

 

[Aquadirt]

It's sad to see an art fade into non-use, but people don't tend to send handwritten letters or anything that really needs it. Most things have been typed out on the computer or a phone or something.

 

[Suicune]

I think cursive is beautiful and it's a shame that it's kind of dying out, but it's not really used anymore. I find that writing in print is much faster than cursive, although I do connect a few letters together sort of like cursive. The only time it's really used anymore is for signatures and on the SAT when they make you write out an honor-code paragraph thing (that was the longest part of the SAT, I swear).

 

[HULK G]

i was taught cursive 3rd-4th grade but i dont use it any more
i can still use it. just takes me longer than print

i will say that reading someone else's cursive is a pain.

Especially Doctors. I'm amazed how those Pharmacist can actually read it.

 

[GriffinMaverick]

They tried to teach me cursive in like 3-4th grade but it didn't really stick, I can write my first and last name but that's about the extent of it. And my handwriting is horrible with just normal writing anyways, I've been typing on a computer since I was like five or six so I'm loads better at it. In fact I haven't written more than perhaps a paragraph (excluding signatures) on paper in probably two to three years. :/ I know that's probably a bad thing but that's just the world that we live in now, everything is digital and in my opinion that is better. Less people using pen and paper means the trees might get left alone for a bit, lol.

 

[demoness]

Cursive was still part of the curriculum when I was in 3rd-6th grade, so it was second nature to me until my hands became crippled due to muscular dystrophy and I could only type with software. It is sad to see it fade into obscurity from an aesthetic and educational standpoint, but I'm glad its professional relevance has waned. I no longer have to authorize documents by telling someone else to sign my name.