Alternate Handwriting Methods

Print script to cursive

Many programs start by teaching children print-script (also known as manuscript), only to switch in later grades to conventional cursive.

The sequence and direction of strokes that children learn first becomes habit. This habit is then undone and retrained for the different “cursive” forms. Frequently this change causes confusion, frustration and reluctance to write.

Conventional cursive

Limiting instruction to conventional cursive is an improvement, but conventional cursive letter formations are more complex than the BFH alphabet.

Conventional cursive demands no pen lifts within words, difficult unless one writes with whole arm movement; a posture that has seldom been enforced beyond the 19th century.

Rhythmic movement is lost as one concentrates on connecting all the letters with loops. Writing can become a matter of deliberate drawing, rather than free-flowing.