"A good handwritten letter is a creative act, and not just because it is a visual and tactile pleasure. It is a deliberate act of exposure, a form of vulnerability, because handwriting opens a window on the soul in a way that cyber communication can never do. You savor their arrival and later take care to place them in a box for safe keeping."
Catherine Field
This brings up an important point: What are we supposed to do as educators when our students are issued lap-tops by the school (also in elementary school) and no longer even bring pencils to class? All the writing is done on the computers that also do grammar and spelling checks for the students. Many students do not even have penmanship. Is this right or wrong? Any thoughts? Am I just old fashion?
ReplyDeleteI was shocked that when my kids were in elementary (2 years ago now) that they were only required to read cursive writing, there was no expectation that they be able to write it other than to sign their names. In reality, thre is no large demand for such skillsets because technology has removed the need. There is no imperical evidence that by not teaching our kids creative skills (cursive, music, art to name a few) we are harming there long term development, but I firmly believe that we are doing them an injustice. Could be that I am also old fashioned, but only time will tell what harm has been done or is currently being done.
ReplyDeleteCaptain Lambert,
ReplyDeleteI can certainly appreciate the responses to this post. For those folks that do not seem to understand that education is a great deal more than just learning a few things that might help you get the necessary grades to pass the many courses you will be exposed to, it should be a process that enables one to understand and solve the problems of communications, mathematics, physics, social aspects of the world, science of all its aspects and a number of other things including our countries history, patriotism to country and honor toward our country and our heritage, as well as to encourage the drive of Capitalism that has allowed this country to become the greatest country in the worlds history . Without spending years at teaching the basics of penmanship, cursive correctness, language skills, and basic mathematics, we would be doing an injustice to the upcoming children of our society. They will become an element of Social Justice as is expressed today and not able or willing to follow the example of their forbearers.
Very Respectfully,
Navyman834