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Singapore’s National Library Board offers micropayments to build reading habits

288 points · 149 comments · geox

  1. andsoitis · · focus · HN ↗
    > to build daily reading habits among a phone-first population

    Reading is fundamental.

    EDIT: Other skills and habits that you can then build on reading: critical thinking, reasoning, detection and handling own biases, numeracy, financial literacy, and more. All these dimensions are manipulated via phones and the apps on them, so you need a firewall.

    Also: writing. Cursive writing.

    1. Viliam1234 · · focus · HN ↗
      > Cursive writing.

      Is there anything useful about cursive writing? Other than it being positively correlated with many good things because education is the common topic?

      1. homarp · · focus · HN ↗
        <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.psychologytoday.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;blog&#x2F;the-athletes-way&#x2F;202010&#x2F;why-cursive-handwriting-is-good-your-brain" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.psychologytoday.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;blog&#x2F;the-athletes-way&#x2F;202...

        note that at least &quot;Handwriting but not typewriting leads to widespread brain connectivity: a high-density EEG study with implications for the classroom&quot; is critized - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.frontiersin.org&#x2F;journals&#x2F;psychology&#x2F;articles&#x2F;10.3389&#x2F;fpsyg.2024.1517235&#x2F;full" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.frontiersin.org&#x2F;journals&#x2F;psychology&#x2F;articles&#x2F;10....

        1. 201984 · · focus · HN ↗
          Is there any evidence that handwriting in cursive is better than handwriting normally? The Van der Meer study only compared cursive to typing or drawing, not handwriting.

          It&#x27;s rather suspicious to leave normal handwriting out of the study, and makes me suspect bad faith.

          1. ninalanyon · · focus · HN ↗
            &gt; evidence that handwriting in cursive is better than handwriting normally?

            Perhaps I&#x27;m too old for this conversation but surely cursive is writing normally?

            1. nancyminusone · · focus · HN ↗
              Yes. Roughly zero people my age would consider cursive to be normal. The number I&#x27;ve seen is that you&#x27;re in the 20% that does.
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