Miranda Byrd
Dr. Lambke
EN-111-05
09/16/13
The Write Way I’m never going to use this, I think to myself as I trace over the dotted lines on my worksheet. I am sitting at my small, wooden desk in the second to last row of my 3rd grade classroom. We have been practicing our cursive handwriting for several weeks now and I hate it. My penmanship isn’t very great to begin with and the flowing letters feel awkward as I slowly copy the letters R-I-N-G onto my big, blue-lined paper. I don’t understand why I am being forced to learn this fancy writing style when my regular handwriting still needs help. Fast forward several years and I’m sitting in the third row of my 7th grade science class passing notes back and forth between my friends, Tayler and Cammie. Seeing my handwriting mixed on the same page as theirs, I again realize how bad my own writing really is. I am jealous of the big, bubbly letters Cammie uses and the tight, angled letters Tayler is using. Girls are supposed to have neat, pretty handwriting. At least that’s what I’m assuming since all the girls in my class write with perfect, bubbly letters. My scribbled writing is sloppy and always changing, pathetic in comparison to theirs. This needed to change.
From that point on, I took every opportunity to practice my handwriting. Instead of drawing in the corners of my homework, I would write little phrases in as many ways as I could. I would doodle my name over and over and write lines from song lyrics up and down the margins of my class notes. I tried big, girly handwriting like all my friends had, but it didn’t look right when I tried to imitate it. I tried slanted writing, all caps writing, and writing with sharp, pointy edges, but none of these styles were working for me. I eventually gave in and decided to try out cursive handwriting again. I still didn’t like the traditional way cursive letters were supposed to be written, so every time I didn’t like a letter I changed it to something I did. I finally came up with a handwriting that felt natural to me. All of my letters looped together in a long, drawn out way.