Jack’s Winning Words 2/3/21 “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.”  (Palmer’s Teacher’s Manual-1840)  This early instruction book for teachers is still available.  My sister has beautiful handwriting, having been taught, The Palmer Method.  Palmer taught that if you fail at something, you don’t give up.  You try again.  That lesson might sound trite, but that’s how Edison came up with his inventions.  If something failed, he tried again…and again…and often succeeded.  Failures don’t need to be permanent, so keep on trying!  ;-)  Jack FROMEDUCATOR PAUL:  It’s interesting you brought up the Palmer Method Of handwriting. Do you know what’s two of the most contentious curriculum areas between parents and elementary school curriculum?   They are handwriting and spelling. Parents beg for more teaching of both. Schools say,  Look at the data (research) as well as the fact that if we teach those areas as separate subjects, what do we leave out? I guess Palmer thought that if a kid wrote 10 rows of the letter “A” correctly...that would be worth the time and effort. ==JACK:  My sister's pretty well educated (In spite of the Palmer method of writing?). FROM ST PAUL IN ST PAUL:  Edison experimented with hundreds of different filaments before finding the right one.   he famously said something like this:  that experiment was not a failure.  it succeeded by informing me that this was not the correct filament.    (a very rough paraphrase but you get the point.) ===JACK:  Edison wasn't perfect   I understand that he stole some of Tesla's ideas and claimed that they were his own.===SP:    my Mother learned the Palmer method of writing in school and she had very good handwriting in her younger years.  Uncle Ellis did too as well as my Dad===JACK:  I, too,  learned the Palmer method, but my handwriting has deteriorated over the years to become almost unreadable.===SP:  Jack,   a few years ago i switched to printing my name and almost everything else i write.  it is somehow easier than writing.  my motor skills allow me to print easier than to write===JACK:  The same for me.  I print much more than I write.===SP:  my Dad used to tell me that i wrote sooo poorly he could not even read my typing!    now that IS bad.  FROM BLAZING OAKS:  homemade noodles..It definitely took several tries, (bless her!) before I mastered that skill, but it stood me in very good stead ever after, as I could feed guests at dinner economically with a big dish of chicken and noodles, or beef and noodles when money  was scarce. Delicious over mashed potatoes!. My kids occasionally remark about sheets of noodles drying on wax paper draped over chair backs at our house!  Failures indeed, needn't be permanent===JACK:  Just because something's old-fashioned, or old, doesn't mean that it's useless.! FROM JU IN NC:  3 letter words can be so much fun and easy to work with.  such as (try or cry). We can cry about our failures or try to overcome them.  So many stories available to illustrate this.===JACK:   A wry answer.  Thanks