Gentle Cursive Practice with New American Cursive from Memoria Press {Product Review}

I am one of those educators who is adamant about learning how to write/read cursive. I started each of my boys in 1st grade and continue to have them work through cursive copybooks to keep up their skills. Over the last several weeks, my youngest son has been working through New American Cursive 2 (Scripture) from Memoria Press (one of our favorite companies), and today I am going to share my review!

About Memoria Press and New American Cursive

Memoria Press is an award winning classical curriculum company. Their full line of grade level packages are much beloved in the private school and homeschool communities. They are also well known for their electives and other miscellaneous curriculum. Some of the products in their electives and miscellaneous categories include their New American Cursive curriculum, Traditional Logic curriculum, and their Classical Composition curriculum.

Adventures in Hand Lettering

Are you into the latest craze of Bible Journaling? I have several friends who love the hobby and I admire their gorgeous creations. I started getting into the world of Hand Lettering towards the end of last year. I just admired the beautiful creations and quotes that so a few artsy friends were making--so I decided to start small and start playing around with it--and so I began my adventures in Hand Lettering!

Patriotic Penmanship from Laurelwood Books~ A Copywork Book for Cursive Writing {Product Review}

We believe that copywork and penmanship are very important aspects of education, and provide daily copywork exercises for Little Britches to complete. He is also working in cursive, so I try to find copywork that lets him see and then practice his skills. We were recently given the chance to review Patriotic Penmanship: Grade 4 from Laurelwood Books, which combines copywork and cursive practice in one book. I was curious to see how he liked this book compared to his current copywork book--would he like this one more?

Product Information

Patriotic Penmanship, is a series of copywork books from Laurelwood Books. The series is a collection of penmanship books that incorporate everything from A-Z dinosaur names (for the lowest level) to famous quotes and scripture (high school level). Level K-2 is designed to practice manuscript, while 3rd-high school is in cursive. The books even include the transition stage from manuscript to cursive at the 2/3 grade levels. The books are paperback and retail for $13.95.

We were given the Patriotic Penmanship: Grade 4 (cursive) to use with Little Britches, age 10.

How Did We Use the Product?

The book arrived, and because it was just a workbook this time, I was able to add it in with little effort. I decided that with our summer schedule he would complete just 1 page a day, two lessons a week. This is a good speed for us and lets him break down the two page lesson into one per day. The two page lessons are broken down as such (using Lesson 9 as an example):

Letter Practice: practicing particular strokes of letters for the first 26 lessons, one letter per lesson. (ie. I and i)

Key Words: focused attention to words from the quote usually about three of them (ie. Nothing, politically, right)

Word Pairs: as it says, they practice word pairs from the quote (ie. politically right, Nothing is)

Full Quote: focused attention to a full phrase from the quote (ie. Nothing is politically right)

After the first 26 lessons, there is no more Letter Practice as part of the lesson.

What Were Our Thoughts on the Product?

Little Britches says that since he's only ever required to do a page a day, it's not too bad. He also says he likes the quotes and reads them even if he doesn't copy them all the way yet. He recognized some of the hymn lyrics like Amazing Grace when he got to those lessons.

My thoughts:
This is a quick and painless (though he might disagree!LOL) product for him to work on for practicing cursive and copywork. The quotes and phrases are quite meaningful and lovely, and I like that he's practicing "real" words and phrases taken straight from them. The pages are very easy to assign, and I think that the lessons are kept concise which is perfect for Little Britches attention span and hatred of copywork. LOL. I also like that these lines are smaller than other lines we have written on, helping him bring down the size of his letters. With our background in cursive, this book has been a very very good review and has brought to my attention letters and cursive strokes we should review.

I will note that because the quotations for each lesson are relatively short (2-8 lines), I wish there was the portion where they copy a full quote, was indeed the FULL QUOTE, not just one phrase. By grade 4, I think they should easily be able to copy a full quote down without issues. Perhaps the next level (grade 5) has more comprehensive quotes for copywork.

I will also note, that though I missed it the first few lessons, I discovered that at the bottom of the first page of each lesson, there is a vocabulary word and definition (for lesson 9, that word is political). I think this helps the student with expanding their knowledge as some of these quotes are older and not as known.

Oh, and as one last thing--I think it would be a great idea if the book listings on the website, gave at least a one lesson example (preferably one from the middle), so that a parent/teacher could look at the level they think they need, to see how difficult it is. I know that I would appreciate that. I also MAY have decided to request the next level up had I known this wasn't going to have full quotations in it.

Will I continue to use this product?
Oh yes. No-nonsense when it comes to a simple cursive assignment is the right style. His cursive has become more neat and legible, so I know it's working.

Would We Recommend the Product?

It is a very basic level 4 cursive book. I think that if someone is looking for a straight forward book for their child to continue to practice their cursive, this works great. All of the words in the writing comes straight from real quotes, hymns, scripture and more. There isn't any cutesy illustrations, and the writing space is smaller in the size of the lines. It's a more "grown up" copybook sort, something that I really don't mind.

If you want a fun, eye catching cursive book, you may want to pass on this. While the quotes included and style is excellent, it could be seem "dry" or "boring" without any illustrations, and being in black and white. If your child is ready for full length quotes, and not just phrases, you also may want to try a different level.

Want to Know More?

We reviewed the Patriotic Penmanship~ Grade 4 (Cursive) from Laurelwood Books. You have read about what we thought about it. But go check out the rest of the books that they sent the crew! There are some for Latin, states, and scriptures too.
It is easy to stay up to date on the latest news at Laurelwood Books, by following them on Facebook.

