What is SmithHand?
SmithHand is a new method for teaching handwriting.
Because SmithHand is a true cursive hand instead of a
copy hand (like other methods) it's achievable as taught and therefore needs to
be taught only once. It can be written with speed yet retains its legibility. It
is written with the natural motion of the hand and uses the stroke over which
the writer has the best fine motor control. It results in flowing, elegant,
practical handwriting.
SmithHand writing.. .
We call it the
"phonics" of penmanship
Explore our site to learn more about the
SmithHand Writing Method.
Origins of SmithHand Writing
Methods
A while back, I spent a year in a 4th grade
classroom with other kids learning the finer points of cursive handwriting using
the Palmer Method for public schools. It was a challenge trying to form the
large, awkward letters, but I did my best to try to master the method. We used
lined paper worksheets, laboriously copying the example our teacher put on the
board, and then used copy books and theme tablets to write sentences and
paragraphs from the exercises assigned.
My name begins with B, so we soon came to a letter I would
use often. The upper case B was plain ugly, always reminding me of the profile
of Hitchcock’s face created for Alfred Hitchcock Presents on television.
The lower case b was just as bad, reminding me of a decrepit kangaroo with a
saggy pouch. Both were difficult to make, but because we were told to make them
that way, I tried. Then there were letters like D, H, Z, and that greatest of
all letter disasters, Q. In all the books and all the efforts I made, everyone
assumed it was a 2. It was impossible to write anything with speed, and for
years when I tried to use the cursive hand the look of a 4th grader’s
writing was the best I could do. Although I would never have let it show at
school, there were many quiet moments after school when I shed some tears over
the effect it was having on my self-respect. I assumed something was wrong with
me because no effort of mine
At the time, I noticed that a classmate rival, the cerebral
Margaret, didn’t bother to form her letters the way the lessons showed. She
invented her own handwriting form that year while we boys tried to do it
“right.” I found out later that other girls wrote the way she did, and I failed
to note the irony that they tended to get better grades for cursive handwriting
than I ever did. Adding to the mystery was the fact that she had a batting
stance like Musial, and was usually chosen fourth or fifth for our softball
teams, right after me. This made no sense to me, but I chalked it up to another
of life’s mysteries.
My saintly fifth-grade teacher usually did not require me
to write much in cursive, so I reverted to my adapted stick-and-ball printing
which, if only barely legible, was at least much faster than cursive. All that
year, and for the next 30 years that followed, my rapid printing and much
abbreviation carried me through high school, college, and grad school. At least
I could decipher it, mostly.
As an undergrad history major, I was already a veteran
antique hunter, because antique shops are little haphazard museums of historic
artifacts. In county courthouses I discovered the beautiful, flowing Spencerian
handwriting taught by the Spencer brothers in the 19th century. With
an interest in books, I began to discover that this handwriting had been taught
in public schools until about 1900, when it was replaced by the Palmer Method of
Business Writing. I bought a copy of the Spencerian method book of 1874, and sat
down with calligraphy pens to learn it. It was surprisingly easy, and even I
could make beautiful letters, words, and paragraphs if I went slowly enough,
something I had never been able to do with Palmer’s plan of misery. For fun I
used Spencerian as calligraphy, but for classroom work it was always scratch
printing.
There my skills paused until an opportunity came along in
1997 to take some time off and think about what to do next. I decided that I
might make an attempt to create an alternative handwriting method, so I began
work on an alphabet. It took me two solid weeks to come up with an alphabet that
could be written smoothly but still be legible by anyone. Then I created a
method to teach it using the four basic strokes first, then the letters in
difficulty order, starting with i. I had it printed up and took it to a small
home school curriculum show near Omaha. I decided to call it SmithHand, like
shorthand for faster, truly cursive writing. To my surprise, homeschool parents
bought it eagerly, and soon reported that it worked so well that they wanted it
for their other children, and sometimes for themselves. They began to ask me
about manuscript lessons, and in that way I created SmithHand manuscript. Which
also began to sell well for younger children.
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SmithHand Writing Methods
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