LEARNING HANDWRITING

At the age of around two to three children have what is called emergent writing where children are taught to explore just with pen to paper. Whether straight lines, and then curved lines, it is the stepping stone to help children to learn to write. The classroom is set up so writing can be a vital part of any classroom activity, whether it is an art area, numeracy area, or role play area, this is to try and instigate the child to write without being forced.

Whilst children learn to write, it is important that they write anything, and there are activities, such as writing letters and lists that encourage writing. At this stage of emergent writing, it is not even wholly important for letters to be correctly formed, just as long as this idea of communication is embedded into what the child seems as normal, that they understand the purpose.

At the later date, most primary schools have a handwriting policy which specifies the exact style of handwriting which teachers and pupils are expected to use. Using the same school handwriting font throughout the school ensures that a consistent handwriting style is modelled and taught, keeping confusion to a minimum.

PRECURSIVE

The school handwriting font above is probably the one most commonly used in UK schools. Most of the letters end in a flick for easy joining later on. The letter f has a tail which hangs below the line.

Some schools prefer to have a letter f without a tail, as above.

At some UK schools the preferred handwriting style has a straight letter k. This font has an f with a tail.

This school font has a straight letter f (with no tail) and a straight letter k.

This school font has a straight letter f (with no tail) and a straight letter k. The q has a curved tail.

CURSIVE

The cursive handwriting style is gaining popularity in UK schools. Each letter is taught with a lead-in (entry) stroke with every letter starting from the line. This makes joining much easier to learn whenever the child is ready.

This cursive school font version has a 'curly' x and a letter z with a tail loop for joining. 

In this cursive style, all of the letters have lead-in strokes. The letter f has no top loop, the x is a straight style and the z has a flat top and a loop for joining

In the Cursive 4 school font style, all of the letters have lead-in strokes. The letter f has no top loop, the x is a straight style and the z has no tail. 

In Cursive 5, every lower case letter has a lead-in stroke. The letter f has no top loop, the x is in a curly style and the z has no tail.

In Cursive 6 the letter f has a cross bar with no top loop, the x and z are straight style.

In the Cursive 7 school handwriting font, the letter f has no top loop, the x is in a curly style and the z is in a curly style with a looped tail.

In Cursive 8 the letter k is straight, the letter f has no top loop and no crossbar, the x is straight and the z has no tail.

Cursive 9 handwriting font has a letter f with a tail which loops at the front, the x is curly and the z is curly with a tail.

Cursive 10 handwriting font has a short letter f, a straight x and a straight z with no tail. 

This is the modern method of children being taught how to write, and probably has changed too much in recent years. This however still doesn't give full credit to how most peoples handwriting does change, dramatically. I think its really interesting, no matter what we learn everyone is there own person. Personality in handwriting is everything.