I've heard some schools are reintroducing it now, but that doesn't help those that never learned.

The thing is, it's easy to read good cursive. It's just another script. It took me 5 episodes of Last Exile to memorize the Greek equivalents to English letters so I could read all the text without looking up the translation guide. But when their writing looks like Jack Lew's signature, there's not a whole lot I can do to decipher it

feels like a lot of older people just use cursive as an excuse to cover up bad handwriting, because it's harder to tell when it's all squiggly in the first place

like, there's a reason we don't write in fancy serif typefaces, that would result in most people's writing being even less legible than it already is.

I used to have really legible, accurate cursive. Someone made me feel embarrassed for still using cursive in middle school, so I stopped using it.

Now I can't remember cursive well enough to use it quickly, and my print looks like an elementary child did it. ALL CAPS print is a good way for me to make my print more legible

turbo-scribble some chicken-scratch and call it a day

But that's cursive, isn't it? I always considered cursive the script to be written when you just quickly need to write something down,being the style where the pen is raised the least, which happens to be the fastest way to write, at the cost of legibility. So cursive to me seems like the opposite of fancy.

You're just not old enough. Cursive was everywhere when I was a kid. They should still teach it to children because children learn language and writing easier than adults do. We should be able to read cursive. It is part of our language, and our history. Every old document is written in cursive. We shouldn't end up with a society that can't even read its original Constitution. That's just Idiocracy.

Facts. Everybody's "personal flair" on their style of cursive becomes a cryptographic puzzle. I exclusively used cursive until about 7th grade (because it was faster to me), and I still have to decipher most handwritten cursive

Cursive fonts should at least be consistent.

To be fair, it's trivially easy to learn cursive and it's basically always been an extension of penmanship.

How are you supposed to do any of this when your brain hemispheres aren't connected? If you don't link your letters, you ain't wire your brain cells. /s

I once saw a post on Facebook claiming this unironically. I learned cursive (or a simplified version I think) in school and thought it's still the standard until I saw the Facebook post and was like "so what". How can people get so emotional about such details? Teach your kid cursive at home when it's so important for you! Oh, you don't have kids but a strong opinion about education? Share it on Facebook! I'm not there anymore and for a while now.

Absolutely they need to teach finance. I remember when I had to get a mortgage for my house and it was a complete slog because I had absolutely no idea how the whole process was supposed to work. The thing is its actually not that complicated, but because I didn't know what I was doing it took forever and was stressful.

My tiny quibble with your post is that I wish you had included critical thinking in your first list. Other than that this is spot on.

That being said, my kids are learning cursive and I'm happy for it. It's not something that requires years of in depth study to learn. My third grader is only a few months into school and can already read and write cursive after just starting it this year.

But if it were gone, I wouldn't bat an eye.

How to pay taxes and make a budget. Media literacy. Nutrition. How to drive a car. Coding. The list goes on and on.

Now I may be a bit biased, but it would be nice if people could read my hand writing. There are just some people that write in cursive despite it not being taught. It was mentioned once in 2nd grade for me and for some reason it stuck.

Well cursive helps people with dyslexia

How many social situations do you get into where cursive is relevant? Wedding table cards? Pretty sure even people not taught cursive can get the gist since most letters are pretty close to print.

Find better friends, in that case.

I learned cursive a good 20 years ago in third grade, haven't used it since outside of signing my name and deciphering the odd handwritten letter from someone 40+ who still writes in cursive (and still handwrites letters)

*In the US? I don't think think is a thing at all in Vic Australia. I can't read cursive, and am slightly above averagely educated for my country (honours).

In Victoria Australia practically no one uses cursive, and the joined handwriting they (used to / or maybe still do) teach in Victorian schools is basically just printed text with minor alterations to make it join better. They don't mandate a specific form of writing AT ALL in highschool (years 7-12**). Hence why I switched to writing as close to printed text as possible, slightly joined for some extra speed.

People should write in a way that's legible first, speed second (when you want others to actually be able to read)

If you write in cursive here, no one can read what you're writing.

