Cursive writing used to be an essential skill that was taught in school. Somewhere along the way, educators decided that it wasn’t important. And as a result, most schools don’t bother teaching it anymore. But, did they really do something that helpful or are there important unintended consequence?.
One of the consequences of not teaching cursive that has been discussed is that people in the future won’t be able to read important documents from the past. Well, OK, some of them are not that easy to read if you do know cursive (example, Old English). But others that come to mind are documents such as the Declaration of Independence, The Gettysburg Address, even that family letter that Grandma wrote 80 years ago.
So what does this have to do with your Brain?
Surprisingly, another unintended consequence is the loss of cognitive ability, Researchers have found that writing in cursive (your course notes, for example) will increase your cognitive function, language and working memory. That’s right, taking your class notes in cursive will help you remember the material better. Taking notes on your computer or handwriting them in print doesn’t compare.
It is a proven scientific fact that the physical act of writing in cursive will improve your brain function. One group of scientists believe this is because cursive handwriting stimulates brain synapses. They think it also aids synchronicity between the left and right hemispheres. Another study compared student results on the essay portion of SATs. High school students who wrote them in cursive scored higher on average than students who wrote in print…
Now you know why when you were in elementary school you spent hours with your practice papers with the lines on them. You made circles and lines of “i” and “r” and the alphabet in cursive. We were doing this over and over to improve the cognitive functions of our growing brains. We were also teaching our brains how to remember each word better.
What do you do about it?
Here’s a fun way to check how your brain is working.
“Write aluminum in cursive as fast as you can without looking at the word…“
Now check your work. How did it look? Was it unreadable? How messy was it? Did all the letters connect properly? Oh, did you spell it right? Did your hand shake or did you really have to concentrate just to get the letters right? Losing the ability to write words legible in cursive is one symptom of memory loss.
For those starting to suffer from brain memory and cognitive function loss, “aluminum” is consider a very difficult word to write in cursive.
Here is a suggested exercise to perform every morning to help keep your brain sharp. Make a to-do list but handwrite it in cursive.
Pretty neat, right? And easy. You will not only start to improve your brain functions but a big side effect is you won’t forget the things you need to do.
Remember, the simple act of writing in cursive will stimulate key areas of your brain and help to improve your working memory.
A true win-win!
I’ve got a couple bonuses here for you.
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