In today's edition of our local paper, the syndicated advice column of "Annie" (he writers are long time editors of the Ann Landers advice column), had a letter from a school nurse.
The last letter in the column addresses a concern raised (correctly IMHO) by a school nurse who feels that more skills should be taught at home. Their response was "You want the kids to learn cursive or to make correct change? Here is your opportunity to teach them".
I tell this to my children and my students all the time! I took keyboarding as a blow off class my senior year of HS and it was the best decision! I will be charting on the kids in my office and they often comment about how fast I type and that "You're not even looking at the keyboard!!!"
That being said, I do want my kids to learn cursive. They taught it in the district where my oldest had second grade and I honestly don't know if they teach it at our current district. My oldest sometimes teaches my 8 year olds some cursive, mostly their names.
I took data processing as mine, BASIC, and accounting. Wish I would have taken typing (on typewriters, Google it), but I was going to be a nurse and didn't need it.
I learned how to type at home. My parents made me. We did have a class that covered typing some in middle school. I don't type correctly, but I do type without looking at the keyboard. I owe that experience to working in credit card customer service for almost 6 years. You had to be quick at everything - they timed your calls and compared staff based on what the "average" talk time should be for a specific type of call. I also have a "phone voice" according to my coworkers - yep, also because of credit card customer service. It was a valuable experience for me, I learned a lot (also that I don't think I could have stayed in a job like that after college).
I have passable printing and my cursive is legible. If I'm in a hurry both are a little less so. We write on white boards for work and I default to print for most of that. I've never had anyone question my printing but I'm judgmental of it myself personally. My cursive is somewhat of a hybrid where most letters are cursive and some are print.
The electronic medical record has been a hugely good thing for me. When I worked the floor and now, before we went to one online system (we used to have THREE systems depending on content, location/phase of care, etc - that was super fun) it was always fun trying to read chicken scratch. There are a few physicians with legible handwriting without needing a "crash course in interpreting (insert name here)'s chicken scratch."
I'm old and female so of course learned typing and cursive in school. The typing came in handy for the keyboard but I can't say that I've been reading too many historic documents lately.
Anyhoo, both typing and cursive are easy to teach with the abundant tools available. I bought a CD typing tutorial for my kids way back in elementary school when we got our first family PC. They learned it in about 2 seconds, little stinkers. All of my kids can read and write cursive and I just don't believe it takes an educator to teach them the figures. There are plenty of workbooks available. That pretty much all they did in school was to give them worksheets, on that icky paper with the wide lines, you know what I'm talking about? I'd take a crisp workbook anyday.
With all the gadgets, a lot of the schools don't worry about penmanship at all. My baby cousins all have terrible handwriting, giant loopy letters that are hard to decipher. But they all write fluent txtspk.
I think it's the sudden change from commercial computing to personal computing. At the time the parents of this generation were growing up, we had the 80's-90's basic computing and the dawn of the internet for personal use. Letters were still written. Remember the term snail-mail?
I am not averse to the idea of letting cursive go. Much like calligraphy, it has fulfilled it's function. I'm sure there will be handwriting enthusiasts, just like there are calligraphy enthusiasts. As a means of communication, though, handwritten letters are mostly in the past.
It's too quick and easy to type/text. I can type a LOT faster than I can write, and I can delete instead of using white-out/erasing. It saves me a lot of time.
I think the last letter I wrote was to my grandmother several years ago. And mainly 'cause she was scary and I didn't like to talk to her on the phone. The rest of my communication has been in emails or on social networks. There's just no reason for the average American to write the long missives of the past by hand.
As for the Ask Annie article, it was poorly worded, but I thought the answer was referencing the general "you" of American parents/grandparents.
tell the kid he HAS to learn to write..not print. He has to learn..OH why is this a nursing problem? Since most kids are glued to their phone..aka typing..he has to learn to balance his bank book, and not with his thumbs. AND sign his name to legal papers.
tell the kid he HAS to learn to write..not print. He has to learn..OH why is this a nursing problem? Since most kids are glued to their phone..aka typing..he has to learn to balance his bank book, and not with his thumbs. AND sign his name to legal papers.
If not, he fails.
This. This is the answer we've been waiting for. Thank you, Roy Hanson...Thank you.
MrNurse(x2), ADN
2,558 Posts
I took data processing as mine, BASIC, and accounting. Wish I would have taken typing (on typewriters, Google it), but I was going to be a nurse and didn't need it.
