Indiana Schools No Longer Required To Teach Cursive [POLL]

Is the keyboard completely replacing the pen?

Indiana school officials have announced that students will no longer be required to learn cursive writing, effective this fall.

In a memo to schools in April, state officials said schools can still teach cursive as independent school protocol, but students will be expected to be proficient in using the keyboard, The Tribune-Star reports.

District and school officials didn't find the announcement particularly surprising.

From the Associated Press:

"The skill of handwriting is a dying art," [said East Allen County Schools Superintendent Karyle Green]. "Everything isn't handwritten anymore."

The Tribune-Star also reports that parents are worried about children knowing how to sign their names. The SAT and Advanced Placement exams also currently require handwritten essays.

Quick Poll

Should schools still teach cursive?

YES

NO

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Comments

[JDuck]

10:50 AM on 08/15/2011

The continuing dumbing down of America...

[Seven Teenatheart]

01:22 PM on 07/18/2011

http://fyiliving.com/research/handwriting-is-beneficial-to-childrens-cognitive-development/

Handwriting does contribute positively to cognitive development.
We knew this when I was a kid - if we took notes we retained data better.
We retained it better if we wrote it than if we typed a report.

So aside from cursive being far more elegant and personal than the printed word, it adds value to education.

[mrfnk]

12:21 AM on 07/12/2011

cool, but it raises issues, when contracts get signed, an x is still just an x no matter what your name is.

[mware09]

06:46 PM on 07/11/2011

I'm down with it. Hand-writing that is legible is important. Cursive is not.

[colonelsun68]

12:32 PM on 07/11/2011

We also don't need to learn table manners or common politeness, but wouldn't you rather be around people who did learn these things? Cursive writing is a discipline, and not a difficult one at that. No one's education will suffer if they learn it, and if anything, it might make their lives a little richer.

[Parade Keegan]

02:43 PM on 07/11/2011

I agree with you.

[TINA ANDRES]

01:41 AM on 07/11/2011

This is all fine, I guess, but I have yet to see a school with enough access to anything to teach kids to type. I realize that we probably don't need cursive although I still use it often because it is much faster than printing but they better have a clear plan in place to teach word processing skills because I am sick of seeing my students peck at the computer one finger at a time. I took "typing" in junior high for one semester and it is probably the best semester use of time I ever had, at least it is the only thing from junior high I can remember using for a lifetime. Nevertheless, my kids will learn cursive, even if I have to teach them.

[14tavoliberal]

02:53 PM on 07/09/2011

My geometry teacher would always lecture us about how we needed to learn cursive last year. I personally find it unnecessary because important documents require you to write in print and like 99% of people write in print.

[glockman]

09:22 AM on 07/11/2011

"and like 99% of people write in print"

Good grief.

[tteeghen]

09:45 AM on 07/09/2011

Cursive is like a dying artform. Outmoded. I just wonder, did the ancient Greeks, Hebrews, Phoenicians, or any other ancient writing forms have 2 forms of writing? Isn't our alphabet based on Greek system of writing? How did cursive evolve? Maybe before the printing press? There was a need for 'speed' writing, basically, cursive just strings letters in a flowing manner. Not needed now. This is the 21st century folks!

[Betrayed]

02:51 AM on 07/09/2011

Cursive is pure style.

If you can't do it, you ain't got it.

Got it?

[theroundearth]

06:26 PM on 07/08/2011

Don't be surprised when Asians will get the best positions.
I've heard the Chinese and Koreans are still learning to write their symbols by hand.

[Betrayed]

03:23 AM on 07/09/2011

Shhhhh.... you'll disturb the texters.

[Watching rock grow]

05:26 PM on 07/08/2011

So our future generations will print their names?

[Betrayed]

03:16 AM on 07/09/2011

That's a best case scenario.

More likely it will be a Star Trek reality where people can't even tie their own shoes.

[powermfm]

04:00 PM on 07/08/2011

Better yet, teach Italics. Oldest child went to a school that did just that. Its a compromise between cursive and block lettering and it works! Its not hard. It is totally readable. Some of the kids that went to that school went on to become doctors and I bet the pharmacist has no trouble reading their scrips.

[Jeannette Lacey]

02:54 PM on 07/08/2011

Many comments below state how unnecessary cursive writing is for the modern student. I say that it is a discipline - and today's youngsters are in great need of deal of discipline. As Ariel Bonzai comments, cursive writing can be a tool for forgery and personality analysis. Also, if you can't write cursive, then you probably can't read it (I remember the days when I was small and hadn't yet learned cursive...I couldn't read it). Thus, if these future students want to study old texts at places like The Library of Congress, the Huntington Library or Vatican for instance, they won't be able to read them in the original form! Without that ability, they will have to believe what someone else tells them the document says. (Hmm....sort of like Texas text books re-writing its history.) Sure, people made the same claims when Latin left the basic curriculum, but I think we lost something when students stopped learning ancient languages. Heck! Most students today don’t even know the basic component structure of their native tongues, let along a foreign or ancient one.

I think cursive should definitely stay. These kids will be at a great disadvantange and I for one would not care to hire any of them, regardless of how well they can type!!

[Seven Teenatheart]

05:36 PM on 07/08/2011

I agree.

[tteeghen]

09:39 AM on 07/09/2011

I can't read those old texts anyway, that gothic style of writing is very difficult. Ever try to read the Declaration of Independence? Its not so easy, even if you know modern cursive.

[colonelsun68]

12:24 PM on 07/11/2011

But you stand a better chance than someone who hasn't learned it at all.

[Ariel Bonzai]

02:06 PM on 07/08/2011

Consider the Declaration of Independence and how well the distinct signatures illustrate the spirit of each founding father that lives in them now

[Betrayed]

03:12 AM on 07/09/2011

SO true.

[Ariel Bonzai]

01:59 PM on 07/08/2011

It may nit be an essential skill. Some never can do cursive, but one.s hand writhing is unique and it can be analysed accurately for forgery or personality clues. It requires control and practice that students will lose touch with as well as the past. So many seem to believe cell phones and iPods are necessary. Few of them get how hard it was for us to do research papers the cave man way. If they only knew type weighed ribbons, library binging and how professors had catch plagiarist using documentation. One always played it off like he did this, but like any good teacher he didn't have to check. We know. One student burned the library down to keep him from finding out he had copied his paper. Prof caught on but let the arson slide.