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Penmanship

jaredgorski.org

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Re: Penmanship

#11

Post by bmj »

IceMetalPunk wrote: post #3

Fun (or maybe not-so-fun) fact: my 15-year-old nephew recently had to sign a document for some volunteer work, and he didn't know how. Apparently, schools no longer teach cursive, not even enough for kids to learn how to sign their own names for legal documents. The secretary was just like, "Yeah, we get that a lot; he can just print his name instead, that's fine." I've always had shitty handwriting, and when I was i…

Given my age, I learned cursive in school, and spent my college years taking handwritten notes. My cursive was pretty terrible, much like my father's. However, he spent years working as a draftsman, and then as an estimator (before the days of personal computers), so his printing was very similar to the form described in the linked article. So, I taught myself to write in the same form. I still handwrite a lot (journalling, drafts of papers), because I find it easier to "think out loud" with a pencil in my hand.

Re: Penmanship

#12

Post by sanj »

yodon wrote: post #10

Every couple years, I'll adjust my doodling habits to a set of patterns based on a simplification of the Palmer method. This simple doodling practice has given me the best handwriting at just about every place I've worked in the past ten years. Draw two horizontal lines about half an inch apart and in the space between them doodle one of: + continuous clockwise stream of overlapping circles (imagine you flattened a s…

Can you link to a pic or vid of this? I think a visual aid would help.

Re: Penmanship

#13

Post by doingtheiroming »

Cursive is still taught with ferocity in Dutch primary schools. When done well it's pretty, enables rapid writing and note taking, and at least part of learning to write that way is to learn how to read it. Since everyone older than you will still write that way, it's useful to be able to read it.

Re: Penmanship

#14

Post by yodon »

sanj wrote: post #12
yodon wrote: post #10

Every couple years, I'll adjust my doodling habits to a set of patterns based on a simplification of the Palmer method. This simple doodling practice has given me the best handwriting at just about every place I've worked in the past ten years. Draw two horizontal lines about half an inch apart and in the space between them doodle one of: + continuous clockwise stream of overlapping circles (imagine you flattened a s…

Can you link to a pic or vid of this? I think a visual aid would help.

Something like this [0], but don't worry about the counting, just doodle the patterns

[0]https://fcmdsc.files.wordpress.com/2010/06/exercises.jpg

Re: Penmanship

#16

Post by jevgeni »

I only write by hand, when I need to quickly note down something for myself. For that purpose cursive is by *orders of magnitude* better than "typesetting by hand".

Re: Penmanship

#17

Post by NoGravitas »

> In penmanship class, we learned a standard cursive font. I think it’s the standard cursive font, in fact.

He's wrong that there's a standard cursive. Different countries and different centuries have used a variety of different cursives. Most Americans who were taught cursive in school learned either Zaner-Bloser or D'Nealian, which both derive from Palmer. Both of them are terrible. They have indistinct letter shapes that degrade horribly when written quickly.

Cursive Italic handwriting is much more legible, if slightly slower. There are popular systems including Getty-Dubay Italic and Barchowsky Fluent Handwriting. Both of those are fine, and should be strongly preferred to 19th-20th century cursive.

Re: Penmanship

#18

Post by traceroute66 »

One of the most spectacular examples of penmanship I ever saw was sitting in a meeting with a lady who could effortlessly write phrases and paragraphs in italics... cursive italics ! It was perfect in every possible measurement. (And no this wasn't decades ago, this is 21st century).

But I digress! I did also want to state that I disagree with the author's statement "Nobody writes it anymore".

Clearly the author has not met many doctors or lawyers or spent much time in Europe.

Cursive is very much still in use by all three of the above.

Re: Penmanship

#19

Post by giraffe_lady »

trey-jones wrote: post #6

Covid 19 is going to have introduced a generation with the worst handwriting we've seen so far. By worst I mean both incorrect and illegible, and I'm basing this observations of my daughters who were in 1st and 4th grade during the first lockdown. Admittedly, they already had what I would call "poor" handwriting. I have no problem with the idea that legible is the primary criterium for handwriting. Correctness as I a…

> Correctness as I and my parents and grandparents learned is really just a matter of self-respect, I think.

Fucking weird angle on that imo. It's a skill with broad application but low impact for most people. The actual techniques for good handwriting aren't taught in school anymore, so people will have to decide to value it, seek it out, and practice it themselves. You might think they should, but if they disagree it doesn't indicate that they lack self-respect.

An almost infinite number of skills fit into this honestly. Kitchen knife work, drawing, whistle or sing a tune, phonetic alphabet, advanced mental arithmetic, basic carpentry, sewing, plant care, orienteering, bread baking, small engine repair, knot tying, etc etc etc etc.

Anyone can learn a bunch of these to varying degrees and they'll be frequently valuable through life, and potentially contribute significantly to identity and yes self respect. Which specific ones someone ends up with is pretty much meaningless though. I mean this kindly but there's nothing special about penmanship just because you value it.

Re: Penmanship

#20

Post by usrn »

traceroute66 wrote: post #18

One of the most spectacular examples of penmanship I ever saw was sitting in a meeting with a lady who could effortlessly write phrases and paragraphs in italics... cursive italics ! It was perfect in every possible measurement. (And no this wasn't decades ago, this is 21st century). But I digress! I did also want to state that I disagree with the author's statement "Nobody writes it anymore" . Clearly the author has…

They taught millennials to write in cursive. I only stopped because some of my teachers couldn't read it. It took work to write in print as effortlessly.
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