Is Cursive Making a Comeback, or Is It Still Dying Off?
Is Cursive Making a Comeback, or Is It Still Dying Off?
Auddie Lentine
For many years, cursive handwriting has been on a fast decline since its curricular removal in 2010. Schools across the United States have decided to switch to school issued iPad, and focusing on fast typing skills on sites such Typing.com. Some teachers now defend this method, ruling cursive, or writing in general, as ‘outdated’ and ‘unnecessary’. Other teachers keep true to handwritten assignments or activities, but cursive is nowhere to be seen, my own little cousin can't even read it without assistance.
When I was in elementary school, writing in cursive was mandatory, and there were no electronics. Thinking back, it was very challenging having to sit through lectures and only being graded if our cursive was eligible, but it comes in handy knowing cursive. When I moved and transferred into a normal charter school in sixth grade, cursive was what I knew best, and the other students quite literally called me ‘extra’ for writing in cursive. They knew what it was, but were never taught how to write like that, which baffled me at that time, but I continued cursive, which eventually turned into ‘normal’ handwriting.
In Flagstaff High School, I never saw anyone write in cursive, I didn't care, but it was always something that stuck in the back of my mind. Recently I saw a random student write in cursive, it was very elegant and almost perfect, which brought me back to how I always wondered when cursive would be gone for good. But the more I became aware of my peers, the more I saw that a good five out of ten students actually wrote in cursive naturally. (yes I did the math)
I asked one of my friends who normally writes in cursive why she does so and she said “It is more satisfying to me, and I feel like it makes writing notes and such go by faster since every word is one fluid motion”. Her points definitely make sense, and not to get super nerdy, but cursive is beneficial for so many things. Cursive is a nice fluid motion, and makes writing a lot faster once you get the hang of it, but it also helps with fine motor skills, or reading the actual constitution and other old artifacts. Overall, this topic is something I’m very interested in, and I really hope that schools continue to teach cursive, instead of letting it die off like Latin, and FHS has given me hope for its revival.