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Well, when I was in high school they also taught drafting with fine construction lines drawn with 2H pencils, fancy parallel motion rulers and so on. But that
by MarkusWandel 4y ago
Well, when I was in high school they also taught drafting with fine construction lines drawn with 2H pencils, fancy parallel motion rulers and so on. But that doesn't mean they will always have to. Stuff goes obsolete.
In my parents' and earlier generation, writing letters by hand was an important communications technique, and cursive writing was the most efficient way to do it. My high school assignments were still mostly turned in in cursive writing, until my final year or so by which time computers and printers were available (at the school, perfectly OK for printing off your assignments) and my touch-typing skills had advanced far beyond my cursive writing speed. End of cursive, for me, I can hardly write that way any more.
My mom, at around age 60 discovered computers and email too. Having learned typewriting in her youth, she took to it enthusiastically and 90% of her writing isn't cursive any more either. So it goes. Subjects can go from a mandatory skill to a niche subject, studied only by those who want to, in their spare time.
- pibechorro 4y agoWriting by hand is a basic and essential skill. Cursive is may times better than printing letters. This is an American thing as far as I can tell. My 7th grade teachers in the 90s already where averse to my cursive (moved from latin america) and honestly had a hard time reading it. Ignore cursive at your peril. Its like not learning to do math on paper because we have smartphones.
- _dain_ 4y ago99.999% of the time the stuff you read and write is done by keyboard or touchscreen, not pen. The remaining 0.001% of the time, chickenscratch is fine. "Cursive" is totally obsolete, get over it. When was the last time you actually sent or received a handwritten letter? Birthday / Christmas cards don't count, I mean a real bona fide handwritten letter. I bet it's been years. The comparison to mathematics is wrong. Writing math by hand is more convenient than futzing around with LaTeX incantations, at least when solving a problem (as opposed to writing up a solution). Some people use a stylus on a tablet; but that's just the same kind of thing by digital means. The process of writing out an equation is part of the way you solve it; you cross out terms as you cancel them, you draw ad hoc arrows, little graphs, circle like terms, and so on. In that context, handwriting is not just a means of expression, it's an effective tool of thought. The day digital input matches that convenience is the day I'll abandon handwritten math; but that day has already come and gone for ordinary prose.
- orangecat 4y agoMy 7th grade teachers in the 90s already where averse to my cursive (moved from latin america) and honestly had a hard time reading it. Which is an indication that cursive is not in fact clearly better.