Family Style School: Memoria Press: New American Cursive. {A Review}

I have a confession to make. I haven’t taught my 4th grader cursive yet. (until now)

When I saw New American Cursive: Penmanship Program Workbook 1 by Memoria Press come up for review, I knew I needed to put in for it.

About The Company:

Memoria Press is a family run Classical Christian Education materials publisher. Don’t let the family run fool you though. This is no small company. They produce a wide range of curriculum for all grades Junior Kindergarten up to grade 12. They have full curriculum sets or you can pick and choose individual subjects or books.

About The Product:

I was able to use their New American Cursive: Penmanship program workbook 1 ($22.95) with my 10 year old daughter, who remember, had absolutely no cursive experience. NONE!

Now my excuses for not teaching her cursive yet are:

She hates writing, even a sentence.
She is left handed, and I am right handed.
I know how to read and write cursive, but I had no idea what I was doing.
She didn’t start reading real well until this year.
I am pretty sure she has dyslexia.

This workbook, took all that away from me. Once I first got the 114 page book, I was not scared anymore. I knew she could do it.

This book was written to be able to use it to teach cursive to first graders. It goes through the whys and teaching cursive throughout history. Usually in the US cursive is taught in 3rd grade and many schools are trying to do away with it for good.

I totally procrastinated teaching cursive to my 10 year old, because of my list above. This book actually told me that typically dyslexic kids learn cursive easier than they learn print. That is because there is less letter reversals.

The 3 page teaching guide will tell you everything you need to know, from proper posture to pencil grip, to paper placement, to how to use this book.

This book has Mr. Meerkat who helps you write cursive and is there in the book to tell your child what to do. He begins by showing the proper pencil holding position for both right and LEFT HANDERS! (Whoop whoop!) Then he shows them the correct paper placement for both right and LEFT HANDERS! (Whoop whoop!) Next begins the real writing, he goes over some simple lines used in cursive and then your child practices writing those lines. After that, right into the letter writing you will go. Each letter has an instruction page. My daughters favorite thing is that it has you,

Say the letter
Feel the letter
Write the letter.

Mr. Meerkat has your child circle the best letter and then you move on. The next page has fun exercises and artwork. These fun exercises include writing and joining letters and a review of previously learned letters.

At the bottom of every few pages it has reminders about pencil position or paper placement for both right and LEFT HANDERS! (Whoop whoop!)

A day/week in our life:

Honestly after going through a few things with my daughter the first day, she has just taken off. She needs no help from me. She does a letter a day at the most. Usually she just does a page a day. This has needed very little involvement from me. I have her show me every day after she has done it and choose her best writing. She is very proud of it.

Our thoughts and feelings:

I am grateful that this program includes both right and left handers throughout their curriculum, in case you couldn’t tell. I think that was my biggest fear of it all. I am surprised at how quickly she has been able to learn cursive too. She is enjoying learning cursive too. It makes her feel more grown up.

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