Thursday, September 03, 2015

Goddard College in Vermont

    This is my alma mater as it looks today.  ~ listener           ~ Photo from the Goddard College Facebook page.

12 comments:

  1. Vivat Howard!

    Pardon my absence. Farming continues apace here; the grape harvest is well under way, and we are making raisins. There is a big forest fire in the mountains east of here, but until a couple of days ago the smoke pretty much stayed there. We have had some smokey days here, and one cannot see the mountains either to the north or to the east.

    Friday past, I found this article in The Atlantic:


    How The Ballpoint Pen Killed Cursive [Click]

    which makes incredibly good sense. The ballpoint also killed off the fountain pen and the indelible pencil, both of which I remember my father using. This happened around the time I entered school, so we were never taught how to use a nib pen (fountain or otherwise). Although the Palmer System was our standard, I realize now that it (like older writing systems) was meant for nib pens, and I also realize that we were not taught the posture and motions necessary to form good Palmer letters. I have never been satisfied with my penmanship, although it is legible when I take my time. I realized that I am not doomed to always have poor penmanship because I did not learn well when I was young; I have ordered some fountain pens (several cheap and one very good), also some books (many old ones are free on the Internet and now live on my computers) and am going to start a systematic program of study and practice. The thing that made the Atlantic article compelling was the observation that with a fountain pen very little force is applied to the pen, thus there is little opposing force to cause injuries to the hand. Anything I can do to reduce the strain on my hands is VERY GOOD. If there is some cultivation involved and I get to show off a bit, so much the better. If all goes well, maybe I will get myself a Pilot "Vanishing Point" pen next year--a retractable fountain pen one can operate one-handed; there is no cap to remove and replace. Someone who doesn't watch closely would assume it is a ballpoint pen from the way it is used.

    TTFN

    Alan

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    1. Oh--and there are some little bits of the standard Palmer upper-case letters I have never liked--so I shall change them to suit myself. So there.

      --Alan

      P.S.: I almost dropped through the floor when I looked closely at how I hold a pen and how one should hold a fountain pen--my grip is ABSOLUTELY PERFECT for a fountain pen--though decidedly questionable for a ballpoint.

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    2. The author obviously experienced different pedagogy than I did in the 1940s (before ballpoints were available). We were taught printing in first and second grade. Cursive was introduced in third grade. I resisted on the grounds that it served no useful purpose, but eventually surrendered to adult authority. My handwriting was never very good, though, and these days -- it probably goes without saying, given the state of my eyes -- I can't read cursive at all.

      I never got to the part of the article where the author tried to link the decline of cursive to ballpoint pens. Doesn't make much sense to me.

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  2. listener--re baseball rivalries joke, even for one not familiar with the particular ones mentioned, the joke is still obvious and effective. I am reminded of the joke that on the freeways of Los Angeles one is either a dodger or an angel...

    --Alan

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    1. Oh, I really like the West Coast version! :-D

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  3. Alan, I hope you won't mind, but I shared part of your pen note above, as well as the article, with some home schoolers. Since the Oak Meadow program for home schoolers still teaches cursive, and the Waldorf schools still use fountain pens, I feel sure that the article and your reflections on it will help them mull and prepare.

    And now I feel like getting out my fountain pen, brown ink and sealing wax! :-) Of course, as Lucy Maud Montgomery noted, "it is not possible to write a love letter with a pen that has a scratchy nib."

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    1. One home schooling parent has already responded:

      "Several things this writer didn't point out....

      "1.) Ball point pens are actually designed for right handed people. They actually roll in a specific pattern for right hands. If you want a true ball point pen for left handed people, you need to special order them.

      "2.) Depending on the maker of fountain pens, it takes a while to break them in. The one I received as a high school gift from a private teacher at the end of my senior year took 6 months to properly break in the 14K gold tip. Keeping them clean and free of residue also help eliminate the 'puddles.'"

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    2. I gather that IF one knows what one is doing, one can polish and otherwise adjust nibs that aren't quite right to start with.

      I today received the inexpensive fountain pens I ordered to start with; I also bought some good black ink (Noodlers). No word yet that the good pen I ordered from Japan has shipped. I await a couple of books I ordered.

      --Alan

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    3. listener--your respondent might find the pedagogical pointers in the introduction to this book very interesting:

      C.P. Zaner--Arm Movement Method of Rapid Writing [Click]

      particularly the parts about how cursive should be introduced to very young students.

      --Alan

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    4. Thanks, Alan! I'll pass that along!

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  4. MonkeySee: How to Improve Handwriting [Click] In this short series of videos I found several very useful suggestions. Now to go back and consider them in conjunction with the Palmer, Champion and EC Mills methods!

    --Alan

    On the way home this afternoon (!) I noticed the upper case "F" on the Fosters Freeze drive-in sign--even more elaborate than the one in the Ford Motor Co. logo.

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  5. :-) Alan, you have a true gift for observation!!

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