Cursive or Print?

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Cursive or Print?
By Julie

Hi...... wow what an issue! lol! I myself am now teaching my 4th grade students how to type using a program called Dream Writer which my district demands I teach. No district will fire you for not doing everything in their
curriculum. It takes far more than that to get rid of teacher.
If you did everything you were suppose to in teaching, you may as well bunk there too. I leave at 4 to enjoy my life and family. I go back at 7 am. My students grade much of their own work too, which makes my life easier. I've taught for 14 years and plan to teach another 14 years. God willing!

Seems like cursive is not so important anymore. I think it's way overated. I did teach some cursive at the beginning of the year, but only as review and then made demands that everything should be in cursive. From the beginning, I start heavy duty into higher level thinking skills in science, health, and social studies with very little focus on handwriting. Writing assessments focus on content, sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, syntax, and big time on organization, etc. Cursive writing is the last thing they look at so really to me as long as it's neat in the FINAL DRAFT it's fine. My kids have to write 5 paragraph essays(with 3-5 sentences in each paragraph)at least once a month sometimes more and if they can write well in cursive or print that's fine with me. Whatever works, because I am grading them on content,organization, grammar, sentence structure and punctuation. We are expected to do so much, be mom, dad, the church and I for one am not going to try to be all those things. I will never live in the fear that they will take my house, my car, my paycheck. It's not like teaching is a glamorous job with a large paycheck. Teaching is all heart and you do what you have time for. That's just my opinion. Oh, in that Dream Writer, I am suppose to teach my fourth grade students how to type for 2 hours a day everyday for 2 weeks, then taper off to one hour a day for two weeks. I am sorry, but that's not happening either!! You are the teacher; you decide what's best for your kids and YOU!
See ya!
Julie