Nothing to do with your level of education, and frankly, anyone who hasn't STOPPED using illegible writing styles by the time they finish an undergrad degree at the latest, I'd look at sideways for being unnecessarily difficult (obviously, if they can't write any better, then fair enough).

**Because there is one year or "prep", it's actually years 8-13

One thing I've picked up from these threads over time is that different places mean different things by "cursive".
In some places it's treated as "how to write legibly by hand quickly" and in others it's more of a formal writing system designed for signatures and the like.
For example, we were required to use it while learning it, and then told not to use it for handwritten assignments once we left elementary school. It was preferred that things were written using print or typed was strongly preferred.

Kids now don't even have to write by hand as much, because typing is a vastly more practical skill.

In the US, my kids have done most assignments online since middle school. They’ve never needed cursive except for the brief refresher every year, and the occasional legal thing, such as a signature card to get a bank account.

Although, I’m amused that my kid in 11th grade now has to hand-write some assignments for the first time, as a reaction to generative ai.

There are some wonky letters, like capital G, S where if you never learned you wouldn't know what you're looking at.

As someone who didn't learn English as a first language, cursive is like another language to me. I don't recognize half of the letters, and i never encountered it enough to properly learn it or have an incentive to learn it.

It's not though like why the fuck is s a triangle that's the only thing I know about it and can't read it

I was similarly confused when I first learned about this. We were never taught to write in “print”, so handwriting - cursive - was the norm.

I'm nearing 40 and haven't been required to write in cursive since grade school. Don't every use it unless more than a word or two a year probably. I have no problem writing in it on occasion. It's just curvier versions of letters that you link by not picking your pen up. Sure, there are some weird capital letters, but generally, knowing the concept is enough to get it mostly right. I don't really understand how some people struggle.

She's talking about students not being able to read it.

Its purpose has passed. We don't write with quills or dip pens anymore. Franky, we don't write by hand much at all. Maintaining two systems of writing when handwriting is rapidly being reduced makes no sense. Your situation (I'm the same) is a great demonstration.

I'd say cursive is the Roman numerals of penmanship. It's a quaint thing to use for style, but that's it.

I find cursive is very useful when writing notes that only I will ever need to read. Reading and writing another persons cursive has never been easy for me and it has never impacted my life with one exception. I cannot read post cards from my aunt. Oh, and that time a decade ago when I had to fill out the "I will not cheat" pledge on the back of the SAT.

Turns out if you need to write something with speed we have these things that are like typewriters, but they don't even jam!

I was taught cursive and I do not remember it being anything like that. I am sorry for your experiences but I assure you they are not universal

Let's all go back to learning shorthand!

This is what my arthritic handwriting looks like anyway...

Harder to do? The whole point of cursive is for easier writing. Writing print by hand is what makes no sense. It's more legible, but print is called print for a reason.

On the other hand, there doesn't seem to be a standard for cursive in the US. When I learned to write in 1st grade in my country, there was an official cursive alphabet and everybody learned the same one. But my daughter started learning cursive now in the US (3rd grade) and because the letters she's learning are very different from the ones I learned, I looked up what American cursive looks like. Every single source I found on the subject had a different alphabet.

Harder to write? It's easier and faster. I take it you don't know how to write cursive?

It's way faster and super easy...

Harder to read, but easier to write.

And not that it matters but there are still fountain pen users, makers, influencers and all that, it's a niche hobby now.

I use fountain pens on the daily and would never dream of trying to do cursive.

My signature is anything from a sine to cosine wave. Doesn't matter as long as it's sined.

Signing just means write your name but real fast ad sloppy

I just use a specific sort of squiggle that only I can reproduce and have used it for decades.

When I turned 18 and had to sign my social security card with my full name, I had to look up how to do the capital letter in my middle name in cursive because the last time I wrote one was in third grade in the early 2000's

No, you're right. That's just called cursive here.

From what I understand after reading a bunch of calligraphy books (both modern and 19th century), there two ways to use the word. Most Americans use the word cursive to mean some form of joined writing, usually something like business penmanship (or a business script). These are usually descendants from English roundhand and spencerian.

However the word can also be used to describe a scale between cursive and gothic. The more gothic a script is the more times the penman lifts their pen. The more cursive a script is, the less the pen will be lifted off the page.

