Recently, a new Young Rembrandts franchisee told me something awesome about her son’s university… Virginia Tech instituted a rule where all notetaking was to be done by hand. No laptops. No keyboarding of any kind. Just good old paper and pencil. (I assume pens are allowed. Haha.)

Now that’s a pretty extreme stand for a college to make, especially when parents sent their kids to college with laptops. Why was this college willing to offend parents and students alike? Why make such a fuss? It seems the school noticed when students took notes on the keyboard, their focus was on typing. They didn’t engage with what they were supposed to be learning. They didn’t connect. Instead, it became a race to capture everything they heard and saw on the PPT. But when students take notes by hand, that kind of note taking isn’t possible because no one can write that fast. Writing notes requires students to slow down, listen and think about what they’re hearing, so they can decide what to write down. It requires them to be much more involved in what they’re learning.

It turns out researchers have come to the same conclusion. Hear what author and speaker Daniel Pink has to say about an article published in Psychological Science:

Cursive handwriting is dying. Here is some more information on why handwriting matters and how to help your child get proficient at it so they can retain the information they are learning.