shoulder writing and cursive

[matthewk]

I view penmenship as a vehicle for self improvement. I started this journey with the book Write Now. I've slowly been teaching myself shoulder writing and noticed, as a beginner, cursive is easier to shoulder write than print. I think it is because I lack the fine motor-skills for legible print with the newly used muscle group Any thoughts on this?

 

matthew

[Ernst Bitterman]

Get a whiteboard or a big sheet of paper, and write as though at the front of a class-- letters as big as your head! This will keep the necessary muscles engaged, keep the fingers out of the process, and turns a fine skill into an easily practiced gross one. When you feel you're doing well enough, reduce the size you write by half, and carry on until you're at the size you wish to write.

[RayMan]

I've never been able to get the knack of writing from the shoulder. Maybe some day. For now, I'm a shameless finger writer.

[Goodwhiskers]

Get a whiteboard or a big sheet of paper, and write as though at the front of a class. . . .

I agree! I started writing on whiteboards eight years ago, first for my own language studies and then for my job teaching English as a second language to adults. This forced me to find ways to write clearly, quickly and without cramping my muscles, so I unwittingly discovered shoulder writing for both block style and connected cursive. I then found myself transferring those movement patterns to my handwriting on paper. What a difference!

[HDoug]

I'm not trying to throw a wrench into the works, but the whole arm and shoulder writing technique never made sense to me. You don't write tiny letters on a paper with the same technique as writing big ones on a whiteboard directly in front of you. It's like typing using mallets.

 

Rosemary Sassoon's book, The Art and Science of Handwriting, points out the different prescribed penholds over the centuries, and also the vastly different penholds employed by contemporary writers. People invent penholds, and some of them work better than the "proper" ones. She writes, "...the statistical findings that unconventional penholds could be faster than conventional ones, proved a turning point in my own attitude to prescribing penhold. I no longer had any reservation in suggesting unconventional penholds as alternatives."

 

My own technique (or lack thereof) is to make sure that all the muscles from shoulder to fingertip are as relaxed as possible. I keep in mind the concept that strength, energy, and intent flow through the arm like water through a hose and needs an open and free flowing way to get to the paper. My main bad habit was allowing my palm/wrist to rest or "plant" on the desk or paper surface rather than gently skim over it. Once over that, my handwriting did improve.

 

I observe in my own hand movement of fingers, wrist, elbow, shoulder -- everything. My arm feels "boneless" and more like the arm of an octopus. Some would say that I have the handwriting of an octopus too, but I have some good days.

 

Again, not trying to contradict anyone. Just trying to open up the learning process to some possibilities.

 

Doug

Edited December 8, 2007 by HDoug

[matthewk]

Again, not trying to contradict anyone. Just trying to open up the learning process to some possibilities.

 

Doug

 

Writing is such a wonderful and personal thing. My definition of proper penmanship is if it is legible and comfortable for the writer. Anything else is just for kicks I personally find a lot of "beautiful" penmanship very painful to read.

 

I searched the book you quoted but I'm not sure what it's about. What has is done for you?

 

matthew

[HDoug]

I searched the book you quoted but I'm not sure what it's about. What has is done for you?

I'm still working on it. It's a collection of essays and what not from an academic (or I guess I should say "scholarly") point of view. Rosemary Sassoon began as a calligrapher. She writes, "We therefore had, just like the scribes centuries before, to be able to sublimate any features of our own personalities that might appear in our letterforms to produce letters that were exact replicas of our masters."

 

One thing that stands out about her attitude is a real appreciation of individuality in handwriting. She observed and measured children's handwriting, and marveled at their inventiveness. She realizes fully that some write with their right hand, and some with their left, and some have long fingers, and some short fingers:

"Letters are a creative statement. We all produce our personally designed letters within our own handwriting so maybe it should all start with valuing the individuality of the written trace instead of what the teaching of handwriting has become -- the copying of an arbitrarily imposed model."

Ouch! -- that may rile up some people, but to me it provides enlightened encouragement. I plan to post a review of this book once I've read and digested it, but so far, it's a wonderful book to ride along with.

 

Doug

Edited December 11, 2007 by HDoug

[dilg]

I'm a Lefty and have characteristically bad overhand writing. About a month ago I set a goal of 'repairing' my handwriting to something legible, and was lucky to find this site shortly thereafter. What an eye-opener to turn my paper clockwise, discover italic handwriting, and now to learn about shoulder writing! My hand muscles are almost too shocked by the change to impose bad habits

 

Despite having never used a shoulder technique in my handwriting or sketching before, I found it to produce amazing results in just a couple hours practice, compared to finger-writing. The biggest issue I have with left-handed underhand finger writing is drawing the vertical lines of characters. It requires a push movement very much like throwing a dart. For me, this movement produces wavering lines and triggers muscle memory from my overhand writing which pushes the pen towards the 10 or 11 o’ clock position. What seems to work best for me is to use the shoulder/arm movement for vertical lines, and use the fingers more for the loops and horizontal movements.

 

As someone new to all of this, I’d like to know if by adopting a shoulder technique am I setting myself up for problems later on? Are there any ‘gotchas’ to shoulder writing, such as difficulty writing without a flat surface underneath the work? I’m really excited about the results but would rather not start off with any new bad habits.

 

Thanks,

Jared

 

[Clancy Boy]

Please excuse my ignorance, but what is the benefit of shoulder-writing?

 

[wdyasq]

Please excuse my ignorance, but what is the benefit of shoulder-writing?

Everything.

 

Ron

[Clancy Boy]

Please excuse my ignorance, but what is the benefit of shoulder-writing?

