Conquering Cursive

Over the past few weeks there has been an echo in the house... When are you going to teach the girls cursive... this has been repeated many times. My response has been a shaky not very confident "Soon honey soon..., definitely soon." But with that said.. how many times do you postpone something out of fear. Out of fear of having to face tears, out of fear of having to face a task that is daunting.
Why is this so daunting I wonder and have to dig deep to answer. I have found fond memories of learning to write in cursive. I loved getting good feedback from my teachers and praised for a job well done. Then boom like a shot of thunder in my head it all came pounding in.. I remember now why I don't like the idea of cursive. The times that I did not do well I remember crying because I could not please my teachers or my parents with that pristine princess style writing that I was expected to write. Over the years my handwriting has diminished to the point where I hate writing by hand, as most people stuck to a computer are also experiencing. I saw my siblings go through torture to learn to write and even with all the tears they shed and all the loud noises from my parents they still cannot write well.

Yes, writing is important, and yes legible writing is even more important. But because I don't spend so much time writing in my day to day life I find it hard to even think of how to start teaching the kids something so important as good cursive handwriting. I was very excited when my kids could type early on (secretly that meant that maybe I could avoid the whole cursive mess!). Boohoo for me no avoiding that now.
So after much internal debating and imaginary hair pulling I decided to try to teach the kids cursive. This is just one of those things that I have to bite back my words and ask God for the patience to face, an internal battle that really is all about not wanting to fight with the kids over something that many before them have struggled with.
I went to the local Marjane (walmart type shop in one stop giant store) and found some workbooks that seemed reasonable. Lots of tracing and spaces for practice. Here they do not start with print they start with cursive.. so if that had been the case this would have been a breeze. But no.. we started with print and even that was a backwards mess. I found two workbooks and they seem great, my only problem is I am not used to these foreign small squished lines for writing and given that no one wants to help me teach on this paper I have to figure it out myself. I miss the American giant first grade writing paper now...
I pulled out the books and set the girls down. They are not on the same grade level, but I have found that when it comes to starting new projects they seem to encourage and help each other... so I started with the idea that lets just take it slow and see how it goes. If it seemed too difficult then I would stop and take a break and let it be and get back to it when they were ready.
Day one... I was shaky and nervous and my butterflies were turning.. this for some reason was like facing a large audience trying to give a speech on a subject that was in your mind but not in your heart. I gave the kids the books, sharp pencils, giant erasers and started with.. now we are going to start something new and I want it to be fun. Think of it like a puzzle... (at least that is how I think of deciphering adult handwriting!!!) They were excited. Ok Kids we are going to start with tracing.. my youngest was over excited.. she loves tracing.. my oldest got tense and tight because she knew that meant real work was ahead.. she hates tracing because it leads to repetitive work soon to come. (They know me too well).
All this said and done the first day actually went really well. By day 2 my oldest was begging to put other work aside so she could do cursive, even during her free time she wanted to pick it up and work on it. So we took a detour and instead of just following the grid and tracing and going one letter a day, she asked me to show her what my writing looks like, what the letters look like together.. and boom we were writing words, deciphering letters on pages and then the lightbulb hit and she was off like a race horse out of the gate. She just started writing her normal school stuff in cursive. Not all of the letters were fully accurate, but the words were legible, and she showed me that she looked at the alphabet in the sample and then just connected the letters. I had a mommy moment of tearful joy. I wanted to shout out loud.. but I kept that in and just skipped to my own beat. She did it. I was so happy, no tears no pain. Fear conquered and the start of a new chapter laid down.....
My youngest on the other hand... she did her page of tracing and stormed off to play with a stick. When I sat with her and we talked she said she thinks tracing is for babies. As I tend to forget she is no longer 5 and is on the brink of moving past the big girl stage into the stage where they full of confidence but are so super fragile. So when approaching the next day with writing I eased her into the tracing and then let her start with the first letter.. and boom she was so excited she did the whole page, and was fairly accurate for a first timer. We both agreed that one page was enough for the day so that she can be excited to keep going for the next day.

My lesson out of all of this is remember a fear is just that a fear. It does not mean something is impossible, might be difficult, but not impossible. It means that something may be hard but if you keep practicing and pushing forward eventually you will get it figured out. We have to conquer our fears no matter how wierd, painful, shameful, or ackward they may be. Have faith and God will always guide you.