Behind the Blackboard: Cursive writing still has a place in the classroom

As an education reporter, I've written about the move away from cursive handwriting and some efforts to revive its teaching and practice in schools, especially in Tennessee.However, I can't help but take retroactive pity and have empathy for my teachers from about fourth grade up through college. My handwriting was pretty good until about fourth grade. Then I started writing faster to take notes from a TV program.Into high school and college, my writing became hieroglyphics of sorts, and I did things during and after college like using the letter "y" for "and" (I got that from college Spanish) and other abbreviations and whatnot, lots of whatnots. Today, my writing has morphed into a type of printed cursive, legible to me in context, but not to others very much. In other words, I can translate it, but if someone found one of my reporter notebooks, they'd be hard pressed to comprehend it.I take notes each workday as a reporter even if I have a recorder going. I've read and been told that taking notes imprints things in your brain unlike taping them and even typing them. One of my former journalism colleagues, Sharon Caskey Hayes, used to write out some of her articles in longhand before typing them into a computer.The late Blanche Mabe, my fourth grade teacher at Surgoinsville Elementary School in Hawkins County and grandmother of classmate Carmen Mabe, now Carmen Mabe Harold, was among elementary school teachers who swore up and down I'd become a doctor because of my messy handwriting. Mrs. Mabe probably never thought I'd write for a living. One of my fifth grade teachers, Lucia Linkous, now Lucia Carico and retired, had issues figuring out my writing, as did many others.By college, I was filling the blue composition books with essay answers to questions in final exams, although my instructors got a break when I used a computer for submitted papers. Back then, computer-generated papers were not even thought about during a final exam like they are today and submitted digitally to boot. However, I can write and read cursive.Robin McClellan, supervisor of elementary education for Sullivan County schools, said cursive became a formal part of the standards and thus the curriculum in Tennessee in 2014 after the General Assembly passed legislation to that effect and the Department of Education followed up with details. "When that was written, we immediately got the information out. We embedded it in the curriculum," McClellan said. She said Sullivan students start second grade continuing printing but start cursive after Christmas, demonstrate mastery of all letters by the end of third grade and write legibly in cursive by the end of fourth grade, following the Department of Education's implementation of the law. "It's not a major portion of the instructional block," McClellan said of cursive work that likely lasts five to 10 minutes each school day. "Lawmakers thought it was lost and they wanted children to still have that art." The new emphasis also fits in with students using primary sources in their work, such as the Bill of Rights and other historical documents written in cursive, as well as reading teacher comments on their work.I hope no students ever have to use my hand-scribbled notes as a primary source. McClellan has seen my scribble and read the articles that ensued and said I must be doing something right when I write.But she agrees that there is something about handwriting that imprints the content in your brain. She said she used to take notes on a computer keyboard but now uses a tablet or other device on which she writes the old-fashioned way, which she said helps her remember. And since learning requires remembering, I think writing, specifically cursive, still has a place in 21st century classrooms. Rick Wagner is an education writer for the Kingsport Times-News. He can be reached at (423) 392-1381 or rwagner@timesnews.net.