I’m going to university this September. Nearly everybody says “In university they don’t try to understand what you’ve written it is unintelligible.” My handwriting is incredibly ugly. I want to improve it by the time I go to uni.
In elementary school they only taught me cursive handwriting. And I never bothered to learn print handwriting. I can write like that but I’m really slow at it.
How can I improve my handwriting? Which exercises I should do?
Thanks in advance!
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I’m very confused.
Does anyone still use handwriting in university?
I thought handwriting was done with, honestly.
Also my handwriting is dogshit and I got 2 degrees ral quick.
Obviously one of them in literature.
I wouldn’t worry about it.
I got 2 degrees ral quick.
Was one of them in Color Standardization?
Well it wasn’t in spelling or proof reading
I think (I need to confirm it I’m not sure.) IT exams here are still in handwriting to prevent cheating. They make you write code with a pen and paper
That is the dumbest thing. All of my comp sci stuff was open everything because out in the real world you would never be programming without those resources available. I don’t see why IT wouldn’t be the same. If they are testing your competency then you should have access to the internet just like you would in a job. If they are testing your memory then they should just use a lockdown browser or something.
you would be surprised how shitty our education system is
Oh, okay. Well practice makes perfect.
If you’re really concerned about it, just set aside 30 minutes a day and get one of those exercise books they give out in elementary school.
It’ll still work.
… how do you debug?!?
How do you copy and past everything from the broad shoulders of those who’ve come before?
That is unfortunately still very common at many schools. Luckily, the profs are usually pretty forgiving, and will give you lots of space to write. They are mostly aware it’s a dumb task and may require an entire sheet of paper for like 10-15 lines of code. I wouldn’t sweat it too much. If you can hand print a message on a post-it note for someone, you probably have legible enough writing for those questions. They aren’t normally big essay questions.
We have to write exams by hand
Probably a good idea and a necessity at this point.
Thanks.
Hooched awn Foniqs Werked phone mini!
In any case I’d be shocked if handwriting wasn’t used for something other than note taking.
It’s a motor skill. Consistent deliberate practice will yield results.
Write very very slowly. Practice all the specific movements for all letter combos. Only allow your speed of writing to increase if the quality doesn’t suffer.
It’s literally exactly like playing piano to your brain.
I used to have really bad chicken-scratch printing and I wanted to improve.
The exercise that really stuck out for me was to find a font I liked in a book on calligraphy and started practicing the alphabet.
Before I started practicing, I didn’t pay much attention to how I was forming a letter, I’d just draw it - and it would look messy. Once you start looking at each letter as a discrete number of strokes you start paying attention to the small parts and the whole looks much better.
If you’re really lucky, you’ll find a guide with arrows showing which way to draw each stroke. Super helpful. Note that this font uses a fountain pen, so it’ll look different with a standard ballpoint:
font I liked in a book on calligraphy
They’re called hands, because you do them with your hand. A font is a given instance of a typeface, which is a design of a script. Now you can be pedantic too!
lost me at 2 strokes for a c just to have a little thin spot on top
In my opinion, choosing the right kind of pen is very important. I use ballpoint pens mostly and prefer some pens much more because of their tip, weight , thickness and shape.
I have really bad handwriting. All my teachers used to complain about it back in school. I did improve it slightly over the years with practice. But nowadays I type on touchscreen or keyboards 95% of the time and in the rare occasions I use a pen I have starting trouble and my handwriting gets really really bad. Hell I can’t even write stuff on a straight line. Writing may become less frequent in the future in most jobs I guess.
But that being said, if you wanna improve it keep practicing, hold the pen properly and choose a pen with the type of tip that works best for you. You can even practice on those handwriting books.
Depending on where you’re going, you may not need to worry about it much. When I was in postsecondary education, there wasn’t much handwriting required. And I graduated 13 years ago; certainly things have gone more online since then. You might want to check with a current student in your field of study at your university and see what the handwriting requirements are. Make sure to ask whether cursive is a dealbreaker.
If it is something you’re going to need to work on, there’s really no getting around it: you’re going to need to practice. Cursive or print, you’re going to need to practice it. Get a big notebook, and something to write (hopefully something you’re actually interested in), and just start writing. Transcribe a TV show as you’re watching it. Copy a book line-for-line. You get good at the things you do a lot, and so you’re going to have to write a lot.
