#sulat-manok

Handwriting is a no non-sense practice. Handwriting is not a "touch screen" task.

Are e-gadgets the probable cause of illegible handwriting of the Z Generation?

At school, in spite of writing practices in English and Filipino subjects most students suffer from writing legibly. Students can be good in answering exams by choosing the best answers in a multiple choice and by means of matching type, but when it comes to essay writing, majority of the students would scribble in a way they are called in Filipino lingo as "sulat-manok". I have consulted the parents of those students whose handwriting  is problematic, most of them gave the same answer, their children spend most of their time on the Internet. Using their e-gadgets children have learned to swipe, type and scroll in gaming and in sending abbreviated and coded messages. 

According to them, their children stayed till 3 to 4 AM. 

E-gadgets such as Laptops, iPads, and cellular phones are the latest and hottest item that even young children at age 2 is fond of playing. By means of the Internet, a child can get INFORMATION from various sources from social media to You-Tube and other links. I used the word information not education because it is not taught by an educator. What the Internet offers are just information and opinions of other people that could be false and misleading.

As an educator I cannot consider using e-gadget a motor skill, because motor skills are physical developments, movements, exercises and obviously not staying in one place and not anti-social. Handwriting is a no non-sense practice. It develops patience and discipline.

Children as young as 2 years old were allowed to play electronic gadgets to make them stay in one place. It restrains them to do indoor and outdoor activities with their families and friends. It may have a bad impact on their social relationships. The virtual world, through text messaging and chatting prefers to connect with their friends and relatives instead of meeting them. 

On an average, children spend more than 7 hours on an e-device, as a result, children experience difficulty prioritizing their studies while violent games promotes aggressiveness and adult content decays moral values. At home, children once glued on an E-gadget is hard to call on their attention. Children's health are also at risk, the adverse effects of E-gadgets include: neck, shoulder and wrist pain, eye and ear impairment and early cases of diabetes, obesity, indigestion, gas trouble, and even heart ailment due to less physical activity. In one study it referred that, technology has it's negative impact on child's writing skills, generally in the text messaging or chatting where standard English is not used. No one cares about the spelling, punctuation and grammar. Writing short-cut text messages results in poor writing skills of children (Positive & Negative Effects of Electronic Gadgets To Students, Active Moms Network).

One study have confirmed that, handwriting is one of the fundamental building blocks for reading, communication, expression and test-taking. Effective writing helps children remember, organize and process information. As we teach our children to read and write, we should remember it isn't just a matter of handing them a pencil and a picture of the letter B and telling them to write their letters. As you will see, letter formation is just as important as the handwriting Itself (Integrated Learning Strategies, Kearning Cornet).

I have observed when my students are just beginning practice writing. Some of their letters and numbers were written backwards, the small letter G are above the red lines of pre-school pad papers, their writing curves downward or upward instead of writing in a straight line or their writing first-point below then upward and their letters are written too close at each other. Spacing between sentences, the use of capital letters, proper punctuation marks and zig-zagging written words are also noticeable. These were all signs of poor motor skill that needs development, that if left unchecked, children will have a hard time conveying their ideas and meanings when it comes to formal writing.

This is the very reason why in our school students have a regular 30-minute penmanship class. A time allotted to develop their hands and mind to develop their writing skill.

I am making a fuss about this "little problem" of educating our children, because I have already seen the effect of this in my Graduate School Class and also in my Faculty Teachers at school where I work. You see, some of them reached the higher level of learning disregarding their inability to write well. Their "sulat-manok" is still intact. One of my graduate school student reasoned, Prof "sulat-doktor" po yan hindi "sulat-manok". 

All I have responded is, Ganun ! ? !

After that incident, I have asked my early-grade students about their way of short-cut texting and if they can follow the style of texting a message in complete sentence, they replied, "Teacher naman dala ko CP hindi typewriter" ... and "Teacher nakakapagod ang haba."

Two things I have learned:

(1) They are still aware of what a typewriter is and,

(2) it seems the Generation-Z easily get tired of doing a disciplined task.

Copyright 2018.  drjohniecuison.blogspot.com

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