***This post was originally published in 2014**
Hello Dear Friends!
My posts have not been as consistent these last few weeks, but I have been reading what most of you have been posting! We all know how much time it takes to prepare our blogs and it seems that recently other projects have kept me away from my blog. I miss posting and hearing from my readers, so my goal is to get back into my routine of posting once a week! I also post some fun items and share what other creative people are doing on my HorseMark Cards facebook page, which I hope you will visit soon! Now, on to my blog!
A few weeks ago I received an e-mail from a customer asking me if I could personalize a card she found on my website. Of course I said Yes! She composed a personal message and asked that I ‘write’ it on the inside of a card and mail it for her. I was happy to do this, but when I sat down to write the message, a thought occurred to me…does the person know how to read cursive?
Since I had no idea of the age of the person or where he was educated, I did not know if he was taught cursive writing. In the end, I printed the message on the card.

It was a beautiful message of love, and I believe the romantic style of cursive would have been more appropriate for the lovely message. I felt it inappropriate to ask if they knew cursive, but now I feel that I should have been more specific on the style of writing I used. The customer was extremely satisfied with the card and the printing looked very nice.
This experience prompted me to think about current views on cursive handwriting. I know many schools are no longer teaching cursive to our youngsters, and many more school districts across the USA are considering deleting this class. Many people think it is not relevant today, given that keyboards have taken over our writing tasks. However, there are also many people that think learning and writing in cursive is a positive learning experience. Cory Turner wrote an interesting article on this for nprED that is worth reading.
This experience got me to thinking if other languages and countries still use cursive. I knew Mr. Google would know, so I did a bit of research for my own curiosity. Many other countries still use cursive and I found it very interesting when I began my research. I did find some articles that have been written recently. Lisa van de Geyn wrote an interesting article for Today’s Parent. Another article I found was written by Katherine Collmer.

I do believe cursive should be taught and used in our world today. There are a variety of reasons that are mentioned in the above articles and I do believe we can keep skills from the past and incorporate them with our current technology. Moving forward doesn’t always mean that we need to replace skills, we can just add new skills!
When I began this blog over two years ago, I knew I wanted to have it be a ‘Creative’ blog. So, talking about cursive writing fits right in. After all, it is a very creative skill!
Thank you for stopping by for a visit today. Your comments are always appreciated. Wishing you all a wonderful, creative day!
~~ Vickie ~~