Cursive

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Home : 2003 : September : 10

Cursive
By Sarah

I have a cursive book that has a half page of practice for every day of the week. I copy the whole week's work and give the packet to the students on Monday. It is due on Friday (before they can play!).

My children have
been taught cursive in previous years, but still make many errors.
I analyze their packets on the weekend and meet with them individually on Monday morning to give them a "cursive prescription" for the new week. This is just 1 skill that I want them to focus on improving.

For example, I had a child this week who was making her f's and t's half the height they should be. I spent

a minute showing her how to do it and it is what she will be looking out for this week.

Another student has letter formation down, but her writing slants every which way. I reminded her to point the corner of the paper to her belly button and she is going to work on the nice cursive slant.

Another child was making extra marks for some reason. I have her tracing, rather than rewriting the cursive, with a skinny marker to get "the feel".

Anyway, you get the point. I do give a letter grade for their packets. You'll have to determine the criteria for that yourself. Mine is: an A for excellent handwriting; B for good letter formation, but not consistent slant; C if there are some problems with letter formation; D for lots of errors. Everyone gets a D or above for trying. I have not had any A's yet.