CORNELL SCHOOL
  • Home
    • About Cornell School
    • Friends of Cornell School
    • About One-Rooms
    • A Teacher's Memory
    • "School Days"
    • By-Laws
  • Teacher's Guide
    • Welcome
    • Prepare for Your Visit >
      • Clothing Suggestions
      • Lunch Suggestions
      • Discipline
      • Schoolhouse Definitions
      • Rules for Teachers
      • Rules for Students
    • Daily Schedule >
      • 1st & 2nd Grade Example
      • 3rd, 4th or 5th Grade Example
    • Curriculum >
      • Arithmetic >
        • 1st Grade
        • 2nd Grade
        • 3rd Grade
        • 4th Grade
        • 5th Grade
      • Elocution
      • Health & Hygiene
      • History/Geography
      • Penmanship
      • Reading
      • Spelling
    • Skits & Stories >
      • Billy Dragoo
      • Johnny Appleseed
      • "The Past Revisited"
      • Drinking from the Water Crock
      • Nurse Maude
      • "Toys Teach History"
      • Christmas Celebrations
    • Extra Activities >
      • Choral Readings
      • Games & Crafts
      • The Flag
      • William McGuffey
      • Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • Gallery
  • Contact/Visitors
  • Inventory
  • Kroger Community Rewards
  • Brochure
  • Cornell Images
  • State Standards
  • Video
  • Teaching Aids
  • Online Resources
  • Special Events

​Teacher's Guide​ ​

Welcome      Prepare for Visit     Daily Schedule     Curriculum     Skits & Stories     Extra Activities     State Standards

Penmanship (Writing)

Picture
Cornell School has a supply of homemade hornbooks that can be used for writing practice. The information below will explain how lessons can be done using the hornbooks.

Hornbooks - The wooden paddle-appearing boards with a handle are pretty much like the hornbooks of old. Hornbooks started out being made of animal horns which were treated and then could be written on. The letters were on them and often other things like a poem. Children were required to have one for school. This goes back for several hundred years. Eventually, paper and leather and other such substances were used which could be mounted on wood. The handle could be on any side of the board. Children basically learned to read just like they do today by learning the letters and then how each sounds and then putting a combination of letters together. About the time this school opened, they were probably not used anymore, but they make an interesting lesson for the students.

These hornbooks have the letters done in scroll writing which was used at the beginning of this school. It can be pointed out to the students that in old books, often found in antique shops, they can find this beautiful writing as people usually signed their names in the front of the book.

The booklets are used to practice these letters, Remind the students that writing is really a form of art work and that they should go slowly and see how nicely they can make them. (demonstrate a couple of letters on the board)
Picture
Spencerian Handwriting
Picture
Penmanship was regularly practiced in the one-room schoolhouse. Students, in developing their cursive script, would repeatedly copy maxims like "lost time is never found" or "He is most powerful who governs himself". The students typically used the Spencer Platt Spencerian Book to practice their cursive script.
Picture
Picture
Copyright ©1998-2025 | All Rights Reserved​
Contact Us
Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
    • About Cornell School
    • Friends of Cornell School
    • About One-Rooms
    • A Teacher's Memory
    • "School Days"
    • By-Laws
  • Teacher's Guide
    • Welcome
    • Prepare for Your Visit >
      • Clothing Suggestions
      • Lunch Suggestions
      • Discipline
      • Schoolhouse Definitions
      • Rules for Teachers
      • Rules for Students
    • Daily Schedule >
      • 1st & 2nd Grade Example
      • 3rd, 4th or 5th Grade Example
    • Curriculum >
      • Arithmetic >
        • 1st Grade
        • 2nd Grade
        • 3rd Grade
        • 4th Grade
        • 5th Grade
      • Elocution
      • Health & Hygiene
      • History/Geography
      • Penmanship
      • Reading
      • Spelling
    • Skits & Stories >
      • Billy Dragoo
      • Johnny Appleseed
      • "The Past Revisited"
      • Drinking from the Water Crock
      • Nurse Maude
      • "Toys Teach History"
      • Christmas Celebrations
    • Extra Activities >
      • Choral Readings
      • Games & Crafts
      • The Flag
      • William McGuffey
      • Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • Gallery
  • Contact/Visitors
  • Inventory
  • Kroger Community Rewards
  • Brochure
  • Cornell Images
  • State Standards
  • Video
  • Teaching Aids
  • Online Resources
  • Special Events