# Does cursive really have cognitive benefits? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 1, 2013, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383 "2013-07-01T18:56:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/41 "2013-07-02T16:02:16Z")
> [@LawMonkey](#): > > I don’t see **that** much difference between that and the cursive I was taught–it dispenses with some of the oddball capitals (like the S) and lower case (like the b). The letters where I see a significant difference: CAPITALS: A, G, S (note that most capitals aren’t shown–I’m curious about how it’d handle cursive’s weird capitals like E, F, I, J, N, Q, T, and Z) LOWERCASE: b, f, g, j, l, m, n (note that m and n are extra-confusing to new learners of cursive, since a cursive “n” looks like a printed “m” to most kids), q, r (another really confusing letter, especially when you’re trying to teach the difference between “vi” and “ir”–write 'em out to see what I mean), y. I couldn’t find a “z” or an “x”, but those letters are also a bit confusing to kids. So 10 of the 26 lowercase are significantly different, some of them very different. All the differences, IMO, make it easier to read and easier for a kdit o write who first learned print. To answer some of the questions from overseas: all the schools I know of teach kids in their first year (kindergarten or preschool) how to read and write print letters. The idea is that they need to recognize print letters in order to read printed books, and you may as well teach them those same letters in their writing. Around third grade, many schools teach students cursive. [Here’s a sample of that cursive alphabet](http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Cursive.svg&imgrefurl=http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cursive.svg&h=1200&w=1500&sz=141&tbnid=wo8Xz7ehv5vceM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=113&zoom=1&usg=__pXhJZJpFAkGhENZvNiOnVByK9sU=&docid=PdSEusDIbAIUpM&sa=X&ei=BfnSUcvoPNG84APnooGIAg&ved=0CFQQ9QEwAA&dur=3972). [Here’s what it might look like in practice](http://okami-whatever.blogspot.com/2010/07/featured-pen-followup-aurora-88.html). ---
**Author:** ![FeAudrey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7feea3/32.png) [@FeAudrey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FeAudrey)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/42 "2013-07-02T16:16:23Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > If reading cursive makes you smarter, then reading Chinese or a similar language that requires distinguishing among hundreds or thousands of characters should make you a genius. > > Is there any evidence of that? East Asians do score a few IQ points higher than Caucasians, and “Complex logographic writing systems have been proposed as an explanation …”: > **[Race and intelligence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_intelligence)** > > Discussions of race and intelligence—specifically regarding claims of differences in intelligence along racial lines—have appeared in both popular science and academic research since the modern concept of race was first introduced. With the inception of IQ testing in the early 20th century, differences in average test performance between racial groups have been observed, though these differences have fluctuated and in many cases steadily decreased over time. Complicating the issue, modern scie... In art classes, I was told that learning to draw with pencil (charcoal, etc) changed your brain in ways that messing around with graphics program did not – something about the direct interaction of eye, hand, materials, and object being drawn (it’s been a while …). So actually producing the letter shapes by hand might re-inforce the connection with the sounds that they represent. And writing whole, joined-up words might extend that to their meanings. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/43 "2013-07-02T16:22:43Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > Maybe I’m slow this morning, but I don’t understand what this means. If you were taught to write without knowing the alphabet, then just what was it that you were writing? I was surprised as well, but my guess was that she was taught to write letter combinations and whole words first. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/44 "2013-07-02T17:16:57Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The letters where I see a significant difference: > > CAPITALS: > A, G, S (note that most capitals aren’t shown–I’m curious about how it’d handle cursive’s weird capitals like E, F, I, J, N, Q, T, and Z) All the capital letters in this system are essentially identical to printed letters. Capitals are not joined to other letters. Google “Nelson Handwriting” for some examples. (Nelson is the most common handwriting used in UK schools - in fact it may well be universal?) ---
**Author:** ![Cartoonacy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/848f3c/32.png) [@Cartoonacy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartoonacy)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/45 "2013-07-02T18:31:42Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I was surprised as well, but my guess was that she was taught to write letter combinations and whole words first. Hmmm, OK. It’s hard to wrap my head around the idea of writing words without knowing the letters, though. This reminds me of when I was in the first grade (1966, to be precise). We spent several days learning “word shapes.” That is, we would print words in mixed case, then draw outlines around them, following the ups-and-downs of the leading capitals, ascenders, and descenders. At the time, I didn’t get the point of it, and my parents thought it was the most idiotic thing they’d ever heard. It was only recently that I realized the purpose was to train us to see words as units, rather than groupings of letters to be sounded out. It was exercises like that that made me such a rapid reader today. ---
**Author:** ![BleizDu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@BleizDu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BleizDu)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/46 "2013-07-02T19:26:26Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Also, reading your post, I realize where “crossing your t and dotting your i” (or something like that…can’t remember the exact wording) comes from. I assume you’re taught to cross the t and add the dots on the i after writing the word. I was never taught that, either. Writing the letter included the cross/dot/accent/whatever..then only you’d go to the next letter. This. I was taken aback by the mention of needing to go back to cross the T and ad dots. That does sounds like it would slow one down. