Cursive Writing in the News again.

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CREID

CREID

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I was talking to some of our young people at church a few weeks ago and they were telling me that can't write in cursive. Only two of the eight said they could even read it! These kids were in the 6th grade. I was totally blown away by this. They said they have not been taught this in school.
 
tbroye said:
When we give the Grandkids present or send them Card we write in Cursive drive them crazy. Told them once it was secret code for their parents
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Many old documents and letters were written in cursive. If a researcher can't read it they are at a serious disadvantage trying to research things like "letters from soldiers to home" in all the wars up to Viet Nam and some of them. Letters exchanged between scientists, sociologists, politicians, governments etc. Notes kept of meetings and many other important historical documents.
 
Can you imagine a High School valedictorian, standing up in front of their school in the auditorium, being completely embarrassed because they were asked to read "The Declaration of Independence", only to find that they can't read cursive?


"Ummm .... do you have a copy of this in English?"
 
People interested in historical research really must read cursive -- there are so many historical documents for which there is no printed copy available. That is especially true of documents that are one of a kind where no copies were ever made. Millions of them exist. Whole collections of letters - I knew one person (an elderly woman when I knew her) who had saved every letter she ever got from the time she was about 25 years old. She had a few shoe boxes full of them. I've read of a number of famous historical people who exchanged letters with others and both parties saved the letters....
 
It has been quite some time but aren't diplomas written out in fancy script?? How do they read their own diplomas or are they now printing them out. :smile: Maybe they have someone read it to them. Getting jobs in the corporate world and not being able to read cursive writing, wow.
 
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CREID said:
TonyL said:
The CR is 1874. Interesting to go back 140 years.
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Hey Tony, I relearned cursive again:biggrin:
I asked Jeff if he could add it to the fonts and he came thru. :biggrin::biggrin:
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How did you do that???:smile:


I found it. That is cool. Will be like writing in code as someone mentioned

I found it. That is cool. Will be like writing in code as someone mentioned.

It is a little shorter. Just wanted to see.
 
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Since Tony brought up Spencerian. . .

If you are in the neighborhood of a major pen show(maybe even one of the smaller ones) check out the list of exhibitors to see if any calligraphers or master penmen will be there. Michael Sull (Reagan's calligrapher) has been at the Ohio Pen Show the past several years and always gives an interesting presentation on some aspect of penmanship of penmanship or history. In addition he will sign your name for you in Spencerian. He publishes instructional books on Spencerian writing and American Cursive Handwriting at his website:Spencerian Script ::: American Cursive. American Cursive is basically an instruction manual that he wrote primarily (I think) at the request of homeschoolers.

Another name to look for is Deb Basel.

A Little bit of History courtesy of Michael Sull: The Declaration of Independence was written in a script known as English Round Hand. It was the also know as Copperplate from the engravings made for printing and was the most common form of writing at the time. It was also extremely formal and exacting, with all sorts of rules, written entirely with the finger muscles, and much conducive to writer's cramp.

Platt Rogers Spencer, on the other hand, took his forms from nature, and rather than using just the fingers to so the writing he used the whole arm, thus large muscles, thus less tiring. Spencerian script was fast and legible an remained in use as the prime method of business correspondence from the 1850's into the 20th century.https:

Here is an interesting TED talk titled: Why Write? by Jake Weidmann (a very young master penman):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85bqT904VWA

Not a very smooth flow here today. More of a raging torrent. At least it didn't last long

Sorry,

Bill
 
Learning disorder

CREID said:
Indiana lawmakers and educators discuss a bill that would mandate cursive writing | KATU

Something they said in the video I never thought of. If you can't at least read cursive, you can't read the Constitution of the United States of America. I know there is typed copies, but when I was in school we had copies of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
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One of my sons had A-D-D " short attension span" so they tough him to write in cusive. Now he has real good handwriting and out grew his probled he sends his mother mail with pencel skeches on the letters.
 
Seriously? I never had the required attention span to devote myself to writing, and while I enjoyed writing about various things, my hand would often cramp up before I get very far with it.

I certainly also never outgrew my ADHD (Attention Deficiency and Hypertension Disorder). This is why, to this day, I'm still always jumping around project to project.
 
Skie_M said:
Seriously? I never had the required attention span to devote myself to writing, and while I enjoyed writing about various things, my hand would often cramp up before I get very far with it.

I certainly also never outgrew my ADHD (Attention Deficiency and Hypertension Disorder). This is why, to this day, I'm still always jumping around project to project.
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I wasn't diagnosed ADD until I was in my fifties! It explained a lot. Now I make LOTS of lists, write notes to myself, use a timer, etc. But I still spend half my life looking for something I had in my hand two minutes ago! And I usually have at least five or six books going all the time. I love to read, but I get bored with a story and lay it aside for a while and pick up another one I'm reading. I don't seem to have any problem keeping track of all the story lines.
 
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Skie_M said:
Seriously? I never had the required attention span to devote myself to writing, and while I enjoyed writing about various things, my hand would often cramp up before I get very far with it.

I certainly also never outgrew my ADHD (Attention Deficiency and Hypertension Disorder). This is why, to this day, I'm still always jumping around project to project.
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We used to call that multi-tasking and thought it was a good thing.
 
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