Sneaking up on Shorthand?


Your normal handwriting is below average if it is 25-30 wpm, average, if 35-50 wpm, and above average if 55-60 wpm. Let's say you shoot for 60 probably by using a simple, very-connected style such as Palmer.
When you achieve 60 wpm, then try one of the alphabetic shorthand systems such as Quickhand, Personal Shorthand (was Briefhand back in the 1950's) or EasyScript. Words are abbreviated in such ways as:
PROBABLE is PRBB where final B is read as BLE
ASSIGNMENT is ASNM where final M is read as MENT
OBLIGATION is OBGLS where final S is read as SION
It may be possible to reduce words by abbreviation to as little as one third their normal length, one half, sometimes less, but just say it averages out to one half.
Your writing speed has now doubled from 60 wpm to 120 wpm
(Note that the abbreviating principles are similar to Gregg)
Now, switch to the Gregg alphabet whose characters are far simpler and thus quicker to write than Roman letters. Say they are twice as fast to write as normal letters. Now your speed is 240 wpm.
One possible meaning is that issues of achieving speed in Gregg are really and originally problems with plain old handwriting, ignored until one starts practicing Gregg.
Also, it then becomes clear that any system requires being able to go ahead and write without having to stop and think, something most of us probably still do even in everyday handwriting.
Several of the popular alphabetic shorthands offer the possibility through their instructional materials of speeds up to 150 wpm, as much as or more than many students ever got with Gregg. And, if you double that by using Gregg characters, you get 300 wpm.
Thomas Lloyd, a widely known writer and teacher of alphabetic shorthand, recorded the first sessions of the U.S. House of Representatives, and a shorthand society whose name I can't find as of yet, put a plaque on his grave in Philadelphia naming him the Father of Modern Shorthand.

(by ukulele144 for everyone)

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