Should you be concerned about the current rage for keyboards in kindergarten to replace crayons, pencils, and paper? Are you worried if your third grader can’t write or read their name in cursive? What about your own habits? Do you write letters frequently or mostly tap out emails? Is your grocery list on your phone or handwritten on a piece of paper? For longer pieces—a job report, memo, letter to the editor, journal article or restaurant review—would the piece be more creative and invoke deeper thought had you written it out first by hand rather than dictated it by phone or typed it on a computer? Here are revelations from neuroscience for both children and adults regarding the benefits of writing by hand along with warning signs for scrapping the paper and pen.
For preschoolers, kindergarteners, and first graders, the complexity and time spent learning how to grip a pencil, position the paper, write their name by hand, and match written letters to sounds for spelling is worth the extra time and effort, according to the latest findings in neuroscience and cognition. Brain research shows that teaching handwriting has positive effects on letter learning, word reading, spelling and composing (James & Berninger, 2019).
These findings may not be appealing to many educators who now champion digital learning and electric keyboards. Surprisingly, handwriting benefits not only apply to children developing the foundations of literacy in their preschool and early grade years but also throughout elementary, middle, high school and beyond. Handwriting benefits also apply to whatever writing you do as an adult.
In an enlightening article on bringing back pencil gripping and shorthand entitled “Why Writing by Hand Beats Typing for Thinking and Learning,” journalist Jonathan Lambert lays out what he calls surprising benefits for pen and paper for both children and adults backed by the latest neuroscience and cognitive psychology even while considering the practical benefits of keyboarding for saving time, effort, and boosting productivity.
1. The benefits for handwriting start........© Psychology Today