1st welds with my 1st welder

Aaron_W said:
I learned cursive in elementary school. The only time I use it is signing my name, and reading "old people" writing. I guess I'm one of those people who thinks teaching cursive is like teaching Latin. It has some value, but very little real world application.

Personally I think most of the push to continue teaching it is just people reluctant to change. They had to learn it as kids, so kids today need to learn it. I don't know anybody under the age of 70 that regularly uses cursive.
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If public education was limited to things with real world application (for most people) it could end somewhere around 5th grade.

If you can't read cursive then you can't read the Declaration of Independence, and that's a good enough reason for learning it IMO. Imagine needing the nation's most important foundational documents translated for you as if they were in a foreign language. It's hard enough already for people to stay focused on the goal.
Aaron_W said:
BTW that is not a cursive capital A. My name starts with A and I was never taught anything that looked like that. A capital A should look kind of like a squished rain drop.
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I'll tell her Aaron said so :p
 
Aaron_W said:
I learned cursive in elementary school. The only time I use it is signing my name, and reading "old people" writing. I guess I'm one of those people who thinks teaching cursive is like teaching Latin. It has some value, but very little real world application.

Personally I think most of the push to continue teaching it is just people reluctant to change. They had to learn it as kids, so kids today need to learn it. I don't know anybody under the age of 70 that regularly uses cursive.

On the other hand my cursive knowledge does mean I immediately knew what cursive eeee-s meant in welding, so I guess there is some practical application after all.


BTW that is not a cursive capital A. My name starts with A and I was never taught anything that looked like that. A capital A should look kind of like a squished rain drop.
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LOL! How are kids ever going to learn to weld if they don't know cursive?

I had too look up a proper Capitol A and it appears that either way is accepted. I think I learned the large lowercase cursive A also. Either way Strantor's daughter's "Aaron" cursive writing is better than mine EVER was!
 
I stopped writing cursive as soon as the teachers let me get away with it. But I also did years of schooling in Russian, so I can easily do that in cursive- but it screwed up any ability I have to do it in English! Whenever I try, I add hooks to the letters like Europeans do and then mix up the letters by throwing Cyrillic into the mix. Muscle memory is as hard to break as it is to build.
 
strantor said:
My two younger girls (currently 4th & 7th grade) learned cursive in TX public school. My oldest (currently 12th grade) did not. I was in school 1992-2004; I learned cursive because I was home schooled but as I understand it my peers in TX public school did not. This website says that the number of states requiring cursive went from 14 to 21 this year, and seems to indicate that TX is among the states which have mandated cursive all along, but I think that is not accurate. I think we went a long time not teaching cursive and only recently started it again. It is good that it is making a comeback in multiple states in any case.

I know that what cursive my kids were taught was not reinforced beyond the required minimum. I asked my 7th grader about it just now and she said they never talked about cursive again after 4th grade. I had her write a sentence in cursive just to see if she could. She had to look up the cursive capital A but she did write this without any further help, although it took at least 30s and she seemed unsure of herself until the end. I think she could probably read grandma's letters.
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do they teach spelling?
 
strantor said:
If public education was limited to things with real world application (for most people) it could end somewhere around 5th grade.

If you can't read cursive then you can't read the Declaration of Independence, and that's a good enough reason for learning it IMO. Imagine needing the nation's most important foundational documents translated for you as if they were in a foreign language. It's hard enough already for people to stay focused on the goal.

I'll tell her Aaron said so :p
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Yeah looking online there is apparently more than one style of cursive. Some include a lot of fancy flourishes, others are simpler and made for speed.

Interestingly (to me anyway) that search also led me to several places discussing the continued teaching / abandonment of cursive as well. Google searches are such a rabbit hole. :alien:
 
pontiac428 said:
I stopped writing cursive as soon as the teachers let me get away with it. But I also did years of schooling in Russian, so I can easily do that in cursive- but it screwed up any ability I have to do it in English! Whenever I try, I add hooks to the letters like Europeans do and then mix up the letters by throwing Cyrillic into the mix. Muscle memory is as hard to break as it is to build.
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I can't imagine hand-writing Russian (Cyrillic) in anything but cursive. I can do it, but it's painfully slow. Cursive is fast - just painful to read... ;-)

GsT
 
I was taught cursive all through high school, Right after I graduated and started a job as a draftsman everything was required to be printed. I can print faster than I can write in cursive. And my printing is perfect block letters like used on a drawing. I was drafting long before CAD or even computers were invented. I had my kids teachers refuse to accept notes from me that were printed because they thought the kids forged them.
 
Being older than dirt, my grade school 5th & 6th grade teacher stressed mastering cursive. I still do a reasonable version of it and use it for my own use. I took drafting in high school and then got a degree in architecture before CAD so my printing is still pretty good but it is easy to get sloppy. I just looked at some notes to self, a mixture of cursive & printing! It's important to produce easily readable information, neatness counts! Especially true when trying to convey dimensions/ numbers.

I almost got started on conveying information via sketches but thought better of it.
 
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