FULLERTON, California (Reuters) - A generation of children who learned to write on screens is now going old school.
Starting this year, California grade school students are required to learn cursive handwriting, after the skill had fallen out of fashion in the computer age.
Assembly Bill 446, sponsored by former elementary school teacher Sharon Quirk-Silva and signed into law in October, requires handwriting instruction for the 2.6 million Californians in grades one to six, roughly ages 6 to 12, and cursive lessons for the “appropriate” grade levels - generally considered to be third grade and above.
Experts say learning cursive improves cognitive development, reading comprehension and fine motor skills, among other benefits. Some educators also find value in teaching children to read historic documents and family letters from generations past.
You must be right handed. Left handed people generally get more hand strain from cursive as you must constantly push the pen against the page as opposed to dragging it as right handed people do. That and the constant need to write at an absurd angle lest you smudge all the diligent work.
It was my understanding that left-handed people experience more hand strain with any handwriting, for the same reasons? But yes, I am right-handed for writing.
Its especially pronounced with joined style or cursive writing due to always pushing compared to block writing allowing small rests when picking the pen up between letters where there is no added friction against the page. After writing a page or two there is a noticeable difference in the fatigue between both forms
That’s good to know, and something I hadn’t been aware of before. I can understand a bit more the resistance for “forced” learning to write cursive being a part of core curriculum. Though I still think it’s something important, or at least beneficial, to learn to read and understand.