Ask Lemmy

do both after writing the main part of the word. you don't go on to the next word till the first is complete. Sometimes you do forget but not often. it takes no more thought that writing in general. its just all part of it.

No, we do not pluralize with an apostrophe.

When something becomes "second nature" like writing, it is impossible to know exactly what your brain is doing to do it, because it is doing it automatically without you being consciously aware. (I think that is what some other comments mean in calling it "muscle memory".)

So asking people this is not going to get you reliable answers, it is going to tell you what people think their unconscious brain is doing.

However the word you just wrote is right there in front of you, and you know mentally what word you just wrote, so seeing or knowing that there are t's and i's that need completing, seems pretty much a no brainer. Of course this is the sort of observation we use to make up answers about what our brain must be doing...

I'd be interested to know how often people miss their dots and crosses.

I think it's like reading. You don't read individual letters, but rather recognize entire words at a time.

When I write cursive I also write entire words before sprinkling some dots over the squiggles.

People who "cross the T's and dot the I's

Is there somebody who doesn't?

keep track in your head [...] then remember

In theory yes, but that's kinda muscle memory. Nothing to really think about.

other languages like accents from other languages too, e.g. á, à, ü...etc

I live in such a language :) and therefore I think ASCII is stone age and all software that still has exceptions with some characters is buggy AF.

You literally just finish writing the letters as you write i guess?

I need a ton more weed for this one

I think you are overthinking writing. How do you visualise tying your shoelaces?

I also dot my lower case "j's" and cross my lower case "f's".

About the only mental processing going on when I'm writing is what word I want to use next. In school, writing the letters was drilled in to me so that it is simple muscle memory to make them. That goes for both print and cursive writing.

Now when I took French in high school, I did have to stop and remember when the accents were required. I never reached a fluent proficiency with the language.

Contrast that with my wife who is fluent in French, both speaking and writing and she writes the accents with no additional thought.

how do you visualize a word when you write?

I don't, I just write.

So for the letter t, do you just keep track in your head to write the vertical curve first then remember the horizontal dash after?

It's not really something to remember, past like.. pre-school where they first teach you to write, it's just instinctual to write it that way

For longer words, do you sometimes forget these final touchups?

Can't say that I have :p

Also does signing a signature come natural for you, i.e. due to the non stop motion?

Most people I know have a signature that consist of multiple strokes, so it's not really any more non-stop than any other kind of writing.

And not just "t" and "i", if you do the same thing for letters from other languages like accents from other languages too, e.g. á, à, ü...etc. Then please share your thoughts too.

We don't write accents typically in my native language, but we do have some special characters (ą, č, ę, ė, į, š ų, ų, ž) for the diacritic marks that aren't attached you'd treat them the same as writing dots on i's and j's in terms of write order, for ą, ę, į, ų the final stroke or the letter is in place to write the diacritic in the same stroke

This is how cursive was taught to me in Austria: Here it only makes sense to cross the "t" to flow into the next letter. Usually I kept track of the various dots and accent marks for each word, though sometimes I would write them immediately.

I don't write in cursive any more, so it doesn't really make a difference if i do the accents immediately or later.

Interestingly, cursive is now taught slightly differently in Austria:

I didn't. It was just muscle memory.

So for the letter t, do you just keep track in your head to write the vertical curve first then remember the horizontal dash after?

I would do them right after finishing the letters, not at the end of the word.

You may know this but the saying is referring to cursive writing, in which one would never lift one's pen mid-word to cross a t.

Honestly it feels like it's just 2nd nature, I don't even really have to think about it. Every time the pen comes off the page (usually every word, but it can happen mid-word in some cases), I just go back and finish off any letters that need it.

My signature is a personalised scribble I learned a long time ago, it comes naturally due to the number of times I've signed things, rather than anything linked to handwriting in general.

I've not hand-written in an accented language for a while, but I'm pretty sure I treat the accents similarly

Block writing, do it with the letter, linked/cursive do it at the end of the word. Many linked writing words turn into a block-linked hybrid for legibility. Idk, just picture how well it will be read and write accordingly. Single strike-out if you mess up, it lets the reader see what you were trying to write but messed up, helps with homonyms...