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/47 "2013-07-02T19:53:11Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I teach third grade, and my legislature has just passed a law mandating that all students learn cursive. Given the forum, the less said about your state’s legislature, the better. 🙂 > [@](#): > > This is a debate I’ve had with other teachers. It seems to me that cursive had a place in society when it was the fastest way of putting ideas down on paper. But now, keyboarding is far faster for folks that learn the skill, and it’s a superior means of communication. I’d much prefer that my students learn effective keyboarding. One anecdote isn’t data, but I’m convinced that typing and editing on computers was a necessary condition to my becoming a skilled writer. As I type, my fingers can almost keep up with my thoughts, something that was never true for me when writing in either print or cursive. When handwriting by any means, my thoughts would be racing on ahead, going down many branches, and the words I put on paper would eventually lag so far behind that the connection would be lost and I’d give up in frustration. > [@](#): > > Some folks argue that learning cursive has strong benefits for cognition. What little I’ve seen of the research makes me skeptical, though: it looks as though they’re not comparing cursive-instruction-as-intervention to any other intervention, but simply to a lack of intervention, and that seems sketchy to me. That’s the thing: you can teach cursive, or you can teach something else in the block of time that one would otherwise teach cursive. And I’m sure there are plenty of other things one would like to include in the curriculum that there isn’t time for at present. So that’s the question that has to be asked: whether cursive is a better use of that time than any of the other things that one might teach instead with that time. I’d add that as typing on a computer keyboard increasingly reduces the need to handwrite in any form, ISTM that teaching two ways of handwriting needs a much stronger justification than it did 20 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/48 "2013-07-02T21:51:23Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > [Here’s what it might look like in practice](http://okami-whatever.blogspot.com/2010/07/featured-pen-followup-aurora-88.html). Uh oh. It’s slanted the wrong way! That means 10 whacks per palm, being sent to the office, 1,000 lines of I will never use my left hand, standing in the hallway all afternoon, a note to your parents and one in your PERMANENT RECORD! ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/49 "2013-07-03T07:30:44Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Around third grade, many schools teach students cursive. [Here’s a sample of that cursive alphabet](http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Cursive.svg&imgrefurl=http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cursive.svg&h=1200&w=1500&sz=141&tbnid=wo8Xz7ehv5vceM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=113&zoom=1&usg=__pXhJZJpFAkGhENZvNiOnVByK9sU=&docid=PdSEusDIbAIUpM&sa=X&ei=BfnSUcvoPNG84APnooGIAg&ved=0CFQQ9QEwAA&dur=3972). [Here’s what it might look like in practice](http://okami-whatever.blogspot.com/2010/07/featured-pen-followup-aurora-88.html). [rant]Has somebody informed your school board that nobody writes a capital Q as the number 2? Even the script F looks ye olde preposterous and the S highly dubious. And what psycho designed their letter G? Sheesh: that design must date from the horse and buggy era. Wiki says that it was published in 1978 and is based on one from the late 19th century FWIW. [/rant] ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/50 "2013-07-03T08:42:15Z")
I had never given this any thought before, but I was taught the cursive as depicted in the link that **Left Hand of Dorkness** provided. But I don’t write that way now, and I can’t really remember when I changed. My signature provides the last vestige - I use the cursive capital F and A, but that is it. I know I made some deliberate modifications in writing style when I was an undergraduate - to cope with taking notes, especially in mathematics lectures. I deliberately started to cross my 7’s and Z’s. Also avoiding the cursive capitals. Everything was done to improve legibility whilst taking fast notes. I needed all the help I could get having legendarily bad handwriting. Looking at my current note books and the script is a curious creole of cursive and not. For the most part due to ignoring any rules about not lifting the pen off the page, letters that flow together are joined, those that don’t are not. It would greatly upset my early school teachers. In the end I think the question is not about the difference between keyboard and paper. I write more on keyboard than not, and am pretty fast, but I need to take notes on paper, and I need to do it often in an unobtrusive manner. It isn’t viable to take notes in a meeting on a keyboard. You lack the flexibility to jot down things fast enough, you are limited to a linear flow, with editing and annotating previous ideas causing a massive slowdown in entry speed. Keyboards are fine when you are alone with your ideas, but useless if you are working with people. Pen on paper allows vastly greater freedom, and supports non-linear flows in a manner that keyboards just can’t do. Block printing just isn’t viable in these environments either - you need a form of cursive. But being precious about the niceties of loops and traditional forms is silly at best. Students need to be taught a fast and legible script. