I read with great pleasure a recent Baltimore Banner article about the rebirth of cursive writing instruction in several local school systems.
Across the nation, cursive instruction was sacrificed, beginning around 2010, as Common Core curriculum standards were implemented.The purpose of Common Core was to standardize instruction so a fourth-grader in California was learning the same content at the same pace as fourth-graders in Texas or Alabama or Maine. According to theory, a child whose family moved across the country could be seamlessly plunked down in a new school and pick up right where she left off at her old school.
But somewhere along the line, with a school day packed full of required academic elements to satisfy those new standards, cursive writing was kicked out of many school districts.
I remember being sad for future generations when cursive disappeared. I was the education reporter for a daily newspaper when Common Core was implemented, so I followed it closely as it pertained to the local school system.
My memories of my earliest cursive instruction are wonderful. One of the most exciting things about entering second grade was the knowledge that cursive writing was on the agenda. I had a terrific teacher that year — Miss Anna Nistico at Mars Estates Elementary — and she was both talented and patient as she led her latest group of 7-year-olds through the loops and curly-Qs and tails of cursive. We first learned each individual letter of the alphabet, filling entire sheets of paper with just one letter, carefully practiced over and over again. After we mastered the entire alphabet, we learned how to loop those individual letters together to form words.
We wrote on rough, rather pulpy, lumpy light beige, almost gray paper that had two solid lines split in half with a dotted line, which created one lane for writing. The guides were there to show sizing for upper and lower case letters. Because the paper quality wasn’t great, the over-zealous erasing of inexperienced pencil-holders could result in a hole. To that end, Miss Nistico had a few rules: If we made a mistake, we were not to erase, attempt to write over the error or scribble it out. We were to draw a single line through our mistake and move on.
It was a wonderful day when a paper came back with a gold star or when extra careful penmanship elicited a compliment from the teacher we all adored.
I am more than 60 years removed from that classroom, and can still smell that paper, still feel the awkwardness of the fat pencils we used, and still revel in the thrill of mastering a new letter as we progressed through the alphabet.
Over the remaining years of public school, I took great pride in having good handwriting and worked to develop my own style. In high school, I dropped a lot of the curly-Qs on some upper case letters and I customized my lower case Rs because I was never happy with my rendition of the formal, “approved” style.
In college, for speed purposes, I developed a hybrid style of cursive/manuscript for note-taking but always used my formal style for assignments to be turned in.
I have always loved doodling and never met a pen I didn’t like. Somewhere along the line, I bought an instructional book and specialized pens and taught myself calligraphy. Today, most of my handwriting is confined to mailing cards and making lists but I still love the physical act of writing. And I’m convinced my penmanship is terrific with certain pens and crappy with others, although I also admit that a 20-year journalism career destroyed my handwriting.
So it is those fond 60-year-old memories that made me sad when I heard that most schools had eliminated cursive, and made me happy as I’ve watched the resurgence of what I consider an art form.
According to the Banner article, Baltimore and Harford counties are both reintroducing cursive to all second- and third-grade classes. Baltimore County’s move follows its pilot program held last year at 24 schools.
“Educators and researchers who embrace cursive say the skill can help students’ motor skills, improve their writing’s legibility and even help them better retain what they’re learning,” the article by reporter Kristin Griffith stated.
Much has been made in recent years — perhaps decades now — of the perceived inability of youngsters to communicate verbally or in written form because of the increased time spent on screens and the impersonal communication of text messages, email and social media. I personally have worked with younger colleagues who would rather die than pick up a phone and talk to someone in person. They depended on email before texting was prevalent, and I would imagine the ubiquitous presence of smart phones has exasperated that situation. Couple that with folks who can’t write in a fast, efficient manner and you have a communications disaster waiting to happen. It’s more bizarre when communicating is the job.
So this doodler is very happy that cursive is making a comeback and I hope there are many gold stars in the future for this year’s second-graders.
Thanks for reading and feel free to critique my writing!
