It is the “default” activity for my students during our rotations. I believe copywork to be so important that I include it in our everyday schedule. And she is already trying to teach herself cursive from the Cursive chart we have on our school wall. She has over time developed a lovely manuscript form. We worked through the Primary Arts of Language: Writing with our second student, who needed a bit more help with beautiful handwriting. Again, she is a proficient cursive writer. Her interest in cursive writing led me to start teaching her cursive in second grade. She took to it and has beautiful, if tiny, handwriting to this day.

I took our first student as ready for writing instruction and started teaching her manuscript first. They were clear pictures of pre-writing interest on the part of my girls. The resulting “letters” were not even letters, not even a letter. When we started homeschooling, I had kids who would scribble across page after page of paper writing “letters to Grandma” dictating each word as they went. I say that to say I have noticed my girls are more interested in writing, in coloring, in anything having to do with a writing instrument of some sort. We have, in order: two girls, a boy, and another girl. If you are interested in more information about the “science” of copywork and cursive, Andrew Pudewa’s talk “Paper and Pen” is excellent! Our approach to Copywork We give our children a small part of this when we encourage them to cursive copywork. Your words were found and I ate them, And Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart įor I have been called by Your name, NASBĭo you see how Jeremiah responds to the word of God? Searching for it, finding it, eating it – taking it into his very soul. I like the way Andrew Pudewa described in his lecture “Mastery Learning.” He spoke of the writer “taking in” the words and the words becoming part of them, passed through the eyes, the brain, and out through the hands. It requires reading, internalizing, and then synthesizing. Kinesthetic learning is also happening when a pen scrawls across a page.Īnd copywork requires something unique in learning. (There are studies to support that, too.) There is thought required – more thought than that done whilst typing. The effect of the written word, written beautifully, is positive. In my opinion, cursive and cursive copywork are some of the simplest ways to bring truth, goodness, and beauty into the hearts and minds of my children. I only recommend things I use and believe to be a blessing.

If you click and make a purchase based on my recommendation, I get a small remuneration at no extra expense to you. What we need to teach our kids is typing – the better the word-speed, the smarter the kid, right? Cursive is no longer necessary because of computers.

One of the many time-worn practices now considered passe by public school teachers is cursive. I can fill my little learner’s heads with goodness, truth, and beauty.

Now I get to do all the old-fashioned, unworthy-of-my-time activities I want to. Good thing we decided to homeschool our kids. Thus, they must be excised from education. They are actually burdensome to students – filling their heads with useless facts and knowledge. The studies are in and they say these things are not beneficial to children.

Copywork manuscript paper printable