Make Handwriting Lessons

Make Manuscript Handwriting Lessons with Software

If you have a word processor on your computer, you can make your own handwriting lessons. A nice thing about making the lessons yourself, is that the lessons can be tailored to your children. The problem with making handwriting lessons on a word processor is the fonts. Few free handwriting fonts include the lines. I have tried two free fonts that include the lines, one of the fonts is for manuscript and one is for cursive.

The Manuscript Font

penmanship.zip
This is a true type font, download and unzip, then install in your fonts folder. If you do not know how to install fonts, open a search engine and type, "install fonts" to search for instructions.

A Sample Lesson

Before opening the file that is linked below, install the font. The file will not display correctly until the font is installed. Of course, it will not hurt to view it without the font installed. The image on the left shows a part of the sample file and what it is supposed to look like with the font installed.

Dogs Run (doc format)

Dogs Run

The Blank Ruled Lines

With the Penmanship Font, the blank ruled lines are made with the Grave symbol (`). On a qwerty keyboard, the graves symbol key is the key to the left of the key for number 1 - the upper left key.

The Hollow Font Format

To make the font hollow in Microsoft Word: Select text, then from menu, choose Format > Font. Under Effects, check Outline. Click here for image.

To make the font hollow in Open Office: Select text, then from menu, choose Format > Character. Choose the Font Effects tab and check Outline. Choose Okay.

Note: Not only is the font hollow, the lines are hollow too.

Updated: July 27, 2008
Donna Young