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Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

bbc.co.uk

11–20 of 106 posts

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#11
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US they've stopped teaching cursive, at least in some areas.

In the right hands and with the right practice, cursive is beautiful and a work of art.

Yes, skilled penmanship and calligraphy is wonderful. But in my personal life, the majority of times I encounter cursive, I can not even read the handwriting, which is, to put it lightly, bad.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#12
post #7
post #2

Look how neat that handwriting is. None of that nonsense scrawl they introduce in KS2 now (I believe Americans call it cursive)

In the US they've stopped teaching cursive, at least in some areas.

Good riddance. If people want to learn those arts they can always go to the monetary with their sensei.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#14
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US they've stopped teaching cursive, at least in some areas.

Good riddance. If people want to learn those arts they can always go to the monetary with their sensei.

The writing on the message isn't cursive.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#15
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US they've stopped teaching cursive, at least in some areas.

In the right hands and with the right practice, cursive is beautiful and a work of art.

And the rest of the time it's illegible scrawl and has no place in basic education.

Even [0], the US declaration of independence, is horrendous to read compared to this 8 year old girl's handwriting.

https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-declaration-of-independenc...?

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#16

> found bottle in 2020 > The Norwegian sent a Facebook message for Joanna, but the former Peterhead schoolgirl did not spot it until Monday [January 2022] This pretty much sums up Facebook/Instagram inboxes.

It feels somehow significant that the Facebook reply ended up being its own message in a bottle.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#17
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US they've stopped teaching cursive, at least in some areas.

Good riddance. If people want to learn those arts they can always go to the monetary with their sensei.

If we're honest, most of the actual content of the first 5-7 years or so of schooling is unimportant and ultimately forgotten, save for reading, writing, and basic arithmetic. Ideally some basic computer use too. But it's not like every moment spent on cursive writing in primary school would be a moment taken away from some critical, core subject. Aside from those few key building blocks, most of what you're doing in early school is learning socialization and 'how to learn'.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#18
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the right hands and with the right practice, cursive is beautiful and a work of art.

And the rest of the time it's illegible scrawl and has no place in basic education. Even [0], the US declaration of independence, is horrendous to read compared to this 8 year old girl's handwriting. https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-declaration-of-independenc... ?

The chancery/round hand style used in the Declaration of Independence is not a style of cursive much used in the last ~150 years. So it's potentially quite difficult without some practice.

A major part of why we teach (or taught) writing cursive is because it also helps teach you to read cursive. You may not need to write much, but until recently you would encounter written cursive all the time. In my experience it's still common enough. It'd be awkward to be unable to read the New Year's cards from my older relatives.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#19

> found bottle in 2020 > The Norwegian sent a Facebook message for Joanna, but the former Peterhead schoolgirl did not spot it until Monday [January 2022] This pretty much sums up Facebook/Instagram inboxes.

It feels somehow significant that the Facebook reply ended up being its own message in a bottle.

Savage. But accurate. We should start making articles about that. Person checks their nested nested spam, other inbox on Facebook and finds endearing highly relevant message from the turn of the decade.

Re: Message in a bottle from Scottish girl found in Norway after 25 years

#20
post #2

Look how neat that handwriting is. None of that nonsense scrawl they introduce in KS2 now (I believe Americans call it cursive)

Some people, including some commenters down thread seem to think cursive is about being fancy. It’s not, it’s an efficiency play for writing faster. That’s of course useless in modern day with so little actual hand writing. So it’s less common in schools
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