Handwriting

I do do some printing practice with my kids ... in a very relaxed manner with Handwriting without tears (awesome) which has very little boring practice. Learning a letter is seriously a neat little process which can involve playdough, magnetic stamping board, writing in cornmeal, very little written practice and an easy to understand lesson and terminology....I digress....
So the other night we had some friends over and the questions start...."So is this the table you sit down and do school with the kids?" "And what does your school day look like?" and "How many hours a day to you work with the kids?" to name a few.....I really hate getting into it, but somehow we got onto the fact that I won't be teaching them cursive unless they ask me to. The looks of horror I got were funny. I actually wasn't sure what hubby's position on cursive was until I said to the ladies, "I mean, really, how much is the next generation going to use cursive?" and he muttered "Never" under his breath (he never writes.....)
Seriously these three women were discussing this with me felt that the kids need to be able to read cards....CARDS??? A thing of the past! eCards. "They need to read Christmas cards" From whom? I don't send Christmas cards anymore, I'm lucky to send out a Christmas letter. Computers. Our kids will be the digital generation writing with their thumbs. I'll teach them to type before anything else, they'll probably type better than they can print for crying out loud. "They need to sign their name..." Ok, hadn't thought of that one, but seriously that is the only thing hubby writes and it's not legible. (And by the time my kids are grown up it'll be all debit cards and thumbprints....no more cheques.....) One of the ladies who has a 14 year old schooled son says the only thing her son writes is his name. So there, and he's schooled.
They certainly didn't hear me that I'd teach them if they asked. I said it would be 50:50 that they asked, but Don felt it would be a 10% chance they asked. One lady said to me "I just loved learning to write in school" I had to agree, as a girl, learning to print the perfect letters and then learning cursive as a challenge I enjoyed.......I really believe boys are made differently. Both men at the table (and the 14 year old son) had been in remedial printing/writing classes. Pretty good proof for my theory.