The perpetual dumbing of the masses.

[osoab]

Last week Indiana decide to eliminate cursive writing in public schools as a requirement.

Today ILL announced that they were doing away with the written test given to juniors in high school. Apparently ILL had already cut them for 3rd and 9th grades. ILL is doing this to save a measly 2.4 mil compared to the billions owed to pension funds and state vendors. What a fucking crock. To top it off, they are using NCLB as justification.

So what will be left with, a bunch of soda/energy drink sippers that can text on the fly?

Archaic Method? Cursive writing no longer has to be taught (http://tribstar.com/news/x1435410216/Archaic-Method-Cursive-writing-no-longer-has-to-be-taught)



TERRE HAUTE — Starting this fall, the Indiana Department of Education will no longer require Indiana’s public schools to teach cursive writing.

State officials sent school leaders a memo April 25 telling them that instead of cursive writing, students will be expected to become proficient in keyboard use.

The memo says schools may continue to teach cursive as a local standard, or they may decide to stop teaching cursive altogether.

Greene County resident and parent Ericka Hostetter has mixed feelings about the teaching of cursive. She has three children, and two will be in public schools next fall.

“I’m right in the middle,” she said, noting that she learned about it on Facebook. “I don’t use cursive much. I use keyboard. I use my phone, so even for my generation, I think we use the keyboard more.”

Hostetter is concerned about signatures. “I think we all need to know how to sign our names in cursive,” she said during a visit to Terre Haute Friday. Also, children will still need to be able to read cursive written by others.

“I’m really not on one end or the other,” Hostetter said. “I see the points of both sides, but to tell you the truth, I probably lean more toward the keyboard.”

In the Vigo County School Corp., handwriting is currently part of the elementary curriculum in grades 1, 2, and 3, with cursive handwriting being taught in third grade, said Karen Goeller, deputy superintendent.

“We consider our students’ needs, and right now, we do see a benefit in teaching cursive as part of our curriculum,” she said.

Currently, the SAT test and Advanced Placement exams call for handwritten essays, she said. “Speed and legibility are keys to success.”

Also, research has shown that handwriting does make a difference in the perception of a student’s knowledge and ideas. Legible handwriting may improve a student test score, while messy handwriting may detract from the writer’s ideas, she said.

She noted that some employers consider cursive handwriting as important in day-to- day work.

Handwriting and reading textbook adoption will be reviewed again in 2013 by a districtwide committee. “In terms of handwriting, we will consider future student needs like college and employer expectations in writing,” Goeller said.

Keyboarding also is taught in the elementary grades through a software program available in school computer labs. More advanced keyboarding, word processing and application experiences take place at the middle and high school levels, she said.

“We feel it’s important students have a healthy mix of handwriting and keyboarding skills,” Goeller said.

Susan Newton, VCSC language arts curriculum coordinator, said the state is moving from Indiana Academic Standards, which includes cursive writing in third grade, to national Common Core standards, which do not include cursive writing at all.

Most states have adopted the Common Core standards, which aim to create consistent national benchmarks for all students, regardless of their home state.Writing cut from state exam (http://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/education/article_3aa9e5ee-a7d1-11e0-ae36-001cc4c002e0.html)



CHICAGO — Illinois will assess only reading and arithmetic now that high school juniors will no longer be tested on their writing skills during standardized exams every spring, according to a published report.


Cutting the writing exams will save about $2.4 million amid the state’s budgetary shortfalls. Writing tests for elementary and middle school students were dropped last year.


“We’re trying to minimize the damage’’ of the cuts, Schools Superintendent Christopher Koch told the Chicago Tribune for a story published Wednesday. “Writing is one of the most expensive things to assess.’’


Federal law doesn’t require or fund writing tests. Under the federal No Child Left Behind law, public schools are evaluated based on their reading and math test results.


Illinois isn’t alone in struggling with how to offer an effective education for less money. Oregon and Missouri also recently made money-saving cuts to their writing exams.


Illinois education officials expect to restore the writing assessments in 2014 when a new state testing plan will require students to periodically take online tests, Koch said.


And the end of the writing section on state standardized exams for now doesn’t mean students won’t be tested on their writing at all. Many Advanced Placement exams given in May require writing, and the SAT college entrance exam has a writing requirement.


While some teachers and advocates lamented that the changes may take attention away from writing instruction, others said it may open some doors.
Without having to focus on the tests, “I think it offers some freedom,’’ said teacher Heather Schwartz of Pfc. Omar Torres Charter School in Chicago.

[Dogman]

Not very long ago , I posted here that cursive writing was on the way out, the world has gone to keyboards. No one writes letters anymore, or almost. It is now e-mails , texting or phone calls.