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/51 "2013-07-03T09:05:08Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > Maybe I’m slow this morning, but I don’t understand what this means. If you were taught to write without knowing the alphabet, then just what was it that you were writing? Letters, but we weren’t taught every letter in order, nor taught to write them individually, before being taught to write. Same as our first read sentence was _mi mamá me mima_, so the first letters we learned to read were m a e i (our second sentence, _amo a mi mamá_, introduced the letter o; our second consonant was p), our first instances of writing were our own names and sentences similar to that one: they were full words and sentences, not individual letters. The alphabet got taught as part of “how to use a dictionary”. I understand many schools are teaching it earlier now, but I’m not sure there’s an advantage to it: at least for my nephews they just spit it out as fast as possible, it’s out of context and therefore meaningless. Printed children’s books here often use the same type of “handwritten-style” letter that’s used in writing samplers; looks like that may be another important difference. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/52 "2013-07-03T09:26:34Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > [Here’s a sample of that cursive alphabet](http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Cursive.svg&imgrefurl=http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cursive.svg&h=1200&w=1500&sz=141&tbnid=wo8Xz7ehv5vceM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=113&zoom=1&usg=__pXhJZJpFAkGhENZvNiOnVByK9sU=&docid=PdSEusDIbAIUpM&sa=X&ei=BfnSUcvoPNG84APnooGIAg&ved=0CFQQ9QEwAA&dur=3972). . With some minor differences in the capital letters, that’s the cursives we’re taught in France too (and the only kind of writing that is taught. No print letters or such things..) ---
**Author:** ![BleizDu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@BleizDu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BleizDu)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/53 "2013-07-03T10:43:53Z")
Eh, for me these capital letters looks really different than the ones I was taught. I learned these: [![](https://cuy.be/orthotypo/majuscule_calligraphie.png) ](https://cuy.be/orthotypo/majuscule_calligraphie.png) (except less slanted) I still write my capitals like that. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/54 "2013-07-03T19:29:47Z")
> [@Duckster](#): > > [ul] > [li][A CNN article from 2011](http://www.cnn.com/2011/IREPORT/08/24/cursive.writing.irpt/index.html).[/li][li][An NPR article from 2011](http://stateimpact.npr.org/indiana/2011/09/29/why-schools-should-keep-teaching-handwriting-even-if-typing-is-more-useful/).[/li][li]The [Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity](http://dyslexia.yale.edu/EDU_keyboarding.html) prefers keyboarding.[/li][/ul] > For me it’s similar to using calculators in the classroom. If you haven’t mastered a pencil, paper and an eraser to do math, you shouldn’t be using a calculator. I think the same should apply to writing as well. Teach both so each student is able to learn all the skills. > > It might come in handy if there are no batteries or a power outlet. 🙂 > > Besides, is teaching being pushed by technology for the sake of technology, or is technology supplementing teaching? Totally agree. Talking sense there. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/55 "2013-07-03T20:16:31Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I teach third grade, and my legislature has just passed a law mandating that all students learn cursive… Leaving aside what “research” tells us, let’s just stop for a moment and consider the wisdom of having legislators determining the finer points of what is taught in school. How did these people get into office - on the basis of their expertise in the field of education? Or is this a matter of “I went to school, therefore I know what’s best for schools”? They don’t seem to feel they have the right to tell doctors what types of tongue depressors to use, or how to perform their jobs, but teachers (and students) are fair game. When are Americans going to stand up to these idiots and get them to focus on the things that they are actually in office to do? If you want something to look at to explain the depressing state of affairs in many school, you only have to look at the effects of state and federal laws regarding education. Aggghhh - don’t get me started. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/56 "2013-07-03T20:34:14Z")
[hijack] > [@CC](#): > > … let’s just stop for a moment and consider the wisdom of having legislators determining the finer points of what is taught in school. …If you want something to look at to explain the depressing state of affairs in many school, you only have to look at the effects of state and federal laws regarding education. Aggghhh - don’t get me started. In most countries, textbooks are chosen at the national level. Local control in practice produces a lot of duplicated effort in the US. [/hijack] Worth bumping to page 2: > [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > Everything was done to improve legibility whilst taking fast notes. I needed all the help I could get having legendarily bad handwriting. Looking at my current note books and the script is a curious creole of cursive and not. For the most part due to ignoring any rules about not lifting the pen off the page, letters that flow together are joined, those that don’t are not. It would greatly upset my early school teachers. > > In the end I think the question is not about the difference between keyboard and paper. I write more on keyboard than not, and am pretty fast, but I need to take notes on paper, and I need to do it often in an unobtrusive manner. It isn’t