Getting Cursive to 'stick' outside of handwriting practice

lil' ladies · Post by **lil' ladies** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 6:12 am

Last year we started cursive with handwriting without tears, but I found that my girls were only doing cursive at handwriting lesson time and printing the rest of the time.

We will be doing Cheerful Cursive with Bigger starting soon, and I'm wondering how do you get cursive to stick?

I was thinking of typing up their copywork (Poetry) and spelling dictation passages in cursive print to encourage them to use cursive more. Has anyone else done this? How did it go? Any other suggestions to help them switch from printing to cursive?

inHistiming · Post by **inHistiming** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 6:57 am

You could just present it as a requirement for school...such as, "All writing assignments need to be done in cursive from now on" and then give them some leeway for a period of time to get used to doing it. Maybe start small, with just writing spelling words in cursive, then add other subjects as each thing gets incorporated? We are actually still working on this, because my son prefers to print as well. Please let us know how it goes...and I'm sure some other ladies will chime in here.

joyfulheart · Post by **joyfulheart** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 9:15 am

Yes, in PS, that's how they do it.

They start off simple.

First they add cursive to the spelling practice.

Then, they add cursive to the spelling tests.
Then, they have to do one paper a week (3-5 sentences) all in cursive.

water2wine · Post by **water2wine** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 10:00 am

We use Startwrite and it is helping a lot. I use it for copywork of the Proverbs in Bigger and sometimes the poems. I don't know if this program has anything close to cheerful cursive or not. We are doing Italic and it has that. But you could look at the styles and see what it says online. What I like about it is you can put anything in there and have it all degrees of dotted to solid. So it gives some flexibility. You could do spelling words, Bible verses, science facts with writing under it or the Bible verses connected to science in HOD.

We are still not completely there but I have seen great improvement using this to help bring the concept that it needs to be neat and in cursive for some of my kids.

There are a couple of generic cursives there that might work for you if you look at the samples. http://www.drawyourworld.com/dnealian.html

blessedmomof4 · Post by **blessedmomof4** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 12:14 pm

Hmm-for my son, he just decided printing was easier

He is in 10th grade ps now, and at that point, the teachers are just happy if they can READ the students' writing...He does print fairly neatly...
My 8th grader has lovely cursive, because she likes to do it.
My 4th grader vacillates between the two on her own time.
My 3rd grader is just learning.
And Mom-I learned lovely cursive in parochial school and was required to use it for all assignments from 3rd through 8th grade-now, I write a combination of cursive and print

If anyone learns how to make cursive stick, let me know

Post by **Carrie** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 1:51 pm

Annie,

The ladies are wonderful about giving great advice!

In "Bigger..." the emphasis is on learning to write in cursive through short, daily practice sessions in "Cheerful Cursive" or "Italic". Once kiddos have the letter formations down, we will move into having them doing daily (short) cursive copywork in "Preparing...".

Girls often prefer writing in cursive, because it is prettier, and boys often prefer to print.

Most girls eventually end up with a blend of cursive and manuscript in order to make their handwriting "their own". The only cursive that is truly needed in life is to sign your name, so if kiddos do not prefer cursive by the time they hit middle school, it is not the end of the world.

At that point (when I was teaching public school) I let the kiddos write in their preferred style as long as it was legible.

My oldest son prefers manuscript.

Blessings,
Carrie

my3sons · Post by **my3sons** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 2:11 pm

Annie,
I think it's best not to require too much cursive too soon. Easing into it naturally seems best. For instance, we're doing Cheerful Cursive now, and are in the 24th week of it in the Bigger... plans. I just started having my ds write the title of his Copywork poem in Bigger... in cursive. The rest of the copywork will be in print. Then, the next week, I'm going to start one line of the copywork each day in cursive (btw I am writing a model for him to look at always for this). We'll move on like this until all of his copywork is in cursive by the end of the year. If he really dislikes this, we'll just stop it and go back to the title only. Everyone made good points here already about how versatile cursive and print are - virtually no one as an adult writes in beautiful cursive all of the time, so the pressure's off really. It does sort of just become a personal preference.
In Christ,
Julie

Melanie · Post by **Melanie** » Fri Mar 14, 2008 4:14 pm

Carrie wrote:Girls often prefer writing in cursive, because it is prettier, and boys often prefer to print. Most girls eventually end up with a blend of cursive and manuscript in order to make their handwriting "their own". The only cursive that is truly needed in life is to sign your name, so if kiddos do not prefer cursive by the time they hit middle school, it is not the end of the world. At that point (when I was teaching public school) I let the kiddos write in their preferred style as long as it was legible.

This is so true. The only cursive my dh uses is when signing his name. He is in mech. eng. and uses a very small, neat and precise print on all drafts, plans, submittals, etc. Everyone in his industry uses this same type of print.

I do think it's important to teach cursive if anything else just to be able to read another person's handwriting.