Also, I would recommend slowing down. My handwriting is great when I’m writing slowly but can be terrible when I speed up if I don’t pay attention. Slow down to start; if it’s still not legible, slow down even more. Make sure you aren’t practicing your existing bad habits. Then, as you practice, be deliberate: focus on each individual letterform, and as you become more comfortable writing legible letters, try to pick up the pace.
There are other things that you might find help you out: try practicing on wide-ruled paper, rather than college-ruled, for instance. Try a pencil or pen which moves more roughly across the page, for more tactile response. Make sure your pen or pencil is making strong, clear marks so that it’s obvious what legibility issues are your hand (and not just a bad implement).
You can change your writing style; I have, on a couple of occasions. It just takes practice.
I was thinking about going to local universitys’ introduction days I’ll make sure to ask handwriting.
If I go with copying a book do you reckon I should do a book I read before? Would it make it more efficient maybe?
The mechanical action, not the content, is what’s important. So you want something you’ll be able to stay focused on (and not be bored by), but other than that it’s not a huge deal.
Actually this could be a good opportunity. If there’s something you want to learn really well—potentially even memorize parts of—writing it over and over is a good chance to do so.
Practice writing slowly and with good form. Write regularly, give yourself practice pieces. At uni you will be writing FAST, so it’ll get worse if you don’t keep disciplined.
Alternatively, learn to touch type, and type any work you need to hand in. - if your handwriting is so bad, you may want to make your notes legible to yourself for revision.
I’m more worried about exams and what not. I don’t think typing with a keyboard could solve that.
It’s like everything, practice slowly, get good form wired in, then when you write fast for exams your writing will be worse than normal, but still legible.
Buy a fountain pen. They require you to write shower and be more careful.
Second, why write in print when you already write cursive??? It’s much more practical. Just try to focus on writing clear readable cursive instead.
I also switched from cursive to print for legibility.
I always found cursive terrible to read. Letters are more likely to look the same and it’s harder to tell where one letter stops and the next starts. I also read print all day, so I’m just more used to reading it.
I suffered from the same thing. nobody could read my writing because of the reasons you stated
I think one of the reasons my handwriting is bad, is that letters are bunching up because they are connected in cursive.
Honestly, slow down the writing and just keep practicing.
When I was in elementary school, I had a bound workbook with print practice exercises. I bet something like that still exists.
That could help in the beginning thanks!
What worked for me is learning some better letterforms from some free images from the Write Now book (by Getty-Dubay) on italic cursive. It’s a different kind of cursive from the awkward one I was taught in school, and it’s a lot easier to write and read.
I think the biggest improvement in my handwriting was just finding letterforms in that book that are both easy to write but that are also more clearly distinguishable when you write quickly. For example, just putting a little curl at the bottom of my lowercase T’s, I’s, and L’s made them a lot more aesthetically pleasing but also more clearly distinct from other letters.
Once you find some letterforms like that, it just takes a little practice to rewrite your muscle memory.
Have you considered a career in medicine? (/s)
I work in IT so YMMV; Functionally, outside of k-12 education I have not really needed handwriting skills. If I don’t have a working keyboard available, something has gone very wrong
As long as you can read it, speed would probably be the priority over legibility.
I’ve heard even in IT exams are still in pen and paper where I’m from.
that was my reaction too lol I think it is for preventing cheating
First, start big. Get the basic shapes right with large lettering. Ideally you would have something you are comparing to like a stencil or grey printout so you can see the difference between your writing and the target.
After you have the shape fairly good large you can shrink it down. You can take your time getting to that and just make a little progress at a time.
If you find it impossible to shed your current handwriting consider using grid paper to force spacing and maybe try your non-dominant hand.
id suggest finding a style you like online, print off a few pages of text thats fairly large. then trace the original to train your hand where and how to move. then practice without tracing.
No clue if it would actually work, but thats what i did when i got into calligraphy
I could trace in the beginning thanks!
When I was a kid, my parents made me do hand writing exercises. I had to fill entire sheets of paper with slashes and slinky loops.
