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> The physical strain of writing with hand is so much As a teacher my grandfather had a special fondness for teaching handwriting. He read literature on it and
by magicalhippo 3y ago
> The physical strain of writing with hand is so much
As a teacher my grandfather had a special fondness for teaching handwriting. He read literature on it and conducted his own experiments using his pupils, trying to figure out what worked and what didn't.
One of the things I recall vividly is him explaining to me as I started school, how it was vastly beneficial to use thick pencils when first learning to write by hand. He gave me, as he gave his students, a pencil he preferred which as I recall had a diameter about 1.5x a regular pencil. It was also slightly softer, around 2B.
As I recall his explanation was that the larger pencil required less motor skill precision, which lead to more relaxed fingers hence reduced strain. The softer graphite also required less pressure, again reducing strain.
As I recall he had found the reduction in strain really helped kids get comfortable with writing by hand.
- animal_spirits 3y agoI remember as a kid I also had bigger pencils. That makes sense
- harperlee 3y agoI have had several quite funny (to me) anecdotes where I remember something vastly bigger (buildings that are "exactly the same but twice the height", huuuge houses from friends' parents, food being humongous, etc.). Don't underestimate the fact that as an adult you're about twice the size as when you were a kid learning to write! :)
- magicalhippo 3y agoThat's why I estimate the diameter as 1.5X even though my memory feels more like 2X. In my case I had the larger pencils alongside regular-sized color pencils in my pencil case, so I do remember them being distinctly larger.