Depends what kind of cursive you were taught as a child. Mine had the pen up basically after every character, and that's when you just did it.
Different version of cursive: the whole word is one line, then you go back and finish the word. You are supposed to read a finished word, double-checking what you wrote so that's the time you do it.
And there is no visualization, just you and the letters shaping a word on the paper.

As most answers talk about writing, pretending that the question is a valid one, I suggest to take a step back. Crossing the ts and dotting the is is a saying, originating from times when penmanship was important in making good impressions in correspondence. Today, people use this saying because it is a common and short way to describe a certain type of activity without getting into specifics. People today don’t use this saying because crossing ts is always on their mind. Your question is like asking: when you look the gift horse in the mouth, what are you exactly looking for? And then lemmy users stating to make up stories how they one day actually got a gift horse but before accepting it they wanted to make sure vet bills wouldn’t be crazy high.

I don't think I visualise the word. At the end of the word I still remember what word I wrote and how to spell it. In other languages the spelling part it is easier because they have spelling rules so if you know how a word is pronounced you usually know how to spell it.

I'm really confused by the question.

It has to do with the stroke you make as you write. In all three ways that I know how to write by hand (full cursive, my actual current style, and print), crossing the ts and dotting the is is just the last stroke(s) of writing the word. The word is not complete until those are done, just like an A (if you write it as a ball with a tail) is not complete without its tail, and sword is not complete without a d at the end.

You keep track on your head the same way you keep track in your head that a word is not finished up until you have written all the letters in it. My first language uses accents, and it is the same process. And yes, you can forget, not just for longer words. Teachers would certainly mark it on homework and tests. I struggled with accents, in general, but just like learning how to spell a word, you just practice it when you get it wrong until you get it right and it becomes muscle memory for how you write that word.

My signature doesn't, however, since I have not built enough muscle memory to reproduce it. Yes, it is technically cursive, so that part is easy to get right; but the flourishes that make it a signature instead of just me writing a word like every other kid who learned the same cursive style would aren't muscle memory due to lack of practice.

Nobody writes in full cursive any more. You can cross the T and dot the I right after you write it.

When I'm doing calligraphy, the letters are made out of building blocks. And I deliberately look over my work to check if I missed something somewhere.

In handwriting I keep track of the t's, j's and i's and strike those when the word is finished. We also have ¨ above some letters sometimes which I also keep track of. I never forget, it's unreadable when I forget. That's how you know, when you read the word and it doesn't read right.

I also drilled my signature, I don't think about it, it's just a fluid motion.

I don't visualize it. It's just there, just escaped from my head right onto the paper, and it's written just how one is supposed to be writing it.

To me, it's a question of practice. The more (regularly) you write the more it become a reflex, the more you enrich your vocabulary (read widely, read as often as possible) the more you will 'know' words and how to write them (also true for grammar and full sentences). I never think about crossing the t or put on accent on 'à, é, è, ë, and so on' when I need one... it comes naturally because I internalized the various (French, or whatever other languages I can write) grammatical rules.

BTW, it's ok to forget them on occasions, provided the word/sentence remains legible. My handwriting is pretty shitty but I'm used to reading it so I need not write every single accentuation or diacritic sign in order to be by able to re-read myself. I also devised my own shorthand along the years and most of my notes will be written using that shorthand (meaning a lot of symbols instead of traditional words)... I would never use shorthand, and would take a lot more care with accents and punctuation (and grammar) knowing someone else will be reading what I write.

As for the signature, I just decided on mine when I was maybe 15 or 16 and have kept using it since then, now nearing my 60. So, yeah it just flows out of the pen without me thinking much about it.

I don't go back to do it. I do it as I'm writing. The pen doesn't go back on the word for final touches. It's just part of the movement of doing that letter.

Edit: my dad is one of those that goes back to do it. He also writes the u's, i's, n's and m's exactly the same (like little upside down n's). He has a "funny" story about writing the word minimum and not being able to find the i's once.