AbdulKareem Muhammad Jaami'

Are you an old-fashioned hand writer, choosing this over the convenience of the keyboard? Would you rather write lists on a sheet of paper, than place your reminders on your smartphone?     If you answered yes to any or all of the above, then congratulations, you have been training your brain properly.

Given the opportunity to take notes by hand or on the computer, most students choose the latter. After all, modern technology offers plenty of benefits for writers.  The digital writing workspace is convenient for several reasons. A single laptop or tablet can hold all the books and materials a student needs. It can also contain tools for research, entertainment activities, and curated music. The tech devices make learning more accessible. With the push of a button or a tap on a screen, students can activate engaging learning experiences, or they can record lectures.        
Convenience, however, doesn’t trump old-fashioned writing by hand when it comes to learning. Writing by hand has benefits that technology has not been able to reproduce – yet.
Writing by hand:
Develops visual motor skills  
Learning how to pick up, grasp and write with a pencil or a pen requires eye-hand coordination and . You use eye-hand coordination and other visual motor skills to perform self-care basics and even to access digital technology by clicking a mouse or tapping and swiping touch screens. When you regularly write by hand, you are practicing the skills you need to use technology.
Improves thinking
Students who take notes on a computer capture more of what’s said in a lecture, but they are less likely to remember what was said. On the other hand, students who create their notes by longhand are more likely to remember what they were taught because they had to synthesize the information through. Writing by hand develops unique patterns in the brain. Students who make their notes by hand are more likely to enjoy this benefit than peers who type or record the same notes.
Increases language processing skills
Writing and reading are recursive acts that require thinking skills, and writing by hand supports the development of these skills. Composing an essay is quick work on a digital device. Writing by hand slows down the thought process, and it gives the learner time to formulate language expression. Making notes and writing essays by hand requires learners to pay attention to words and how they are spelt, the best ways to use the words in sentences, and how to structure the sentences containing them. Students who write by hand engage with their thinking and the content, and their reading skills and writing expression improve as a result of this practice.
Technology is not going away. Neither should writing by hand because it helps students develop their visual motor skills, improve their thinking, and increase their ability to process language. Long writing prepares students for other endeavors. Writing by hand in this digital age is a critical part of 21 -century technology readiness.

During brainstorming sessions, the occipital lobe (which helps with visualization) becomes more active — meaning that the writers may “see” the scenes theyway want to write about in their heads.When the actual writing begins, the hippocampus and the forebrain become active. Lotze suggests that these regions were gathering factual information to include in the story and sorting through the different characters and plotlines available to the writer.
However, it has been noted that for Expert Writers- The ones to whom brainstorming comes as second nature, and who can juggle characters and plotlines more effortlessly. It’s kind of hard to know what they are thinking when their brain is cycling through ideas, sentences, and the many automatic functions it takes to write. Our technology is advanced, but not that advanced. Thus, while Experts write like they are giving a speech, the Novices write like they are watching a movie.
It was also discovered that, in the expert writer’s brain, the regions that deal with speech and word formation (known as Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas) are used more frequently in the brainstorming stage compared to novice writers, who tend to visualize in pictures more. This could mean that, before even putting pen to paper, expert writers are already thinking about words or phrases they are going to use to tell their story.It could also mean that expert writers have trained their brain to see things differently, to be more language oriented, and to visualize not just with the occipital lobe.

How then do you get from novice to expert? How do you train your brain and activate your caudate nucleus?  You need three things:        
1. Time  
2. Willpower.  
3. Several hundred pieces of paper (Pieces of paper and not keyboard).
Technology has become so prevalent in our lives that it is almost impossible to get anything done without the help of a computer. These days, we use it to get all our work done at our jobs, as well as take notes and research in school. This has caused many different shifts in our day to day life, and has made writing by hand a largely unnecessary act to partake in, seeing as you can just type everything out. But, according to plenty of different studies, there are brain-friendly benefits of writing out letters, notes, essays, or journal entrees by hand that you can’t get from typing out on the keyboard. Writing by hand really connects you with the words and allows your brain to focus on them, understand them, and learn from them. There are plenty of reason to get back to writing by hand — check down below to learn few benefits of writing by hand.
It Increases comprehension.
It fully engages the brain.
It calms the body and nerves.
It enhances focus keeping.
It eases depression and anxiety.
It unleashes creativity.
It slows down mental ageing.
And ultimately it combats dyslexia.

 AbdulKareem Muhammad Jaami' is a Teacher with speciality in Handwriting coaching, Calligraphy, Learning aids & support. 
He can be reached through mobile on :09030946480.