Lawmakers hope to pass a bill once again requiring elementary schools to teach students to write in cursive, but Grant County educators say the technique has been anything but forgotten locally.
Administrators at three districts and two private schools told the Chronicle-Tribune this week that writing in cursive is alive and well even as advancing technology makes keyboarding a higher priority.
“We still teach cursive and will continue to teach it. It can add a lot of joy in communicating to others,” said Lakeview Christian School Administrator Doug Ballinger. “Cursive is a tool … to use and learn from our history that is rich with cursive writing.”
The Associated Press reported this week that state Sen. Jean Leising, R-Oldenburg, is sponsoring a bill that would require all public and accredited private schools to teach cursive. Schools have been free to include, but not required to teach, cursive since the Indiana Department of Education dropped the requirement in 2011.
“I am indifferent to the mandate because we will teach (cursive) anyway,” Ballinger said. “A mandate is simply a reflection of what parents want, and we already know that our parents want cursive to be taught.”
The Senate Education and Career Development Committee had a hearing Wednesday to discuss the measure, which passed the Senate but not the House in 2012.
“I don’t know how I’ll vote on it,” said Sen. Jim Banks, R-Columbia City, who sits on the committee. “I’d rather leave it to each school district. This bill goes a little bit farther than that.”
The committee decided to discuss the matter further before voting on whether it will be considered by the full Senate.
“Benefits include but are not limited to fine motor skill development, hand-eye coordination … a personal touch, signatures on legal documents, (reading and understanding the) Declaration of Independence as well as other important documents,” Ballinger said.
He also touted the “educational and emotional benefits” of keeping a personal journal.
“Students want to learn cursive, and it gives them their own identity like a fingerprint, which is why we use signatures,” he continued. “Dyslexic students find cursive better to work with than balls and sticks manuscript. … In the scope of a 13-year curriculum, it does not take an extremely long time to teach cursive.”
Other local schools teach cursive less aggressively, though educators maintain it still has significant value.
“Marion Community Schools … no longer requires the teaching of cursive writing from the district level. Marion classroom teachers, however, have been encouraged and continue to teach cursive writing,” said Instructional Coordinator Scot Croner. “I believe cursive is a valuable skill. In addition to the ways in which we all have utilized this form of penmanship, some studies have shown that cursive writing has improved reading comprehension.”
Eastbrook Community Schools students are introduced to cursive in second grade, review it to begin third grade and are expected to be fluent by the end of the year, said administrator Mickey Lazard.
“Even though we have moved to using more technology in our daily life, it does not lend itself to the unique characteristics of cursive and penmanship. You can learn quite a bit about a child by looking at their handwriting,” she said. “Many of our teachers feel that teaching cursive is an important skill … (but) most teachers will feel, ‘Where are they going to find the time to devote to another mandate?’ The state continues to add more and more mandates with relinquishing few.”
For Oak Hill United Schools and The King’s Academy in Jonesboro, cursive is decreasing in importance.
Tony Miner, administrator at King’s, said students there “do a little work with cursive writing, but not on a regular basis.”
“The students begin an introduction to cursive in second grade with full implementation in third grade. In fourth grade, handwriting is no longer instructed as a separate subject,” said Sweetser Elementary School Principal Nijual Drollinger, testing coordinator for Oak Hill. “I believe (cursive) is a good skill for a student to have, but has become less important academically. Advancements in technology and research in learning have led society to a much more limited need for the teaching and use of cursive.”
Eastbrook is one of three local districts emphasizing typing because of a one-to-one computing initiative. The district bought a tablet/laptop for every student last fall, while Madison-Grant United and Mississinewa Community Schools are set to buy iPads to start 2013-14.
Administrators at Madison-Grant and Mississinewa did not return requests for comment.
“We are in the process of developing a keyboarding scope and sequence for our elementary students,” Lazard said. “It has taken some of the emphasis off of penmanship, especially since the state is trying to move tests with written responses to the computers.”
Marion, Oak Hill, King’s and Lakeview are embracing typing instruction even without one-to-one efforts.
“Marion students are engaged with technology throughout the school day. … Because technology has become such an important part of everyday life, we believe it is necessary to teach our students in an environment similar to the one in which they will work,” Croner said. “The PARCC assessment (that tests the Common Core standards) requires students to have the ability to manipulate problems, complete electronic charts and conduct research to solve more complex real-world problems. This shift has driven our team to provide our students more opportunities to complete school-based assessments on the computer, which requires keyboarding skills.”
Oak Hill students begin computer classes in kindergarten and continue through sixth grade, Drollinger said. Between the start of school and fourth grade, students attend a 35-minute computer class weekly.
“I would say that keyboarding has replaced the emphasis of cursive, although knowing cursive is still a valuable writing skill,” Miner said. “We teach keyboarding in grades (three to six). Students in those grades have instruction once per week. Much of the grade (three and four) emphasis on keyboarding for our school is the push for online ISTEP testing.”
The ultimate solution might be a curriculum that uses technology and cursive in tandem, as Lakeview does.
“Technology simply enhances our ability to manipulate and teach cursive in creative ways. … When I asked Pam Smith, an educator of over 30 years (about this topic), she communicated with me through a word processed document. She then added a handwritten cursive note to clarify her typed notes,” Ballinger said.
“Moving forward into the future, digital learning can and does include cursive writing.”