Cursive Question

[Busymomma1]

Hi all,
I'm not sure about starting cursive with my dd (age 8 today!). We're in BLHFHG (ds, age 6 as well), and it has no plans for cursive yet, but dd is on the older side and could probably start. She is a strong reader/writer/speller/grammarian! So... what should I consider? Her penmanship with printing is "average". I used A Reason for HW to start, but have just had her do copywork since. Would it be a problem to switch to Cheerful Cursive? How much "teacher guidance" does Cheerful Cursive give? I can't find samples anywhere, so wondering if those of you who've used it have any opinions about it?

Thanks!

[allforjesus]

I'm using it with an 8 year old boy. The Preparing guide calls for them to use it. I love the book and he loves it too. It has tracing first, then trying it. There are cute characters who teach them. I am nearby but am not hovering as he forms each letter. I like it so much better than A Reason For Handwriting. I do use that for printing with younger kids.

[my3sons]

Hi Tricia! Here are some pics of Cheerful Cursive:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4180&p=30768#p30768

Cheerful Cursive is scheduled in Bigger Hearts for His Glory. I'd probably hold off until then and fine-tune dd's manuscript first instead, but that's just my thought on it. We did A Reason for Handwriting A and liked that prior to Cheerful Cursive. However, if you're wanting to dive into cursive, Cheerful Cursive is a super easy and fun way to do it!

In Christ,
Julie

[Busymomma1]

Thanks, ladies.
Julie, the sample was VERY helpful. Looks like the program is comprehensive, not just "here, go trace this or try this." Liked the portion of changing it back to manuscript.

Thanks so much!

[pamh]

My son, who is 6, starting using Abekas cursive program this year. To give you a short background on his writing, he struggled in preschool, when his classmates were doing well. By the 2nd half of kindergarten, he had really nice penmanship (I hovered and would make him work hard at it...needless to say we were both in tears at times ). Well, he's a month in to cursive now and we were just about to drop it because it seemed like it was too much of a struggle and I was advised my teacher friends to not push it. As soon as I told him we were going to lay off of cursive for a while, my son is starting to do well at cursive. HOWEVER, now his printing looks horrible and there are a lot of letters that he half prints and half writes them in cursive, which sends the perfection side of me into a tizzy. Ugghh, I'm wondering if I have started him too early.

Pam

[my3sons]

My son, who is 6, starting using Abekas cursive program this year. To give you a short background on his writing, he struggled in preschool, when his classmates were doing well. By the 2nd half of kindergarten, he had really nice penmanship (I hovered and would make him work hard at it...needless to say we were both in tears at times ). Well, he's a month in to cursive now and we were just about to drop it because it seemed like it was too much of a struggle and I was advised my teacher friends to not push it. As soon as I told him we were going to lay off of cursive for a while, my son is starting to do well at cursive. HOWEVER, now his printing looks horrible and there are a lot of letters that he half prints and half writes them in cursive, which sends the perfection side of me into a tizzy. Ugghh, I'm wondering if I have started him too early.

Pam

My 6 yo could not do cursive yet, and he has always had relatively neat manuscript. I think I'd set the cursive aside and work on his manuscript using A Reason for Handwriting A (or something like it). We are finishing this out with our ds this year during Beyond, and it is helping cement those letters in his memory, while also building up those fine motor muscles. We don't require him to do the full lines of letters, but rather just have him do 3 excellent letters on each line instead. This has been working well. I wouldn't worry too much about the past - writing can be fixed with time and growth usually. But, I would hover for this one - in an encouraging way as much as possible. It helps my ds for me to put a little sticker or star near his best letter(s) on the page too. Once your ds has another year or so of printing, he'll probably be more ready for cursive. I'd look at this year as a time to work on his printing and build those muscles to get ready for cursive later.

In Christ,
Julie

[StillJulie]

We LOVE Cheerful Cursive.

My 4th grader, 9yo is doing it right now (per her request), though she did use A Reason for Handwriting last year to learn cursive.

My 2nd grader, 8yo, is doing Beyond right now. He's still using a 1st grade Rod & Staff handwriting workbook. His penmanship is bad. We'll wait til at LEAST next year, if not the year after for him to do Cheerful Cursive.