Is it okay if I tell my boss that I cannot read cursive?

Question

I am working as a part-time grader. Some students hand in their assignments handwritten. Here is the problem.

As an ESL¹ speaker, I was never exposed to cursive handwriting. Not only I can't write in cursive but it also takes me forever to read.

Considering that they are other graders for this course, do you think it would be okay if I tell the teacher my problem, and ask her to assign these specific assignments to someone else?

Should I be embarrassed (which I kind of feel)?

P.S. Just to provide more context: Most of the assignments are typed.

^{1 _{English as a Second Language}}

Answer 1

The fact that you can't read cursive is going to be hard to hide so you might as well just be up front about it and get the discomfort out of the way. If you disclose it yourself then that gives you more control of the narrative than if they find out.

As for whether or not you should be embarrassed... some schools (in the United States) don't even teach cursive anymore. So even if you weren't an ESL speaker there's still a good chance you wouldn't know it! So I'd say no, don't feel embarrassed!

Answer 2

do you think it would be okay if I tell the teacher my problem, and ask her to assign these specific assignments to someone else?

Whenever you are unable to perform (or have extreme difficulty with) any regular work assignments, you must tell your boss. Preferably this happens before you get a job offer, but it's never too late.

Should I be embarrassed (which I kinda feel)?

There's nothing to be embarrassed about here. We all have different abilities.

Answer 3

"Not only I can't write in cursive but it also takes me forever to read one"

I would phrase it as you can read regular writing much faster than cursive, and ask if someone else can do the cursive ones. There's a big difference between not knowing how to read and being slow at it.

Answer 4

Like others pointed out, in some countries most schools don't teach cursive at all. But also the style of cursive that is taught varies considerably, I remember having a very hard time trying to decipher French cursive even though I could read and write the Turkish one fluently. So there is nothing to be embarrassed about.

I think you should tell your boss that you're having a difficult time. But you should also consider it an opportunity to acquire a new skill that is useful at what you do. Even if it is hard and time consuming in the beginning, adapting to a new writing style isn't all that difficult. You should be able to read fluently within months, if not weeks.

Answer 5

If you truly cannot do the work, of course you must tell the professor.

However, if you can do the work but it simply is harder (and takes longer) than you wish, then allow me to suggest another alternative.

Learn to read cursive fluently.

By doing so, you will cure this immediate problem and will have gained a potentially valuable (indeed, potentially lifesaving) skill for the future. A worker who can handle anything is intrinsically more desirable than one who can do only a portion of the work.

Perhaps more importantly, handwritten work often is a marker of reduced socioeconomic position, and it is socially responsible to be able to treat such students equitably compared with those who can afford computers and printers (and tutors and proofreaders). Homeless students, for example, may be unfairly disadvantaged scholastically, receiving lower scores for the same quality of work simply because it's more trouble to deal with handwritten work. This is a real thing, and you can help to make it better.

Fortunately, mastering this type of reading skill is not difficult and does not take vary long. Neuroplasticity is a wonderful thing: adult humans can grow new neuronal connections permitting them to recognize a new encoding of an alphabet (e.g., Morse code, mirror-writing, or cursive characters) in just a week of serious effort.

Speed and fluency can be achieved with about 6 weeks of regular practice.

You already have a head start on this, since you can recognize cursive characters with some effort. You merely need to achieve fluency. Fluency does not come from recognizing individual letters, but from recognizing patterns that form words or phrases.

Simply trying to read and grade the student papers is not sufficient to let you learn quickly. In fact, if it leads to frustration it will actually slow down the process of gaining fluency. Instead, you must engage in a regular (daily) program in which you repeatedly examine words and phrases written in cursive and attempt to guess (recognize) their meaning, then check the result and give yourself positive reinforcement for correct answers. The use of flash cards is one traditional way of doing this; phone apps are a modern alternative.

Here's one tried and true approach that I guarantee will work: Scan or photocopy a student paper and separate it into words and short phrases. Paste (or print out) each of these words or phrases on a flashcard, and on the other side of the card print the corresponding word or phrase in block letters or some other form that you can read fluently.

