How can cursive help students with dyslexia learn to read, write and spell?
What are the best methods to help a Dyslexic student learn to write using cursive!
What are the best methods to help a Dyslexic student learn to write using cursive!
Anna Gillingham advocated teaching cursive from the beginning, and many schools designed for students with dyslexia do the same (e.g., The Kildonan School, Camperdown Academy, and Sandhills School). In France, and in many other European countries, cursive is taught from the beginning.
It has been argued (by some who should know better) that learning to write using cursive makes it more difficult for beginning readers. This is simply not the case. Reading and writing, although both tasks involve written language processes, engage different circuits within the brain. First graders can easily master formation of lower-case cursive letters by Christmas. When working with older students from fourth or fifth grade on up, I have never needed to spend more than two weeks establishing formation of these letters. Upper case letters take longer, but students can certainly continue to print upper case letters in the meantime.
Before the student begins to write on paper, all cursive formations should be practiced with the student standing up and working on a whiteboard or chalkboard. The four-step multisensory procedure known as “Trace, Copy, Cover, Closed” is vital (March 2015 Examiner). Be sure that each letter begins on the line and ends with a “smile” that is the beginning of the connecting stroke to the following letter. https://dyslexiaida.org/why-bother-with-cursive/
My father after seeing me struggle with writing was the one that stepped in and started correcting my methods and required me to seek quality through proper practice. I discovered the power of learning cursive when I stopped looking at the print alphabet, trying to figure out what directions the letters were formed. I learned cursive because that is what everyone had to do, yet many of the problems I had with my poor ability to print disappeared when I learned cursive. Muscle memory helped me write legibly but also helped me to spell through the wisdom of my hand. Many, many hours of swoops and loops, practicing, sometimes practicing three-four hours every day over the summer I mastered cursive and improved my word letter/word-sound association, I developed that all-important fine muscle memory that helped me remember how those impossible p, d, q, and b are positioned and written. I tricked myself into treating my daily cursive practice as an art lesson. Looking at cursive like calligraphy, the cursive letters and words are art. Being an artistically minded person made all the difference in learning cursive.
Why is learning Cursive so important for all students!
Learning to read, write and spell for many Dyslexic, Autistic, and LD/at-risk students is tantamount to climbing Mount Everest. Learning to write can be augmented and facilitated with the use of computers but many educators overlook the power of learning proper penmanship, especially cursive for Dyslexic and Autistic students. Learning cursive can be a powerful tool for teaching writing very much like learning a second language that helps bring new meaning and understanding to the written and spoken word.
Why Bother with Cursive? - International Dyslexia Association
https://dyslexiaida.org › why-bother-with-cursive In the first place, cursive is undeniably much faster. “Kate Gladstone, a handwriting specialist based in Albany, estimates that while a student needs to jot ...
How cursive can help students with dyslexia connect the dots
https://www.pbs.org › newshour › education › connecting...Students with dyslexia have difficulty learning to read because their brains associate sounds and letter combinations inefficiently. May 6, 2014 · Uploaded by PBS NewsHour
- Cursive develops fine motor skills
- Cursive develops muscle memory that creates secondary, tertiary neurological paths for learning language
- Cursive is art and beautiful
- Cursive is faster than print
- Cursive is the form of writing that many of our most important historical documents are written
The art of joining letters to make cursive words made more sense to me as a dyslexic learner, print was just a jumbled collection of individual letters that got in my way. Dyslexics and many Autistic students think pictorially and try to solve and write things holistically. Learning cursive feeds into the holistic, artistic, pictorial, expressive nature of the written language.
Great articles and research on teaching cursive to students.
Why Bother with Cursive? - International Dyslexia Association
https://dyslexiaida.org › why-bother-with-cursive In the first place, cursive is undeniably much faster. “Kate Gladstone, a handwriting specialist based in Albany, estimates that while a student needs to jot ...
How cursive can help students with dyslexia connect the dots
https://www.pbs.org › newshour › education › connecting...Students with dyslexia have difficulty learning to read because their brains associate sounds and letter combinations inefficiently. May 6, 2014 · Uploaded by PBS NewsHour
New Study: Cursive Writing Benefits Students with Dyslexia
https://newsroom.domtar.com › cursive-writing-dyslexia Oct 8, 2020 — Research shows that cursive writing helps people with dyslexia improve hand-eye coordination, boost memory and stimulate brain development.
Cursive Handwriting Helps Students Overcome Dyslexia
https://newsroom.domtar.com › cursive-helps-students-... Aug 3, 2016 — Researchers, therapists and parents are turning to cursive writing as a way to help students overcome dyslexia, a common learning ...
What Handwriting Style is Best for Dyslexics? - Brainspring.com
https://brainspring.com › ortongillinghamweekly › han... Mar 19, 2015 — They argue that teaching cursive to students with dyslexia is an unnecessary burden for these students: “Children and adults who are dyslexic ...
Why and How I Teach Cursive to my Kids With Dysgraphia
https://homeschoolingwithdyslexia.com › teach-cursive-... Aug 16, 2016 — Not even knowing that dyslexia existed, we had a huge learning curve. It wasn't long before we began to understand that many dyslexics also ...
Handwriting - British Dyslexia Association
https://www.bdadyslexia.org.uk › advice › children › h... When learning to read, children first have to link the shape of the word on the page with the sound it makes. Then, when it comes to writing, ...
Cursive writing benefits to help dyslexic children - Medium
https://medium.com › cursive-writing-benefits-to-help-... Handwriting experts on learning difficulties have from time to time highlighted the need to make children practice handwriting especially the cursive fonts to ...
The Importance of Using Cursive Among Students with Dyslexia
https://blog.empoweringwriters.com › blog › the-impor... Jun 28, 2020 — Although it is quickly becoming obsolete, cursive handwriting is extremely helpful to the learner with dyslexia and much easier for them than ...
Is cursive really better for dyslexics? - Ladder Learning ...
https://atlantareads.org › 2015 › March Mar 4, 2015 — This recent article from the Yale Center for Dyslexia makes an argument for teaching keyboarding skills instead. “Once dyslexic students change ...
I too am dyslexic.
ReplyDeleteCursive made things far worse for me: in terms of handwriting and otherwise. (I've since seen this in many of my students, definitely including those whose diagnoses include dyslexia.)
Not till 24 did I write legibly, let alone fluently — this was only after I'd quit cursive (in which I'd been rigorously trained) for a semi-joined, print-like, fluent system called “italic.”
In retrospect, this shouldn't surprise — research (sources on request) has long noted that the fastest, clearest handwriters are neither the print-writers nor the cursive writers. Highest speed and highest legibility in handwriting are gained by those who join only some letters, not all – making only the simplest joins, omitting the rest, and using print-like forms for letters whose printed and cursive forms disagree.
(Research also notes that cursive writing, when legible, average no faster than printed handwriting of equal or greater legibility.)
Though cursive is not the only path (let alone the best) to fluent handwriting, we still need to _read_ that accident-prone way of writing. Dyslexic children or adults (like othes) can — and should — be taught to read cursive, AND how to write more efficiently and simply ourselves when we write by hand.
Reading cursive can be taught in just 30 - 60 minutes — even to young schoolchildren (including dyslexics) once they read ordinary print. (There's even an iPad app to teach how: named "Read Cursive" —http://appstore.com/readcursive .)
So why not simply teach children to READ cursive — along with teaching other vital skills, such as some handwriting style that's actually typical of effective handwriters?