In the 45 states that have adopted the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), there will be a greater focus on equipping K-12 students with the knowledge and skills they will need to excel in college and throughout their careers. However, something the CCSS does not consider to be essential is cursive writing.
Despite the fact that students will not be required to learn how to write in cursive under the CCSS, many school districts plan to continue teaching this writing style in the classroom. For instance, in South Dakota's Aberdeen Public School District, kids learn how to write in cursive once they reach the third grade, the Aberdeen News reported. However, individual teachers have the freedom to decide how much they want their students to write in cursive.
In other school systems, such as North Dakota's Webster Area School District, officials realize there is not a lot of time in the school day and, as a result, need to focus on the topics students need to excel in under the CCSS.
"With the Common Core Standards, we always continue to question where handwriting instruction will go," Craig Case, Webster's elementary and middle school principal, told the news source. "We want to utilize our time within the school day to teach those Common Core Standards, so we have to consider if we want to take half an hour out of each day to teach penmanship."
As schools are awarded a certain degree of freedom in instruction as long as the required Standards are being covered, educators will continue to decide what is and is not taught in their classrooms.
"You kind of make choices on what you're going to spend significant time on," Maria Santos, the deputy superintendent of California's Oakland Unified School District, told the San Francisco Chronicle.
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