At 2:27pm, on August 30th, Delaware Governor John Carney signed House Bill 70, which will make cursive writing mandatory instruction in all Delaware public schools beginning in the 2018-2019 school year. The new (and old) instruction will require English and Language Arts teachers to teach cursive to students until the end of 4th grade.
So what happens next? I imagine the State Board of Education will issue regulations based on the new law and from there the local school district and charter school boards will have to make sure it is part of the curriculum for the next school year.
As for the fierce opponent of the bill, Kate Gladstone, she will NOT be happy about this. Ms. Gladstone travels to different states opposing cursive legislation. Me, I write a blog. She travels. We all have our thing I guess. But I don’t think Gladstone counted on the tenacity of little old Delaware. She probably thought she could just roll over our state legislature.
Congrats to State Rep. Andria Bennett for getting this rolling again and to State Rep. Deb Hudson for bringing it for in the last legislative session.
The Season Of Myths 
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I have 2 boys 13 & 24. I have arguing this issues wth teachers since my oldest entered public school in grade 4. I have argued with so many teachers over the years about the public schools needing to teach the dying art of handwriting. I have had a few teachers who agreed that handwriting should be part of the school carriculum but the majority I spoke with felt or unnecessary. I had one teacher who when my oldest was in 8th grade go so far as to tell me that they didn’t care whether the kids know how to write or not because they used computers for everything. My argument back was what happens on the day the computer breaks and they have to leave a note and they can’t write. I got no answer from him. My toughest has autism and attendeds private school in media pa and it is thankfully part of their carriculum.
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I agree, teaching cursive is so much more important than teaching reading, creative writing, poetry, etc. How else are our children going to function in the 21st century without being able to write their words like they did in the 1900s?? Next thing you know, they’ll be telling us you don’t have to know cursive in order to type on a computer. I tell you one thing, taking cursive out of the curriculum is why the US has fallen behind China, Japan, and virtually all of Europe in education. Have you seen how pretty their words are??
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I notice that not one of the signatories printed their name.
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I missed that. All the more reason to get this bill signed!
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Better later than never. Common sense has won out in the end. Thabk you, Dear God!
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I am not sure how I feel about this. Yes, a child should learn to write their name, not print, but how much more is needed? Students should learn how to read it, but that isn’t too hard. The reality is with the emphasis on technology, learning to type, in my opinion, is more beneficial.
As a side note, out of all the educational issues in the state, THIS is case they try to take up? I can think of a handful of others that are of much more importance.
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This instruction is positive, but as we recall our elementry introduction was perfecting Printing! That gives young students a sense of pride in reproducing a standard character. Reproducing exact numerals makes sense out of math. A Cursive Bill that ignores printing, as Schools have, will really miss the mark.
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Handwriting is intrinsically linked to other important skills such as reading. A study published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society has shown that a child’s ability to remember and then draw a visually presented shape is predictive of how well they will score on national writing tests. Interestingly, the ability to reproduce was also predictive of scores in reading tests. This suggests, as have other studies, there is a link between writing and reading.
It’s a link that may appear surprising at first, as reading and writing appear to constitute two rather different skills. But there is a growing body of evidence suggesting a close relationship between developing motor skills a developing cognitive skills. It also suggests that processes related to writing numbers also support mathematical development (mathematicians are always found writing formulas with pencils or chalk). (Source: THE CONVERSATION, article: Learning handwriting is more about training the brain than cursive script, Jan 26, 2016)
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I am a tutor. The state also needs to allot time in in kindergarten and first grade for proper printing form and grip. These early skills lead to more success later.
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A million years ago, when I was in school, we were taught printing in grade one, and taught cursive in grade four. I’m sure this was planned to coincide with the development of children’s fine motor skills. By fourth grade, those skills have developed enough for children to be successful. It also helps teach patience and self control.
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Cursive is equivalent to penmanship. Printing was difficult with a nib pen, so Cursive came into the classroom. It is “printing form and grip” that should be the subject of this new law.
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