Quote: "Copying isn't very effective, though, because students are passively recording letters, not actively creating sentences, breaking the sentences into words, and spelling the words. In fact, some students are copying sentences they can't even read, so the activity becomes little more than handwriting practice."
Comment: I totally 100% agree with this section. I remember having my own little whiteboard and copying down everything the teacher wrote on the board. Or even worse writing a paragraph she had printed how and basically just copying that paragraph down word for word on my paper. I too agree that this is only working on handwriting skills. I can't see any other benefits of copying straight from typed text or teacher written text. I can copy down pages of text and not have a clue what I wrote down. When copying words just become symbols, the individual letter instead of words associated with meaning.
Question: What are some ways to still teach handwriting, but also teach other literacy subjects like sentence structure and phonics?
I also really agree with this quote. I think that an effective way to teach literary subjects is to have students write. They need to be able to just work on putting their ideas down on paper. Handwriting can be taught separately, and then assessed through the student's writings.
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