- Inah Stephen Eyiene, Media Consultant, English Language Teacher, Upperroom Int'l School (UIS) Idah Kogi State
In Nigeria today, performance and competency of students are assessed based on written work, particularly in time-limited written examinations. Without fast and legible handwriting, students will miss out on learning opportunities, under-achieve and may fall behind.
Good handwriting is a major form of assessment for many formal qualifications. In fact , the West Africa Examination Council ( WAEC) examiners observed among others, wrong use of the personal pronoun ‘I’, writing below the required number of words on the essay topics, illegible handwriting, use of SMS language such as ‘u’ for you; ‘4’ for, spelling errors, wrong use of the word ‘cause’ instead of ‘because’, ’there’ for their,
Worth to note is poor knowledge of the basic rules of English Grammar: poor paragraphing, poor expression as a result of wrong conduct, poor punctuation marks, wrong use of tenses, poor use of prepositions and articles. Failure to grasp the requirements and demands of some questions attempted inability to construct simple and correct sentences. mindless lifting of answers from the passage. And the inability to restate in the candidates own words, ideas contained in the passage.
Nevertheless, Illegible handwriting can cause poor self-esteem. Poor self esteem can trigger loss of confidence.
A 16-year-old grade 8 student Prakriti Malla has gained widespread praise and recognition for being a master of a dying art – amazing handwriting skill.
Nepal Government has also recognized her signature as the most beautiful one throughout the globe. Hand writing they say is an integral part of students life. It remains the primary level of communication and interaction. Its very important whether in classroom or beyond
Indeed, Malla is an inspiration to all those children who are continually trying to improve their handwriting.
Thousands of Nepalese have shared her work and request Microsoft to adopt her handritting as a new font in MS Word
However, some hand writings can be worse, funny and weired for some students. While growing up as a child, young and ebullient youth, it is good to avoid writing carelessly, and messily, crossing out words, lines going up and down, the slant changing. This is made worse by not crossing your Tt, dot your Ii, as well as hanging letters of alphabet f, g, j, p, & y in between two lines or writing space in exercise book or examination script.
The inability or failure of some students to separate uppercase M, W, from lowercase m, w in the course of writing mini-essay calls for greater attention. Such Gibberish indeed, particularly the art of introducing uppercase in the middle of a word - daNiel instead of Daniel as showcased by some students can be eradicated or minimised through a synergy between teachers and parents . Teachers cannot do all:
Parents , Guidance must draw the attention of their children or ward intermittently to their writing pattern. It is by this means we can reinforced a good habit , enhance a relatively permanent positive change in everyone.
I considered it absurd for any guidance or parents to be passionate in checking the result of their children and checkmating teachers efforts without devoting time during holidays to know the trend in the writing pattern of his or her (child)ren.
The failure of every child in school stems from poor handwriting. Teachers are inundated by such complaints !
I believe , this pandemic will create an avenue for parents , guidance to address the draconian writing habit developed by their children.
"A 1992 study … found that 85 percent of all fine motor time in second – fourth – and sixth-grade classrooms was spent on paper and pencil activities. A more recent study … shows kindergarten children are now spending 42 percent of their fine motor time on paper and pencil activities,
”: writes Malla.
“Furthermore, good handwriting is important long after graduation.” She added
Comments
Post a Comment