Even In a Digital Age, Handwriting Remains Invaluable

Jim Hightower
Tue, 03 Feb 2026 23:00:00 -0800
Opinion

While the production of my Lowdown commentaries is high-tech, I confess that I'm antiquated.

I still write each piece in longhand, applying my ballpoint to paper. This has caused bewildered glances from some who see me scribbling away in local coffee shops and bars. Recently, one fellow sidled up and whispered: "Watch out! If they see you doin' this, they'll haul you off to the Smithsonian."

But we hand writers might not be as obsolete as the key-tappers assume. A fast-spreading grassroots movement is calling for schools to reemphasize the value of writing and printing by hand, instead of being wholly dependent on machines. Already, 24 states — as varied as Mississippi and California — now require public schools to teach cursive handwriting in third through fifth grades.
Updated: Wed Feb 04, 2026

While the production of my Lowdown commentaries is high-tech, I confess that I'm antiquated.

I still write each piece in longhand, applying my ballpoint to paper. This has caused bewildered glances from some who see me scribbling away in local coffee shops and bars. Recently, one fellow sidled up and whispered: "Watch out! If they see you doin' this, they'll haul you off to the Smithsonian."

But we hand writers might not be as obsolete as the key-tappers assume. A fast-spreading grassroots movement is calling for schools to reemphasize the value of writing and printing by hand, instead of being wholly dependent on machines. Already, 24 states — as varied as Mississippi and California — now require public schools to teach cursive handwriting in third through fifth grades.

This squares with a new understanding of how brains absorb information. While keyboards are faster, the slower, more tactile act of handwriting creates longer lasting comprehension of letters — and better retention of the thoughts they convey. Neuroscientists find that rote keystrokes on a computer require little mental engagement, while physically drawing out words and ideas takes coordination of multiple areas of the brain to focus memory, eyes and fingers on creating a written product.

Just writing this piece conjured up a fond remembrance of my early childhood: Sitting on the floor of our home, learning to draw the ABCs, both print and cursive, on those lined practice pads. It was both an artistic exercise and the development of a foundational tool for a life of learning.

Yes, computer literacy is an indispensable element of today's childhood curriculum — but so is the richer development of human thinking through putting pen to paper. So let's teach both!

WHY DO WE LET PROFITEERS CONTROL GRANNY'S END-OF-LIFE CARE

There are industries that occasionally do something rotten. And there are industries like Big Oil, Big Pharma and Big Tobacco — that persistently do rotten things.

Then there is the nursing home industry — where rottenness has become a core business principle. The end-of-life "experience" can be rotten enough on its own, with an assortment of natural indignities bedeviling us. Good nursing homes help to make this time better. In the past couple of decades, though, an entirely unnatural force has come to dominate the delivery of aged care: Profiteering corporate chains and Wall Street speculators.

The very fact that this essential and sensitive social function, which ought to be the domain of health professionals and charitable enterprises, is now called an "industry" reflects a total perversion of its purpose. Some 70% of nursing homes are now corporate operations run by absentee executives who have no experience in nursing homes and who are guided by the market imperative of maximizing investor profits. They constantly demand "efficiencies" from their facilities, which invariably means reducing the number of nurses, which invariably reduces care, which means more injuries, illness ... and deaths. As one nursing expert rightly says, "It's criminal."

But it's not against the law, since the industry's lobbying front — a major donor to congressional campaigns — effectively writes the laws, which allows corporate hustlers to provide only one nurse on duty, no matter how many patients are in the facility. A humane nurse-staffing requirement has been proposed, but the profiteering "industry" furiously opposes it. Congress is dutifully bowing to industry profits. After all, granny doesn't make campaign donations.

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