Print Neatly Please
According to this LAT report by Seema Mehta, kids aren't learning penmanship anymore:
Educators say the days of primary school students hunched over desks and painstakingly copying rows of cursive letters are waning. There are many culprits: computers, a rejection of repetitive drills as a teaching tool, and government testing that determines a school's worth based on core subjects such as reading and math.
"Handwriting and cursive have been pushed aside," said Joe Mueller, principal of Litel Elementary School in Chino Hills. "When you have a student struggling and you have to pick an area to focus on, reading versus penmanship, reading [will prevail]. The plate is full."
Unfortunately, you can't always type, and test-taking in particular often requires legible writing.
But penmanship remains crucial to a student's success, [Vanderbilt professor Steve] Graham said. A prime example is the SAT's new timed essay section, which must be handwritten.
Though SAT graders are instructed not to let legibility influence how essays are scored, at least 10 studies have concluded that that's impossible, Graham said. A 1992 study of graders who had been so trained found that neatly written essays received the equivalent of a 2.5-point benefit on a 100-point scale. Among untrained graders, the advantage grew to more than four points.
The last time Professor Postrel was grading exams, I actually "translated" one particularly illegible one into writing he could read, saving an hour or so of grading time--and a lot of aggravation. Instead of cursive, however, why not teach kids to print neatly, ideally as precisely as architects?