[camle]

sounds like someone has too much time on their hands.

[Rodney King]

I agree. Think of all the hours wasted in elementary school on cursive writing. I have not used it since.

[DouglasKC]

What's wrong with this? I think it's quite beautiful...as long as I don't have to do it manually.

[TontoKowalski]

I agree. Stop teaching cursive in the classroom.

My 6-year-old is doing just fine learning it at home.

Sneaky homeschool bump!

[sheltonmac]

But now I envy her for not spending time learning a soon-to-be defunct dialect of handwriting.

Why not stop teaching all forms of writing? In this age of computer technology, even the keyboard will soon be obsolete. </tongueincheek>

[Ward Smythe]

My cursive writing skills have always been questionable. I can write neatly if I take the time, but if I'm in a hurry, I've developed a block print (sort of like an architect print) to use. I think my writing trouble goes back to the fact that I was born left handed and forced to write with the right hand - but that's my childhood memory at work.

With the rise in computer usage, I rarely write anything except checks - and you couldn't read my signature if you had to.

[Chad Fairbanks]

Actually, years of writing in Log Books forever cured any use of script... ;0)

[Wm Bach]

It's only called cursive because reading it makes you cuss.

[EggsAckley]

With typing now the norm rather than the exception, print handwriting
will be forever dominant over script.

This is Bull. Another lazy Gen-Xer, methinks. I was actually waiting
for the author to say, stop teaching spelling, we have spell check.

[sparkomatic]

Stop wasting third graders time when you could be teach more math...

Stop wasting third graders time when you could be teach the author better use of the English language.

[Protect the Bill of Rights]

Printing is prevalent today because children are allowed to print. It's easier for poor little johnnie to print than sweat over a peice of paper trying to form a correct "r" in cursive. When I was in school, once we learned cursive, we were required to use cursive. Printing was not accepted. Period. In Math, when I was in school showing one's work was required. Now, it seems to be an option. I am the one insisting my son show his work, not his math teacher.

Perhaps instead of dropping it all together, we should go back to the mindset of "this is what we require of you, do it."

As I tell my son, if this is the worst thing you must do in your life, I want your life.

[InvisibleChurch]

anything that is too tough to teach is not worth teaching ... yes public school system , dilute your education system even further ; my homeschooled kids write in cursive , oh the time they are wasting ... (hee hee - Go Hope Christian School Bunnies!!!!)

[Carol Roberts]

I like the idea of dropping cursive writting in school. I'm just not sure it's a good idea. Other than my signature, I haven't used cursive writing since the mid 1970s.

[wjeanw]

The reason why most US child do not make the transition to print is that learning to print in the first place is problematic. Up until Dewey's restructing of the public schools, all children learned to write cursive FIRST. Children in Europe today continue this practice. (For example, when we were living in the Netherlands, my eldest son learned to write beautiful cursive in the first grade.) However, Dewey was trying to reduce the level of literacy in the country (first by discarding phonetics, then by discarding easy cursive called Spencerian). If you doubt the accuracy of the last statement, I recommend Samuel Blumenfeld's IS PUBLIC SCHOOLING NECESSARY? or John Gatto's THE UNDERGROUND HISTORY OF AMERICAN EDUCATION.

[francisandbeans]

My writing is a mix of both....Capital letters are block print (except T and F) and the rest is cursive. I have several friends who use block or cursive exclusively. One friend intermixes capital and lower case letters quite liberally. It ends up looking like hacker speak.

[Lady Heron]

Actually I taught my youngest cursive only. He sees print everyday and can write it but was never taught it. He has great handwriting unlike my middle son who was taught print, connective print, and cursive in school. His handwriting is so messy that you can not read it and once I started homeschooling him in the 3rd grade I was never able to fix it.

[monkey]

Our robot descendants will scratch their plastic domes wondering what we had in mind with the ridiculous cursive version of "Q".

[boris]

How could doctors write illegible prescriptions?

This proposal would cause permanent injury to our nation's health-care system!

--Boris

[Grut]

I gave up cursive when people started assuming I was a Doctor.

[ben richards]

she had never learnt it in school

There are some things that weren't learnt by this writer in school.