Cursive Handwriting: Tips And Practice Sheets

There can be no doubt that cursive writing is not as popular as it once was. But, if you are learning cursive handwriting, we have some tips and practice sheets for you.

Good penmanship can be considered an art form and, like every other art form, mastering it requires a lot of practice.

“Handwriting determines your dream – how beautiful your dream is, so is your handwriting.” — Sumeeth Byahatti

If you already know the basics but need more practice, you have come to the right place. In this article, we will give you the best tips to improve your penmanship and we will also include some practice sheets for you.

Why Cursive?

Unfortunately, cursive handwriting has been in serious decline over the last several decades. This style of penmanship that makes writing flow and connects most letters was popular for hundreds of years in the West. But by the 1930s and 1940s, most US colleges had stopped teaching their students cursive penmanship.

Now, cursive letters are considered old-fashioned. So, why learn cursive writing?

There are several advantages to cursive letters.

If you do all your writing electronically (on your computer, on your smartphone, etc.), you might want to consider going back to doing at least some of your writing by hand. It has been shown by several academic studies that writing by hand improves learning. This is particularly important for children who should be encouraged to do most of their writing by hand. But this could also apply to adults who are trying to learn something.

This particular benefit of handwriting relates to manipulating two-dimensional shapes (in this case, letters) aids in boosting learning comprehension. It seems that using cursive writing is even more beneficial for learning as it improves the spelling and reading scores of students.

Another advantage is the ability to write with pen and paper. As convenient as writing on a smartphone or a tablet, nothing can beat good old pen and paper. For one thing, you do not need to worry about running out of battery.

“I can write with absolutely perfect penmanship with my feet. If I broke both my arms, I could still write a girl a love letter using just my toes.” — Ian Somerhalder

Cursive writing makes handwriting a lot easier. Once you have mastered the art of cursive writing, you will find that is the easiest way to write.

Let us get personal. If you want your messages to have a truly personal touch, you should use cursive writing.

But good cursive writing is not only personal, but it is also beautiful.

Do You Want to Improve Your Cursive Handwriting?

The main tip for improving your cursive handwriting is to get as much practice in as you can. You could use the practice sheets that we have included in this article for that purpose. Be sure to print out plenty of them and take your time to work on every single letter. Remember that each letter has two versions: uppercase and lowercase. It is always a good idea to begin with lowercase letters. Master every single lowercase letter first before you move on and start practicing their uppercase counterparts.

Once you have gone over every single letter (both upper and lowercase), begin to put them together and make up whole words.

Even if have some experience with cursive writing, it is a good idea to review every letter if you have not written in cursive for quite some time. Focus on every single stroke and shape for each of the letters. If you have some previous experience, you should not need too much new practice to get you going again.

One of the most important ways to improve penmanship is by learning how to hold a pen (or a pencil) currently. Some people forget how to hold a pen currently once they get used to doing most of their writing electronically. But even people who still do a lot of handwriting may have developed poor habits when holding a pen.

The correct way to hold a pen is by letting it rest on your middle finger while holding it between your index finger and your thumb. Make sure that you grip your pen or pencil loosely. The best way to check if you are gripping the pen or pencil too tightly is by checking your fingernails and making sure that it is not white. If you grip your pen or pencil too tightly, your hand will soon get tired and your handwriting will look too stilted and stiff.

Another important tip is to make sure that the piece of paper that you are writing on has the correct position. The correct position will depend on whether you are right or left-handed. If you are right-handed, then the bottom left and the top right corners of the piece of paper should follow an imaginary straight line with your nose. And, if you are left-handed, then the bottom right and the top left corners of the piece of paper should follow an imaginary straight line with your nose. This is important because cursive writing should slant to the right by about 35 degrees.

“Calligraphy is the ultimate synthesis of what I love: language, art, and human connection.” — Joy Deneen

Do not press too hard when you write. Remember that cursive writing should always look like it is flowing and crisp and not strained and stilted.

Take your time. Cursive writing cannot be hurried so you might need to slow down your writing speed to adjust to this style of penmanship.

The final tip is to practice. If you really want to master cursive writing, you will have to practice at least 20 minutes every day. This may seem like a lot but if you take every opportunity you get to write something down to practice, you should be able to get up to 20 minutes easily.

If you are serious about cursive handwriting, it might be a good idea to purchase a coursebook on handwriting. There are several available, so it is worth doing some research and reading reviews before you settle on a particular title.

There are different methods to teach cursive writing although the most popular in the United States is the one known as the Palmer Method. This method is so popular because it makes learning cursive writing easy and simple and you will not need any fancy equipment to follow it. Any pen or pencil you already had will work for this method.