My kids are learning cursive and I'm glad they are doing so.

But one of the main point of cursive was to be able to write more quickly, and typing has absolutely replaced that need, many times over. And also you learn print first, so not learning how to write cursive doesnt mean you don't learn to write.

Ironically, your post is supposed to be insulting Americans for not being smart, but God damn is the point fucking stupid and ignorant.

I see some comments of people angrily hating cursive, and that's something a bit weird to me. Why the hate?

Well it’s not “just writing”, it’s a second, wholly distinct type of writing from our primary form of writing, and its use is usually reserved for writing personal letters, which is something nobody actually does anymore.

If “cursive” has no meaning to you because it’s “just how you write”, then you have your explanation for why Americans don’t like it. We’re taught to write in print for everything important. And that means that everything important that we read is also in print. So cursive is just an extraneous form of writing, that the reasons to use are shrinking by the day.

Same here. I eventually ended up with disability accommodations for handwriting since my fine motor skills suck so bad I literally can't legibility write to save my life

I hate "formal" cursive, but the concept is solid -- economy of motion, or time, or whatever. In fact, I've realized that some of my printing looks like cursive if I write quickly. Cursive that just looks pretty can go fuck itself.

Agreed.

I had to learn it in elementary school, and for some extended amount of time, all schoolwork had to use it. Then for a while after that (a few years) some teachers would still require it. Best part was when they'd critique your handwriting too, so it was an aspect of your work that you didn't gain points for, but that you could certainly lose points. I remember one poor girl that came in to our district in like 6th grade, after we'd already had all our training in it. She turned in a paper and I guess was just supposed to know not to print. The teacher made her redo it in cursive...and then didn't like the way she drew a certain letter (different than how the school taught it), so she started subtracting a point for each time that letter appeared or something, so this girl ended up with like a -2 out of 10 or some shit. I guess the issue was worked out somehow but I remember even as a kid thinking "wow what a dick move".

As soon as the requirements from teachers stopped, I quit using cursive and have never once ever needed to use it since (aside from my signature).

Not once.

It's something interesting to learn and I think it's definitely worth teaching kids how to read it and how to write with it themselves...but it should be something that's like...a few weeks of instruction per year, from grades 3-5. Not all year, not required in all subjects. Just "a few weeks each year, we teach the kids this skill and then give them a refresher". Maybe require it in "cursive month" each of those years, and certainly accept it anytime. But way less emphasis than my school put on it.

Oh no, this clock has hands, how am I supposed to know what time it is? Why can't it just display the time?

Ok... 21:35

Wait, not like that!

"Omg it’s so hard. It might as well be in Chinese "

Chinese Simplified enters the chat

A great deal of our education system is intended to coerce us into acting a certain way. We are rushed the cursive and told as children that its useless because we can't use it on essays in school.

We are taught languages slowly, rote, and in a very boring way so that we learn a lot but never become fluent.

Most of all, we are taught that math is highly abstract and useless, because math is one skill that can raise someone working class to being worth a very high wage.

I can see your argument, but would disagree with where. Cursive is really not meant to be artistic: that’s covered by calligraphy. There’s no reason to cover it in advanced lot: I suppose if you’re researching original sources like journals, you’d need to know, but that puts it at college level.

The most important thing people still need cursive for is a signature, but we don’t teach basic life skills anymore, plus a signature doesn’t seem to need to be recognizable anymore

That being said, I do think it should be taught for a bit longer. Ts still the most efficient way to take notes, it’s still in common use by previous generations, plus the all important signature

I think it should still be taught, but maybe just do it in a higher grade and don't treat it as an important lesson.

It's honestly something where you can learn 95% of it just by seeing it over and over again.

So what do you do, write all caps ?

pretty sure the point of cursive was that you can write it real quickly without lifting the pen, especially useful with older stuff like fountain pens where you can get blobbage when lifting and placing it.

I had fine motor control problems as a child and cursive did NOT help. It was painful and maddening.

I just write in an weird cursive-print hybrid, which combined with my left handedness, renders my writing completely illegible to anyone but me.

Not quite the same. Some of us were taught stuff like this