Everything.

 

Ron

 

Can you be a little more specific? Or point me to a link?

[wdyasq]

Please excuse my ignorance, but what is the benefit of shoulder-writing?

Everything.

 

Ron

 

Can you be a little more specific? Or point me to a link?

Shoulder writing is using the entire arm and mainly the shoulder when writing. This method was once taught in American schools. When it is even semi-mastered, the writing speed will be higher than 'finger writing', the letters will be smoother and the hands will not cramp as quickly after long periods of writing.

 

Perhaps someone will have a link, I do not.

 

Ron

[finalidid]

Highly recommended for your THINKING as well as your writing. Requires larger desk, better chair angle, that sort of thing. If you have the room, set up a two-foot by two-foot desk at MINIMUM.

 

I do agree with some of the comments in this thread, that different muscles should be engaged for different purposes. "Like typing with mallets." Very funny. And apropos.

 

For me, as a lefty, I had a lifetime of teachers giving up on me -- or not giving a damn, since I was a phenomenally good student on all other subjects aside from neatness. But as I aged I realized that a lot of my mental processes were getting stymied by my manual process. I want to be a WRITER, not a can't-get-it-written-fast-enough-er. When I journalize in my lap or in a cramped position, I get frustrated and annoyed. When I journalize on a firm, solid, large writing surface, engaging the proper mix of finger, hand, and shoulder movements, I become a brilliant expositor of the miracles of life (at least, in my own mind).

 

I don't necessarily say shoulder writing alone is the solution alone to all manual problems. But I do say you have to give yourself a chance to see its benefits. And then mix and match as necessary for your own physique and preferences. Best case scenario would be, that each person masters a nice useful "finger writing," and also masters shoulder writing, and then creates his own perfect mix. But first you have to master both.

 

Edited January 3, 2008 by finalidid

[beezaur]

A lot of the benefit to "shoulder writing" is that the muscles used to do everything with your fingers are really not that capable of the fine control required for good penmanship. It seems counter-intuitive, but the larger muscles are capable of better control for longer periods of time.

 

I think the term "shoulder writing" can give the wrong idea. It isn't like you only use your shoulders. The idea isn't so much to move your whole arm as a unit as it is to make use of the larger muscles of the whole arm. The fingers do a tiny bit of the work, just not the whole job. Finalidid describes it well: "the proper mix of finger, hand, and shoulder movements. . ."

 

The way I learned was to stop using my fingers altogether, and only use my arm muscles. I think it is good to pretend your wrist is rigid when starting, in order to better train the previously unused arm muscles. Things were a mess for a few weeks of practice. However, once my muscles began to get the knack of it, things improved past where they began.

 

Scott

[mohdrizalrazali]

I'm a newbie too who's learning to improve on my cursive handwriting. I'm currently learning my italics and joining them together like how I'm being instructed by the book, Calligraphy For Dummies. Whilst working on the exercise in the book, I decided to take a break and started to surf the internet. Whilst surfing through FPN, I got to this website http://briem.ismennt.is/4/4.1.1a/4.1.1.1.quick.htm which provided an interesting method of learning italics and cursive writing. I also got onto http://www.paperpenalia.com/handwriting.html which describes shoulder vs. finger writing.

 

Here's my thoughts on both subjects. I agree that shoulder writing is a better technique for extended period of writing and produces more consistent cursive writing results. Why does it work? My simple logic dictates that the shoulder (in a writing motion) has lesser variable planes which provides it more consistency in movement. Secondly, it's also a bigger muscle which takes longer to tire. The wrist is very, very flexible with so many opportunity to move around (which makes consistent cursive a bit challenging). Because of that, extra control needs to be put in place which also takes up more energy in writing.

 

I came up with this analysis by looking at my golf swing (which is really pathetic). I've had my golf teacher always rebuking me for using too much wrist / neck movement etc. which indicates too many moving parts. The golf machine, Iron Byron is simplistic in mechanism which produces very consistent results.

 

Net - I like this technique and it's working for me. It'll take me some weeks yet before I dare to share my handwriting on FPN.

 

My 2 cents worth,

Rizal

[Thor]

I have to agree that I disagree with the shoulder writing thing, with the exception that it might be easier for making calligraphy. I've been playing drums for ...geez, about 10 years now, and was heavily involved in corps style percussion for a large chunk of that time. In order to be able to correctly execute all of the grace notes and have a good sound quality out of the drum, one needed to learn to use the fingers to control the stick. Why? The reasoning was simple - the smaller muscles that make up your forearm and hand are much more capable of performing the fine dexterity needed to play properly.

 

To me it goes the same way with writing - perhaps it's just because I've learned to write one way, but my writing is far neater when I write from the wrist (outside of the fact that my handwriting is the best when I don't pay any attention to how I'm writing). I just can't accept that your shoulder muscles are better at performing fine dexterity.

 

On the other hand (pun intended), for something like calligraphy I can see shoulder motions being better, given that (at least for how I write) my hand needs to be planted write, which would sort of force the pen to rotate, where you would want it to stay flat with respect to the writing surface.

[retypepassword]

I've found that partial shoulder writing makes my writing look more relaxed; my italics are detached. I say partial because I only use my shoulder for vertical lines; my fingers are used for everything else. Besides that, I'd have to agree with Thor on using the shoulders to form whole letters.

 

Sort off topic: Is shoulder writing supposed to reduce writing cramp? My arm starts hurting after about half an hour of writing, and I'm holding my pen extremely lightly --- sometimes, it almost falls out of my hand.

Edited January 13, 2008 by retypepassword