Pens or Pencils
I read on Allanah’s Blog “life isn’t a race to be finished first” an interesting discussion on what should our children be using pen or pencil and what were teachers preferences. It gave me a moment to think and reflect.
I guess first of all we should state some background – the question was which do you allow your students to use pen or pencil with respect to primary students – so my reflection is not a criticism of the conversation or its validity.
If I was to ask the question I would have liked to have asked which do you prefer and which do your students prefer – Pen, Pencil or keyboard. That we have to teach handwriting and that the process of handwriting is a key component in literacy is a given, but I feel it is equally valid in our world to include this “new” form of writing into the mix.
I have asked several times before in posts this question of adults..
When was the last time you wrote anything official or significant by hand?
For many of our students the last signifient hand written event will be their examination. How many of them will throw away there pens after that?
Allanah talks about rewarding the students with typing/keyboarding (I know this is additional to the great work she does with IT and her students). The use of the computers in class for the students is engaging and fun. Hence there use as a reward as well as a classroom tool. Isn’t it nice to have a classroom learning tool the students love to use.
I believe (and my perspective may be naive as I am a secondary rather than primary teacher) that we must achieve a balance between digital and analog. Between using pencils so we can rub out our mistakes and easily correct them and drafting using the computer. From the youngest years having writing that has balanced emphasis on traditional and digital writing.
It is important to be able to write, but this is diminishing as time goes by. Do I see a time when students learn to write only via a digital medium – Yes. Is it soon – No. Is this, as my friend Ian Jukes would say TTWWADI – That’s the way we always do it?
September 24th, 2009 at 8:49 am
I wish that I had more than three computers to offer the children to practice their keyboarding. Fortunately I do have a few very ancient alpha-smarts that no on-one else seems to bother with. We use these to improve child word-processing opportunities. For the six alpha-smarts we have one spliced together y cable. When that breaks they will be useless for us to use in a meaningful way as we won’t be able to upload to a computer.
http://www.renlearn.com/neo/NEO2/default.aspx
What I could do with more than three quickly aging and fast dying laptops!!!!!!
It is a whole new skill for little ones to learn to compose directly on the computer rather than just ‘publishing’. For many children using the word processing applications are just for writing a ‘good copy’ after composing and editing by hand which is IMHO a wasted opportunity for learning and creative thinking.
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September 24th, 2009 at 9:19 am
A thought provoking read. We are it seems adding to our methods of recording information over time. Those mentioned reflect silent types of input which is why I guess voice recognition will always be reserved to a quiet room; indeed even web 2.0 tools that record sound can never work in the same way handwriting or text can. My preference is for a keyboard as you allude to above. That said a visit I made to Albany Senior High yesterday required a notebook and hand written notes seemed the best. (Didn’t realise you were just next door lol). In schools where we are working 1:1 I would like to see some exams move online as the issue with pen and paper is that nothing sits behind it ie it doesn’t connect to anything anywhere. This connectivity is becoming more important and sensible with online forms being more efficient than handwritten ones etc. The keyboard strangly offers the opportunity to use more visual features, Fonts, bold, drop caps, Shaping, Size, editing etc For the years to come I would agree that being unable to write by hand would render us illiterate in too many situations. Students I wonder may argue otherwise; happy for an Ipod touch in a visit for note taking. Ubiquitous access to easy connected electronic recording of words is coming, here for some. Do we need to adjust our expectations of students; to have excellent levels of literacy in all these domains? My feeling is yes unless we can offer them a clear understanding of what excellence in each should be. Exemplars and standards can provide motivation as students try to meet the requirements of Tertiary entry etc. What we need to do is allow them to learn and show their learning without unnecesarily limiting them to providing evidence in only a written handwritten form. Sorry abit of a rambling comment but I did enjoy thinking about it.
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September 24th, 2009 at 10:21 am
As we look to introduce 1:1 across our cluster of schools I had an interesting conversation at the secondary school this week. What to do about the 3 hour exams. It’s not just whether they should be handwritten or not, it is how do we build ‘match-fitness’ into our yr 11-13 students particularly so they have the physical ability to write by hand effectively for 3 hours? If all their work is keyed in during the terms – to avoid trying to maintain their documentation in two environments (paper and online) – then how can we also make sure they are capable of 3hrs of writing during this interim when exams are handwritten?
Solutions please
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September 25th, 2009 at 10:06 am
If I ever get any handwritten mail, it’s always the very first thing I open! Handwriting is for the really significant things: I still send handwritten thank you notes and when necessary (more often, as I age) hand-written condolences on beautiful cards. Love notes should be hand written — at least on important occasions. Poetry ought to be handwritten. I keep my grocery list on an online shopping service, but I do find it faster to write down items as I think of them, and in spite of the wonderful mobile device I have with a keyboard, I often need to take out the pen and notebook to write what I want to remember. And, of course, I have my signature, which seems to be needed at least twice a week. I wish it were more of a work of art, myself.
I’m amazed at how many young people are hunting and pecking at the computer, having never learned a system to do this fast. I learned how to type on a manual typewriter in 8th grade. It’s one of the most useful things I learned in school.
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October 7th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
This entry was enlightening.
With technology increasing at exponential rates, it’s not surprising that students will spend more time typing than writing by hand. But I don’t think there will ever come a time when handwritten things will be unnecessary, just as cash will never be eliminated by cards. No matter how amazing technology is, there will always be a need for pen (or pencil) and paper.
I really appreciate what Betsy said about how certain things should be handwritten, like thank you notes and poetry. I think most would agree that an emailed thank you note just doesn’t carry the same weight that a handwritten, snail-mailed one does. You just can’t beat it.
Pens and pencils may become something of an archaic device in high tech classrooms though. There is a definite and looming possibility that classrooms will become entirely electronically based. Note taking on laptops, online tests and quizzes, emailed essays. It’s very possible and I don’t doubt it will become more and more present as the years pass, until the day that bringing a pencil to class is unnecessary.
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