***

We now have two different cursive copywork books that we can use throughout the summer and into the next year. Since Little Britches feels the same about either book (he strongly DISLIKES copywork) I think I will let him choose whether or not he would like to get the grade 5 level in Patriotic Penmanship or his other book. One way or another, his penmanship is bound to continue to improve!

CursiveLogic ~ New [Logical] Approach to Cursive {Curriculum Review}

One of things that has surprised me about Little Britches, is that he loves to write in cursive. He's been studying it since the beginning of third grade last year. I have noticed though that it seems he still struggles with a few letter formations and of course...keeping it neat. When I learned about CursiveLogic Workbook from new company CursiveLogic, I was intrigued by their claim of a NEW way to learn cursive and I wondered if it might help Little Britches fix the things he was still having issues with--and I was interested in exploring it as an option for Baby Britches in the future.

Product Summary

CursiveLogic got its start when the founder, Linda Shrewsbury, felt compelled to help a 23-year-old student with learning disabilities learn cursive in a simple manner to be able to sign his name without the days and months of practice. In the course of figuring out what she could do, she discovered some things about the cursive alphabet's form and shape that lit a lightbulb and CursiveLogic was born and proven successful as her student was able to sign his name after just one session of using it. It is geared towards children who already are proficient print writers (Grade 2+).

The only thing you need is the CursiveLogic Workbook ($29.00), but CursiveLogic has a video seminar that goes with the class available as well.

We were given the CursiveLogic Workbook to go through with Little Britches (Age 9).

How Did We Use This Product?

We came at this book NOT as cursive beginners, so my method was a bit different than someone who was introducing it for the first time. We just worked through it together and he really just did most of it independently with me double checking all of his work. I really wanted to see how he would do with the method of breaking down the strokes and if they would improve his neatness and letter control.

We began at the beginning...

Begin by learning the Orange Oval letters

The way this program teaches cursive is to rely on the inherent structure of the cursive alphabet and teach focused on five aspects:

#1 The letters are grouped by shape
CursiveLogic teaches similar letters all in one lesson based on the similar cursive shape they have. The primary focus will be on lowercase, but there is some time at the end of the book for the upper case, where they are again grouped together.

#2 They teach letter strings
Instead of focusing on the letters of each group individually, the program puts them together in a string with the student immediately learning how to write in cursive through practicing the strings of letters. They are learning the shape, AND how to string them all together with a flowing motion.

#3 They use color coding
Each of the letter strings being learned has been given a color: orange ovals, lime loops, silver swings, and mauve mounds. By connecting the strokes being learned with a color, the student now has something they can verbally say as they are doing the action. This step further teaches the brain the idea of cursive and helps the child have a mnemonic when they are practicing.

#4 They use catch phrases
As I said in the last one, there are verbal catch phrases taught in this program to help the child remember strokes they are learning.

#5 They use real words
Right from the get go, the student will be learning how to put their new strokes into real words. This is because of the programs focus on teaching groups of letters at one time.

practicing the "dips: which allow certain letters to connect

Student can practice real words after learning their first string of letters

Little Britches found this method very easy and never had any problems doing what I assigned him. We typically did 3 pages a day a few times over the week. He liked having all the tracing to do, and I really tried to direct his attention to cleaning up his letter shapes. This is where the method of CursiveLogic really came in handy with the focused attention on the letter strings. I was quickly able to figure out what string we needed to spend the most practice on (the lime loop!).

Once your child works through the book, they are able to practice signing their name...

Little Britches is quite proud of being able to sign his name and does it on all his papers

The conclusion of the book takes a look at the capital cursive letters and the forming of each capital letter. The students practice by tracing and writing famous historical sayings.

There are dry erase pages at the end too, where your child can practice their letter formation and strings over and over again.

There is only one book right now, but with the dry erase pages, and the ability to receive additional practice sheets if you are subscribed to the newsletter, I think there is plenty to practice!

What Are My Thoughts on This Product?

Little Britches:
"It was way easy, but that's because I already know how to write cursive. But I don't mind easy. I like easy a lot."

Me:
I think that this workbook is definitely a gentle introduction to cursive because the focus is not on the letters, but rather the strokes. I love the way the letters are grouped by the similar strokes and how each stroke is learned separately. I love the idea of color coding the strokes to help remember the mnemonic pattern.

I especially love that the teacher guide and student book are together, AND that it's spiral bound. I love spiral bound books for school.

I think the extra dry erase pages are very helpful for further practice and can be used over and over again. I also love the extra copywork pages at the end of the book for cursive practice. I was happy to also see that if you subscribe to their newsletter they will even regularly send out practice sheets.

I don't really have anything I don't like about it, because it was just so easy to use and worked very well for us.

Will I continue to use the workbook until it's completed?
Yes. I think that Little Britches has "fine tuned" his cursive with this book and it has helped him with a couple cursive strokes he was having issues with, even though we have been doing cursive for two years now. I think that finishing the book will help reinforce what we have learned so we can then continue on in our penmanship books.

Would I Recommend This Product?

Yes. I think it's a gentle approach to cursive and it's very logical (as the name implies). I think it would be especially good for the much younger beginners--maybe 1st grade level. The verbal guidance would be ideal for that age group.

Want to Know More?

I'm sure that you are ready to learn MORE about CursiveLogic and their CursiveLogic Workbook ($29.00) since I only have given you a taste! To see what the rest of the crew members did with this product, make sure you click the graphic below!
Want to find CursiveLogic in Social Media? Here is the list of outlets where you can follow them:

Twitter: http://twitter.com/cursivelogic

Facebook: http://facebook.com/ilovecursive  

Instagram: http://instagram.com/cursivelogic

***

This ended up being a great program for working on making Little Britches' cursive writing more neat AND it helped him really fix a few of the random letters he was struggling with before. I like having this as another option for the day when Baby Britches begins to learn cursive!