21/06/2016

Article time! The need for good handwriting...

Hi everybody!

I just read a very interesting article about the need and importance of handwriting, in this age of ours of computer-keyboard-digital technology.

Go to http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/20/why-handwriting-is-still-essential-in-the-keyboard-age/?xid=soc_socialflow_facebook_realsimple&_r=0 and read all about it!!

The key points I'd like to emphasize and share with you are:

...there is a growing body of research on what the normally developing brain learns by forming letters on the page, in printed or manuscript format as well as in cursive.

...researchers looked at how oral and written language related to attention and what are called “executive function” skills (like planning) in children in grades four through nine, both with and without learning disabilities.

...“handwriting — forming letters — engages the mind, and that can help children pay attention to written language.”

...the cognitive process of reading may be connected to the motor process of forming letters.

...For typically developing young children, typing the letters doesn’t seem to generate the same brain activation. As we grow up, of course, most of us transition to keyboard writing, though like many who teach college students, I have struggled with the question of laptops in class, more because I worry about students’ attention wandering than to promote handwriting. Still, studies on note taking have suggested that “college students who are writing on a keyboard are less likely to remember and do well on the content than if writing it by hand,” Dr. Dinehart said.

...we should be careful that the lure of the digital world doesn’t take away significant experiences that can have real impacts on children’s rapidly developing brains. Mastering handwriting, messy letters and all, is a way of making written language your own, in some profound ways.


SO, work on your handwriting skills! It's more important than you think!! :) :) 


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