Pencils 'n' Paper vs. Keyboards: Does It Matter?

What makes us smarter?

In an age where corporate America (aka, money machines) are selling electronic devices to babies, most everyone is thinking about the effects of raising "plugged in" children.

In many schools, we are increasingly moving toward being "paperless."  Is this really better for learning, especially for younger learners?

We must consider the reciprocal nature of reading and writing.  We know that recognizing letters is an essential skill in learning to read.  Children must be able to recognize many abstract visual images; learning letters of the alphabet requires being able to perceive subtle differences between similar images (such as "a, b, d, g, p, q") and to conjure sounds to correlate with these abstract shapes.

Being that this trend is new, research is just beginning to come into existence.  In 2012, a compelling study emerged from Indiana University and Columbia University (James and Engelhardt) in Trends in Neuroscience and Education.  

Essentially, pre-literate five-year-olds printed, typed, or traced letters and shapes.  Then they were showed images of the letters while undergoing MRI scanning to determine understanding/brain activity.  The findings showed that children's brains had a "reading circuit" established only after handwriting the letters.  (This means free-forming [self-generating] the letters from the brain, forming them with the fine motor muscles, via the pencil.)  Even tracing the letters did not produce the same result!

Only free-form printing resulted in enhanced letter identification (and, hence, reading abilities).

In other words, the regions of the brain used for successfully learning to read were positively affected only by the mental act of generating the letters coupled with the physical act of handwriting the letters--

typing did NOT facilitate reading acquisition in young children.

Whether cursive handwriting is important remains to be researched more deeply.  However, there is thinking out there (needing more research) that act of physically gripping a writing tool and practicing the swirls, curls, and connections of cursive handwriting activates parts of the brain that lead to increased language fluency. Some people believe that this is why boys respond well to learning cursive--it uses both sides of the brain, helping to build connections between the verbal and nonverbal sides--increasing linguistic skills and neuropathways needed for most beginning readers and for stabilizing knowledge.

Dr. Virginia Berniger (a professor of educational psychology at the University of Washington) found that children's writing abilities were consistently better when they used the act of physical handwriting rather than a keyboard.  This included "normal" and "disabled" learners. The quantity of writing increased as children wrote faster, and quality increased as children composed more complete sentences. 

As for the affecting actual composition, consider this quote from Natalie Goldberg in her book, Old Friend from Far Away:  The Practice of Writing Memoir:

     "...pick up the pen...choose a cheap notebook, in which you are not afraid to make mistakes.  Use a fast pen.  Try out different ones.  Find what suits you.  The mind is faster than the hand.  Don't slow the hand down more with a ballpoint or a pencil.  Cover both sides of the page.  

     But I like the pencil, you say.

     Then use it.

     What about a computer?

     Use that if you like.  Only know that handwriting and pressing the keys with your fingers are two different physical activities and a slightly different slant of m ind comes out from each one.  Not better or worse, just different.

     ...You can't say, but I'm in the woods and don't have my computer with me.  Learn to be comfortable with the most simple tools.  What if you can't afford to pay your electric bill?  You should still be able to write.

     Often people who use a computer at work prefer handwriting... to create a boundary between their professional and personal writing...."


Similarly, Patrick McClean, writes about the merits of writing longhand (perhaps with some sentimentality):

     A pen and paper has but one functionality. It captures the marks I make so that they can be referred to at a later time. It doesn't ring, it doesn't bother me with an incoming chat or IM. It never asks me to plug it in so it can get more power. It doesn't crash, it never needs an upgrade, and it is unlikely that someone will snatch my pad and bolt from a coffee shop with it when I turn my back.



All of this said, perhaps the power lies in the fact that "writing, itself, is a multi-modal act that involves sensory input...and motor execution." (Kersey and James, 2013)  We access more of the brain with self-generated handwriting than we do with typing; maybe this is why experienced writers (who have long-aquired reading skills) still advocate for handwriting original works vs. keyboarding.

But, for now, the jury is out on whether this truly impacts literacy outcomes.