Newshour Features Cursive

[proton007]

I find cursive hard to read, even "well written" cursive. Reading old letters is like deciphering a foreign language.

 

If the first and most important part of writing is readability, then why add in a whol eload of loops to obfuscate it?

 

My grades in high school leaped when I was allowed to stop using cursive and start using print.

 

I doubt there's a relationship between grades and cursive/print...both can be legible or illegible. Neither do I believe cursive is hard to read.

 

You say you find Cursive hard to read, but you 'stopped' using cursive in high school. So how did you write it in the first place?

 

The sole reason of using cursive (and loops) is that it increases speed without sacrificing legibility. I believe Cursive has a higher wpm limit where it starts to become illegible as compared to print.

Edited May 29, 2014 by proton007

[NevynM]

 

I doubt there's a relationship between grades and cursive/print...both can be legible or illegible. Neither do I believe cursive is hard to read.

 

You say you find Cursive hard to read, but you 'stopped' using cursive in high school. So how did you write it in the first place?

 

The sole reason of using cursive (and loops) is that it increases speed without sacrificing legibility. I believe Cursive has a higher wpm limit where it starts to become illegible as compared to print.

 

My cursive was illegable, even to me. My print is ledgable to other people. Therefore what I put on paper was able to be marked in a more sensible way, and my grades improved. I'm not joking when I say I moved from c/d in English at yr7 to A* at GCSE. I moved up a set at the end of the year I switched.

 

I find *other peoples* cursive hard to read is what I mean. I have to decipher individual characters. It may well just be lack of practice, but I *do* find it hard. So I would argue that the "without losing ledgibility" is at best subjective.

[proton007]

So I would argue that the "without losing ledgibility" is at best subjective.

 

Of course. The handwriting has to be legible first in order to lose legibility.

[Mickey]

 

Of course. The handwriting has to be legible first in order to lose legibility.

 

+1 and I'm sure you'd agree that legibility is a two way street, i.e., the scribbler cannot be held wholly responsible for under-qualified would be readers.

[CaptainBA]

I find it interesting that people have faster cursive writing than print. My standard handwriting is like a draftsman: all uppercase letters. When I switch to print or cursive, I write MUCH slower. And yes, I took cursive in grade school.

[proton007]

I find it interesting that people have faster cursive writing than print. My standard handwriting is like a draftsman: all uppercase letters. When I switch to print or cursive, I write MUCH slower. And yes, I took cursive in grade school.

 

Depends on the standards you set for yourself. If you're trying to replicate Palmer perfectly, ofcourse you can't write too fast, even the drills have a certain wpm listed underneath them. However, once you've practised enough, added your own flourishes and adapted the style to your taste, you can achieve speed and legibility at the same time.

 

I just feel most of us write Cursive under the looming image of a strict and perfectionist schoolteacher who'll rap us on the knuckles lest we deviate from the shapes drawn in the exercise book. That image drives the 'perfectionist' attitude when we try to write in cursive, and is also the basis of liberation felt when using print.

 

In addition, Cursive is a fine motor skill, and like any other fine motor skill, needs patience and persistence to achieve proficiency followed by regular usage to maintain those finer controls; the absence of regular usage in our modern lives causes our skill and confidence to deteriorate, the obvious result of which is slow writing speed as one tries to be more deliberate.

Edited June 1, 2014 by proton007

[proton007]

 

+1 and I'm sure you'd agree that legibility is a two way street, i.e., the scribbler cannot be held wholly responsible for under-qualified would be readers.

 

Yes.

Unfortunately, in this era when a computer/tablet is omnipresent alternative for readers and simultaneously a threat to handwriting, the scribbler gets burdened (rather unfairly) with the responsibility of making his/her handwriting more legible.