Dive Brief:
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Cursive handwriting recently got a nod from the Utah Board of Education, which added it to the state’s core standards for 2023. Currently, public school students are required to learn cursive in 21 states, according to the National Education Association.
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That requirement should include every elementary school student, particularly between kindergarten and 4th grade, said Joan Sedita, founder of literacy professional development service Keys to Literacy. Giving students several years to learn cursive ensures they have enough time to practice without stress.
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"Students need explicit instruction and time for guided practice to become proficient with handwriting, whether that be print or cursive, because fluent handwriting is essential for composing in writing,” Sedita said. “If students must focus too much attention on how to form the letters, this takes away from the focus on the ideas they are writing about.”
Dive Insight:
Though much work done by students today is on computers and mobile phones and written by clicking letters on a physical or virtual keyboard, Sedita said handwriting is still a tool that can be helpful when students are taking notes on the fly and also when taking tests, including standardized exams.
“Even though a lot of school work is now done using devices that require typing, there are still many times when students need to write by hand, including note-taking and completing state proficiency assessments and standardized tests that require handwritten essays,” Sedita said.
Sedita added there may be literacy benefits in adopting and including handwriting in curricula. When young students are learning how to read and spell words, she said, the physical act of handwriting that information may help them better embed these skills.
“In the earliest grades, learning writing letters reinforces and improves the learning of phonics concepts, and having students write letters while learning letter-sound correspondences supports both the decoding and spelling of words,” Sedita said.
