Last week I finished teaching a series of Upper School workshops on the writing portion of the Common App, which American students use for college applications.
In order to break the ice, I wrote the following personal statement, answering Prompt Number Four, to share with students: “Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you?”
My Cursive Handwriting Connection
“Miss Bushell! You write like my grandma!”, the middle-school student yelled. I took it as the highest compliment.
I’ve been writing in cursive since the third grade. I have the late Barbara Palesty, my class teacher at The Rudolf Steiner School, to thank for this. We began learning this important skill in third grade and from then on we did all of our school- and homework, in cursive. We even wrote in our Main Lesson books, a daily practice of the Steiner curriculum, in cursive. This meant that from third grade on I wrote every day in cursive. That’s a lot of practice.
Cursive handwriting is still something I do every day, for getting my thoughts down, but also for feeling grounded. Perhaps it is because I spent so much time in a school that created a cursive routine as a child, it naturally became a habit as an adult. There is something about the feel of the classic blue Bic Cristal ball point pen on notebook paper that is elemental. It is one of the moments when I most feel myself. At Steiner, we learned to write in fountain pen, which I also use for more formal letter writing to friends. Yes, I write regularly to friends in cursive. In fact, I have saved all the letters anyone ever wrote to me. It is quite a collection.
I retain information better when I write in cursive. The research is out there to support this. It seems that a new article comes out regularly on the many benefits of cursive handwriting. “Despite the advantages of typing in terms of speed and convenience, handwriting remains an important tool for learning and memory retention, particularly in educational contexts,” says a 2025 article by the National Institute of Medicine. “Handwriting,” the article says, “activates a broader network of brain regions involved in motor, sensory, and cognitive processing” while “typing engages fewer neural circuits, resulting in more passive cognitive engagement.”
I love sharing the cursive mission and have even taught cursive workshops at the New York Public Library. Some of the students are older adults who want to re-connect with their cursive practice. Some are young adults who never got the cursive training to begin with. My favorite part is hearing the stories of students’ cursive handwriting connections: did they learn as a child? Did they never pick up this skill? Did they always want to “write like my grandma”? One student even told me that in her South American country, they don’t teach print; the children learn cursive first!
I will always remain grateful to the late Barbara Palesty, and the ongoing Rudolf Steiner cursive curriculum, for giving me this lifelong gift.