Cursive Handwriting will become a lost art.

[Buddha]

I have no big problem with this, and I was taught cursive in second or third grade. The reason is that I can't read others cursive writing most of the time. I would peer edit peoples papers in college, or read something that someone wrote me at work, and it's as though a retard wrote it (probably was lol). I actually handed a paper rough draft back to one of my peers once and said "I can't read this fucking shit". My Aunt would write me letters and it looked like Sanskrit, I have to guess words, read very slowly, and use context clues to figure out what the hell I'm reading. This has nothing to do with my reading comprehension, but rather the letters bleeding into each other and over all sloppy writing etc.

If you want to get your point across just write in print, or use cursive but take your damn time. I want to read what someone is trying to tell me with out feeling like I'm in a parallel universe reading an alternate human language. Otherwise it kind of defeats the point of writing something. Cursive can be elegant, but all it's done for me is steal a little bit of my sanity.

.

[Dogman]

I have no big problem with this, and I was taught cursive in second or third grade. The reason is that I can't read others cursive writing most of the time. I would peer edit peoples papers in college, or read something that someone wrote me at work, and it's as though a retard wrote it (probably was lol). I actually handed a paper rough draft back to one of my peers once and said "I can't read this fucking shit". My Aunt would write me letters and it looked like Sanskrit, I have to guess words, read very slowly, and use context clues to figure out what the hell I'm reading. This has nothing to do with my reading comprehension, but rather the letters bleeding into each other and over all sloppy writing etc.

If you want to get your point across just write in print, or use cursive but take your damn time. I can to read what someone is trying to tell me with out feeling like I'm in a parallel universe reading an alternate human language. Otherwise it kind of defeats the point of writing something. Cursive can be elegant, but all it's done for me is steal a little bit of my sanity.

Yea , out of practice myself, have to write tiny to be understandable.


And BTW: I like your avatar. 221

[Buddha]

Yea , out of practice myself, have to write tiny to be understandable.


And BTW: I like your avatar. 221

uggggggg, nothing is worse than tiny cursive.

TY! That is my new meme, "Black Power"

[Awoke]

Pretty sad sign of the times.

Soon the peasants won't be taught how to read or spell, and only his majesty the king and his entourage will be educated.

A return to the dark ages.

[chad]

as long as you can write + spell, who cares what script you write it in? this is akin to being horrified that microsoft is going to eliminate the times new roman font from ms word.

[osoab]

as long as you can write + spell, who cares what script you write it in? this is akin to being horrified that microsoft is going to eliminate the times new roman font from ms word.


Yes, but how many will not be able to read the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence in it's orginal written form? It's the lack of cognitive initiative that I see as the major problem. The initiative deficiency is on both sides of the classroom.

This almost seems like the next step in the whole word teaching method.

[chad]

i guess i don't see it. nobody uses sliderules anymore either, but we can still build spaceships and refineries using computers + calculators.

as for the constitution, as long as the words are the same, i don't see script form as an issue. it's not like it's being translated or anything, it's just a different script. i've seen photos of the cursive constitution, but i've never read it in cursive. i've always read it in block letters in a history book, pocket constitution, etc.

my view probably comes from not having used cursive myself (other than my signature) for years now. my daughter is learning cursive in school as we speak, and i don't see the practical point of it. the only people i know who even use it are my grandparents on birthday cards. my parents in their 60s don't even use it.

then again, i don't believe in capitalization, either.

[Dogman]

Yes, but how many will not be able to read the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence in it's orginal written form? It's the lack of cognitive initiative that I see as the major problem. The initiative deficiency is on both sides of the classroom.

This almost seems like the next step in the whole word teaching method.

It would seem you are right about this in many ways, as long as the government keeps its hands/nose in the education system you can expect the continuing dummying down of our kids. And as long as schools spend most of their time teaching a standardized test that are government mandated, that the results may look good on a pie chart. The schools will continue to churn out kids that may know facts and some formulas but not a lick of understanding. The teachers have a good ideal of what will be on the test and will teach the test. And the result will be the overall dummying down of the educational system.

Who here remembers the "New Math" bullshit?

For a long time the only real mandate schools really had , at least at the grade school level. Was to teach social skills, educate at least the basics skills that can allow the students to plug into society and work force.

Now it seems they turn out cookie cutter semi-educated robots.

IMHO

[Silver Rocket Bitches!]

This is a huge red flag. Cursive writing is more than just writing letters connected together - it's motor skill development, dexterity development..a cognitive challenge.

These days if it's not on a standardized test it gets thrown in the unimportant bin.

[Twisted Titan]

if you don't have a language you don't have an identity....... if you don't have an identity you can be molded into anything they want