Yes! And they made us use entire words, including vowels.
No words in our penmanship classes. Just straight pens and inkwells...and circles and diagonal lines. All done with the meat of the forearm staying set on the desk.
What a bunch of nonsense. My penmanship was crap when I started...and even crappier when I finished.
I remember doing hours of those cursive exercises. I still do those rows of circles on occasion to loosen up my handwriting when it starts to condense into an unreadable scribble.
In grade school, teachers held up my papers to show off my handwriting. Now, it is so bad, it's the reason I bought my first computer. Too hard to read my own handwriting.
Handwriting was the only subject I ever failed in primary/elementary school. My writing was so bad that my 16th birthday present was typing lessons at a secretarial college, my parents reasoning that I'd never get to university writing by hand.
Luckily for me computers took over and I had a touch typing speed of 60+ wpm. I'm pretty damn good on a numeric keypad too - courtesy of summer jobs doing stocktake totalling.
I was alway ok but not perfect in handwriting. In high school, I played around with it. In college, I scribbled in panic. In the lab, I scribbled for notes. In design, I learned to do drafting printing. Some of my best arty pals had non perfect but beautiful handwriting, so I played too. I took calligraphy early and tossed it, nice as it was. Thus my own handwriting is a mesh and my printing depends on my mood.
I've hand printed many many many design notes.
I look at the bits I've retained with some present wonder.
But that is nothing.
At one point, business partner and I redid a need housing area, and I looked at the original designs.
Whoever did that was a genius. I'd have kept those drawings but had to give them back.
0 Replies
edgarblythe
2
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Mon 19 Jan, 2015 10:21 pm
Don't get the wrong impression. My typing sucks too.
0 Replies
hingehead
2
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Mon 19 Jan, 2015 10:51 pm
@edgarblythe,
The other blessing was the lecturer who told us not to take notes during her lecturers as we 'wouldn't be paying attention' to what she said if we were writing. In a bout of wishful thinking (perhaps influenced by the fact I couldn't read my own writing) I extended 'not taking notes' to all my lectures. It worked - I usually got D or HDs (although I only got a CR in statistics. Stupid chi test.)
0 Replies
dlowan
2
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Tue 20 Jan, 2015 03:35 am
@hingehead,
hingehead wrote:
Handwriting was the only subject I ever failed in primary/elementary school. My writing was so bad that my 16th birthday present was typing lessons at a secretarial college, my parents reasoning that I'd never get to university writing by hand.
Luckily for me computers took over and I had a touch typing speed of 60+ wpm. I'm pretty damn good on a numeric keypad too - courtesy of summer jobs doing stocktake totalling.
My writing was so bad.....and still is....that I'd have been referred to an Occupational Therapist if I were a kid today!
0 Replies
Frank Apisa
2
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Tue 20 Jan, 2015 06:51 am
@Butrflynet,
Butrflynet wrote:
I remember doing hours of those cursive exercises. I still do those rows of circles on occasion to loosen up my handwriting when it starts to condense into an unreadable scribble.
I notice that they do not even do cursive writing in schools these days. Some kids are actually baffled by having to read it...putting documents like The Constitution (in the original) out of their reach.