viable to take notes in a meeting on a keyboard. You lack the flexibility to jot down things fast enough, you are limited to a linear flow, with editing and annotating previous ideas causing a massive slowdown in entry speed. Keyboards are fine when you are alone with your ideas, but useless if you are working with people. Pen on paper allows vastly greater freedom, and supports non-linear flows in a manner that keyboards just can’t do. Block printing just isn’t viable in these environments either - you need a form of cursive. But being precious about the niceties of loops and traditional forms is silly at best. Students need to be taught a fast and legible script. So the two key criteria are **speed and legibility**. In the early 1900s, Sears hired armies of script writers because much of their customer base didn’t like be written to by a machine (the nonelectric typewriter). Those days are long gone. Even the word script has changed its dominant meaning in a business context. > [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Around third grade, many schools teach students cursive. [Here’s a sample of that cursive alphabet](http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Cursive.svg&imgrefurl=http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cursive.svg&h=1200&w=1500&sz=141&tbnid=wo8Xz7ehv5vceM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=113&zoom=1&usg=__pXhJZJpFAkGhENZvNiOnVByK9sU=&docid=PdSEusDIbAIUpM&sa=X&ei=BfnSUcvoPNG84APnooGIAg&ved=0CFQQ9QEwAA&dur=3972). [Here’s what it might look like in practice](http://okami-whatever.blogspot.com/2010/07/featured-pen-followup-aurora-88.html). A lot of the capital letters in that sample advance neither speed nor legibility. The lower case “e” and “l” might advance speed. Joined up letters may have some justification. The only remaining purpose of US cursive is to help you write your signature. That exercise might be left to art class. Seriously: graphic arts are often underweighted anyway. The art teacher should probably post a range of options for writing various capital letters. I’d still leave out the writing of the capital Q as a 2 though: I don’t think I’ve ever seen that presentation in the wild. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2013, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/57 "2013-07-03T22:01:52Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > In most countries, textbooks are chosen at the national level. I hope you’re not suggesting that we adopt such a bizarre practice. Public schools are essential parts of local communities. Everyone working from the same books across the country would be the antithesis of the one-size-fits-all scheme. It would be one-size-fits-hardly-anyone. > [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Local control in practice produces a lot of duplicated effort in the US… I’m not sure what you mean by this. What gets duplicated, and how is this a problem? ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2013, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/58 "2013-07-04T01:08:11Z")
> [@CC](#): > > I’m not sure what you mean by this. What gets duplicated, and how is this a problem? The US has 13,600 school districts each choosing their own special curriculum. England and Wales have something like [174](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_Education_Authorities). England has maybe 1/6th the population of the US, so scaling up that’s the equivalent of having about 1000 school districts for the US. But curriculum decisions are made at the national level in Britain - although admittedly there is some local flexibility as to how national standards are met. I retract my textbook claim but maintain my duplication of effort claim. I mean we’re talking about an order of magnitude here. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2013, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/59 "2013-07-04T13:56:22Z")
There’s a middle ground here. Comparing England and the US might work better if you consider that England is about the size, in square miles, of Iowa. Let the states set up very general educational guidelines, listing the broad topics and goals they desire for their students. Local districts would then design their own curricula. That would provide more particular guidance for schools. And then, each school and each teacher would have the latitude to implement the curriculum as they see fit, crafted to the particular needs and desires of the students they are working with, under the larger umbrellas I’ve described. ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2013, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383/60 "2013-07-05T16:33:34Z")
> [@CC](#): > > I hope you’re not suggesting that we adopt such a bizarre practice. Public schools are essential parts of local communities. Everyone working from the same books across the country would be the antithesis of the one-size-fits-all scheme. It would be one-size-fits-hardly-anyone. > I’m not sure what you mean by this. What gets duplicated, and how is this a problem? I never understood that argument. A person today might easily live in a half dozen states and a dozen cities by the time they retire. I have more in common with people in certain parts of cities thousands of miles away than I do with the part of my city that is a half mile from here (cross one street and the Obama Biden stickers become McCain Palin). I communicate instantly with people all over the world both at a personal level and for business. I really don’t want different ways to call the same mathematical operation. hell, I just had a weird conversation the other day about some kids homework where they were using 2:5 rather than 2/5. Math, science, and English are universal. Sure we need to teach local history as well, but I don’t want to move and then find my kid is at a completely different level in his various subjects because local school districts just decided one way was better. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-cursive-really-have-cognitive-benefits/662383.md?page=4)