Palmer Method-it Really Works!

[Gone Gray]

After reading a thread about how to improve handwriting, I looked up "The Palmer Method of Business Writing", that was mentioned, and downloaded a copy from http://archive.org/details/palmermethodofbu00palmrich . It was written in the early 1900's and gives detailed explanations on technique and practice drills. At first, I wanted to skip the stupid drills and get right down to practice, but I was getting nowhere. So, I went back and carefully read from the beginning and starting doing the circle and line drills...WOW, after only a couple of days of practice my writing is noticeably better. All these years I was using the wrong muscles, movement (of body and paper), and technique. I can write longer periods of time now, the pen flows effortlessly, my hand no longer aches, and my writing is starting to look beautiful.

I'm going to write a few sentences in my old style and do it again in a few months and then I'll post, what I hope to be, the dramatic difference. I have found out it's not just a matter of practice, but knowing the right technique that makes all the difference.

 

[andrew98]

Glad to hear it's working well for you. It'll be great to see before and after writing samples. Really cool to see the original book, too!

-Andy

 

[Drybonz]

Thanks for the link... I'm going to check it out. I have been wanting to improve my writing.

 

[Legion]

I used that as well. My hand writing is still hardly what you would call good, but it is improved thanks to that book and a bit of practice.

 

[Mr5x5]

Thanks. Nice reminder that you can't skip the fundamentals.

 

[The Nid Hog]

My mom was a disciple of the Palmer method. I'm not sure when she learned it or what her writing was like before, but her handwriting was beautiful.

 

[Cynomys]

Palmer Method is what we were taught in school in the 1950s. It was in the third grade that we started with cursive writing.

If I'm not mistaken, Palmer was developed in response to the introduction of fountain pens. In contrast to the 19th century dip pens with their flexible steel nibs where the tines could spread apart a bit with pressure, the fountain pen couldn't do the variations of light and dark, thick and thin lines characteristic of Spencerian. Am I right in this?

 

[AllenG]

Palmer Method is what we were taught in school in the 1950s. It was in the third grade that we started with cursive writing.

If I'm not mistaken, Palmer was developed in response to the introduction of fountain pens. In contrast to the 19th century dip pens with their flexible steel nibs where the tines could spread apart a bit with pressure, the fountain pen couldn't do the variations of light and dark, thick and thin lines characteristic of Spencerian. Am I right in this?

Palmer also simplified the capitals and his method also does not use alternate ending letters (t, d, f, s, and below the line loops--y, g, etc. are different when at the end of the word in Spencer's system).

 

[Gone Gray]

Palmer Method is what we were taught in school in the 1950s. It was in the third grade that we started with cursive writing.

If I'm not mistaken, Palmer was developed in response to the introduction of fountain pens. In contrast to the 19th century dip pens with their flexible steel nibs where the tines could spread apart a bit with pressure, the fountain pen couldn't do the variations of light and dark, thick and thin lines characteristic of Spencerian. Am I right in this?

According to the introduction, one of the purposes was to speed up writing for the business world. Later in the text, it states "Many young pupils have developed such control of muscular movement that they have made more than two thousand ovals with one dip of ink, in a space not more than eight inches long." These ovals are 10/16 inches in height. So, they were still using dip pens.