When I was in grade school, I remember when we learned to do cursive writing.  (We had been printing our letters for several years.) It started by being shown how to correctly hold the pencil in our hand. (We used pen later on.)  Then, we began to practice by drawing circles, loops and other movements.  

The special paper we used to learn how to print, came back out again.  The paper consisted of rows made of two straight lines with a third, middle line made of dashes.  We were instructed on how to practice the segments of a letter which would be combined to form one whole letter.  Once that was mastered, words could be formed by connecting the specific letters into words.

In my class, the word “penmanship” was used as the term for cursive writing, even though penmanship, as defined in different dictionaries, can be handwriting in pen, the art of skill in writing by hand, even as calligraphy.  Printing was less formal, and as such, seemed to have a lesser value.

In 2010, Common Core standards no longer included the teaching of cursive in the curriculum.  But further research into the benefits of learning cursive has had schools rethink that decision..  Since then, over two dozen states have reintroduced it into the curriculum. There is some disagreement about the benefits of teaching it, but research has discovered many reasons for learning this skill.

Some of the pro-cursive arguments include:  “improved neural connections by a more dynamic interplay between the left and right cerebral hemispheres which helps build neural pathways that increase mental effectiveness.“  In other words, it’s good for the brain. Other reasons include: increased writing speed, the ability to read cursive and improved fine motor skills. Most articles I read had at least six more reasons.  Some had more. And yet a few other articles did not see it as being useful. I disagreed with those.

Regardless of the reasons, I think that writing in cursive has a place in the school curriculum.  It demonstrates an acquired skill that distinguishes one person’s signature from other ones. It requires concentration and attention to detail in order to learn the proper strokes.  It is artistic. And it can be fun. That’s about it. And that is enough for me.