On the "answer" side of the cards, don't try to match the cursive word or phrase character by character. This is all about helping your brain map a new symbol (the cursive word or phrase) to its conceptual meaning. You can write the meaning in another language if you wish. In fact, another language will work better if it's more natural for you. Make one extra card that says "FINISHED!" or has a picture of something you like.

Shuffle your deck of flash cards and put the "FINISHED" card on the bottom, then look at the card on the top and try to guess the meaning. Don't agonize or try to decipher it letter-by-letter. Instead, just make a quick guess as to the meaning.

Turn the card over and look at the answer. If you were correct, give yourself a physical pat (somewhere on your body) and put the card on the bottom of the deck, below the "FINISHED" card. If you were wrong, put the card somewhere in the middle of the deck.

Give yourself a faster-than-comfortable time limit for each guess, so you are always feeling a little bit rushed for time and thus have a sense of urgency. You can use a timer or just push yourself on time.

Several times each day, take out the cards and go through them. When you can go through the entire deck and get to "FINISHED" without ever having to put any cards in the middle, you will be well on your way to fluency in reading cursive writing (or as most of the world calls it, 'handwriting').

You can add cards to the deck (or remove cards you have mastered) at any time. Handwriting style varies quite a bit from era to era, country to country, and person to person, so you will want to include a variety of handwriting samples over time. The inclusion of a surprisingly small number of variations will allow your brain to generalize its cursive pattern-recognition networks.

This approach works quickly to produce recognition fluency and is very resilient under variation in cursive writing style and the incorrect word spellings and other errors that often appear in handwritten material.

If you choose to pursue this approach, please come back here after a few weeks and tell us about your experience in achieving fluency!

Best of luck!

Answer 6

I do agree with neubert that you should disclose it ahead of time before they find out themselves. The reason being you're in a better position and they'll be more receptive of your problems. If you do not say anything, there's a good chance your boss will not figure it out. Instead he may think of something negative like you're being lazy or whatnot. He wouldn't think you can't read cursive. So it is best to say now.

I think one thing I'd like to add over neubert's answer is that you shouldn't be embarrassed by it nor should you explain it as a limitation. Instead I would just word it the same way you did here. Say you learned English as a second language but you were never exposed to cursive handwriting and while you can decipher it, it takes you a very long time. That would be very good. It would not make you look incompetent, just that you don't know what you don't know.

As a side note, I am an american and know how to write in cursive. However, reading other people's cursive handwriting can take me a long time as well. Some people just write really horribly in cursive while others are a bit better at it. Sometimes I can read it right away but other times I have to pause and take my time.

Answer 7

"Is it okay if I don't tell my boss that ...?" No.

Believe it or not, your boss is hired to help you succeed. If there's something that you can't handle, don't feel comfortable with, etc., be sure that your boss is the first to know.

Speaking as "a boss" here – "there's probably nothing that I (and/or the HR Department ...) can't help you with ... if I know that you need help!" If you "bottle it in" and "try to put on a face," you're actually working against yourself. "So, please, for both of our sakes, don't do that!"

Answer 8

I wouldn't be embarrassed.

Most adult native English speakers were taught cursive in school, but in the vast majority of cases it is extremely hard to parse, and only a small minority of writers are capable of producing a cursive that is aesthetically pleasing and can be read at a normal pace by the average person.

I've even heard that cursive is now being jettisoned from school curriculums.

If you are struggling to read a small amount of handwritten material in your job, I would just be frank about this, and be clear that you only have sufficient skill to grade printed materials.

Answer 9

While it might certainly be beneficial to tell your boss that you have some hard time with it, you can try scanning the docs and give them to the OCR to decipher. You can try the built-in one in Google drive-> docs conversion or use some other specialized solution like FineReader.

btw after some exercise it is pretty much possible that you learn to read it. May take you a weekend but it is worth a try.