In this Issue
 
 

Happy New Year, Friends!

The New Year always brings one of our favorite holidays, National Handwriting Day. To celebrate this January and to recognize the coexistence of handwriting and technology in the classroom, we are giving away a couple of free subscriptions to our Digital Teaching Tools. To get your name in the running, visit our National Handwriting Day webpage or our Facebook page for details, and enter now! 

Everybody is talking about cursive, so we have dedicated a whole issue to show why cursive is so important. Our feature, "Five Reasons We Can't Write Off Cursive," reinforces the importance of cursive in 3rd-5th grades. Read "Cursive Connections—Best Practices" to take a look at why technology will not replace cursive. And, "How to Make Cursive Carefree" focuses on making cursive effective and fun for students. 

Check out our thank you letter downloads for students in Pre-K – 5th grades and the Little Hoppers column for our Pre-K educators. 

Have a great 2012!


Jan Z. Olsen

 

Five Reasons We Can’t Write Off Cursive

Children must be able to focus on the content of their work, not the mechanics of their writing, particularly as they get into the more advanced grades. Strong cursive skills enable speed and legibility, so children can communicate with ease, take tests, take notes in class, and do their homework within a given period of time.

Cursive is crucial. This important skill sets students up for success academically and professionally. However, as more schools adopt Common Core, cursive has fallen by the wayside.

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Between the Lines — Best Practices

Cursive Connections—Best Practices
Cursive becomes particularly important as children enter the third grade. Developmentally, there is a tremendous difference between third, fourth, and fifth grade students. Within just one school year, children make great strides in motor and cognitive development and in all academic areas. Handwriting instruction should reflect this progression.

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Unique Instructional Tools & Strategies

How to Make Cursive Carefree
By the time students reach the third and fourth grades, they should have good posture, pencil grip, and solid printing skills. They are developmentally ready to write longer stories, use richer vocabulary, and expand their written communication to other forms including poetry, articles, fiction and non-fiction. Such writing requires the speed and fluency of cursive.

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Activities & Downloads

Access free downloads to extend lessons and integrate handwriting in all subjects.

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Off the Page with Hands-On Learning
During Pre-K, children learn through movement, play, and participation. By integrating purposeful readiness activities into their busy days, we can help them develop important social, physical, and cognitive skills, such as language skills, including vocabulary and alphabet knowledge, and early math skills, including counting, patterning, and sequencing.

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