Relegated in 2006 to an optional piece of learning in Ontario elementary schools, cursive writing is set to return as a mandatory part of the curriculum starting in September.
Relegated in 2006 to an optional piece of learning in Ontario elementary schools, cursive writing is set to return as a mandatory part of the curriculum starting in September.
The point is the culture war. Populism. “Reverting to a better yesterday.” Fascism, writ tiny.
It’s clever, no one can really object to it like they can to removing things from the curriculum. But it serves the same purpose as whipping up anger over sex ed or CRT, just low key.
It can be useful to learn for the purpose of knowing how to read it. There’s still a large population of cursive writers about. I doubt cursive usage will grow anymore, even teaching it, as everything is computer based these days.
The argument isn’t that cursive is useless, but rather it isn’t useful enough to warrant spending the amount of time that is required to drill the muscle memory into children. Learning to read cursive is relatively easy and can be done easily on one’s own if they happen to be exposed to cursive writing and need to read it. But no one has a meaningful need to write in cursive because we don’t use feather quills anymore.
I spent a considerable amount of time being forced to do something that ultimately my disabilities will never allow me to do. I was degraded and humiliated because I couldn’t write cursive. I was punished and told I was lazy and careless and then forced to do it even more than the other students. I still carry shame with me. And it was all essentially pointless; we even knew it at the time!
Shit like this is just about grinding down children and making them good worker units.
It can also be nice to learn as an art form! But in the same way I wouldn’t expect mandatory calligraphy lessons - even though that seems like the more logical thing to introduce if we’re talking about developing fine skills and learning how to read or write cursive - I don’t really see the point of mandatory cursive lessons.
The option seems reasonable to have as an option. But kids are already so overworked in school, with homework and tests having increased exponentially over the last two decades, that getting to remove one thing off of their curriculum seemed like they were finally getting a break.