Rev 2025-06-16
Canonical copy and licence at https://cricketbr.github.io/Crickets-Shorthand-Site
This course will (hopefully) work with any shorthand system and any book. Options are given to accommodate different types of systems and quality of books.
Graduates of this course are encouraged to start Swem’s Systematic Course for Advanced Writers.
Most modern shorthand students do not have the luxury of a teacher, or even a good self-instruction book (especially those of us who prefer older systems).
A good book will:
This course will help you overcome those deficiencies in your book, and to do for yourself most of the things a good teacher would do.
Experts do not agree on a method of progression. Even books published by the same company disagree!
There are three main methods:
Options 2 and 3 are only available if the text has sufficient shorthand images in each chapter. Therefore I have focused on the first.
If you use shorter sessions, do a bit of each work each session, or do one after the other. Finish writing and building speed on each passage the session you start it. Always end with a bit of precision practice. (Second thoughts: What happens if you spread a passage over multiple days?)
Just like with music, shorter and more-frequent works better than longer and less-frequent.
15 minutes reading the text.
Review the theory and copy words that demonstrate each rule. You will work through the book several times. You can stop this step this once you can take dictation from unseen material at 125wpm on your first attempt.
The reading material in modern books usually review theory from earlier chapters in a systematic manner. Those lucky students can skip this step until they finish the book. If your book has reading material, take time from writing to read this. You will save time overall because you will know which details are important and which are not, and your brain will better know that to tell your hand to write.
Reading instructions are in a later section.
Advanced, after you finish the first book and reach 60wpm: All the modern 2nd year texts I’ve seen include a review of the basics, usually a few concepts in each chapter, and Swem advise reviewing the basic manual at least 1-2 times, until you reach 125wpm. That’s unusually unanimous. If you have an advanced book that reviews the basic theory, you don’t need to review the basic book. If you have an advanced book that only teaches new rules but does not review the basic theory, read that book instead of the first book 1 day in 4 and continue to review the basic theory the other days.
10 minutes reading your own writing.
Use material that has rested for a bit. This give you practice reading your own writing, and will catch bad habits early. Practice a few words that need it, but do not redo the entire passage. At first, focus on recent work (to catch bad habits quickly). Then gradually extend it to six months or more, so you practice reading old material. Note that your first writing will be so bad that, while it’s good to read it to find problems to fix, you may not benefit from reading it weeks later. Use your own judgement. (Keep a sample so in a year you can look back and see how far you’ve come.)
30 minutes copying and/or writing from dictation.
If you have not already written for 5 minutes (copying example words), do that now to warm up. Use penmanship exercises from your system, or one similar, if you have them.
As said before, take time from this block if your book has reading material.
3 sessions out of 4, follow the usual copy and dictation pattern, described later. Start slow, increase speed until accuracy is fairly low, then finish at a medium speed.
1 session out of 4, experiment.
5 minutes practicing penmanship.
End each session, no matter how short, with accurate writing. Music teachers also recommend this. Your body remembers the final minutes of a lesson strongly.
Swem suggests tracing shorthand in the textbook. This will force you to notice subtle details, but isn’t always an option and may not give much variety. Many systems have penmanship exercises. Do some from your system, or one similar, or invent your own. Sometimes work on problems you know you have. Other times work on other aspects. Often the real problem is something we only think we’ve mastered.
Divide your penmanship time equally between tracing, penmanship exercises, and copying a recent exercise carefully – but keep it fluid. You are writing, not drawing.
Once you know the shapes well, add speed to this, enough to make your writing smooth but not enough to sacrifice accuracy.
Keep a diary showing the date, passage description, length in words, activity (Read, Copy, Dictation), the wpm (words per minute) and accuracy of each attempt. The numbers will go up and down, but the average will gradually go up. Include room for other notes.
You do not need to count or time all the readings or copies, but do enough that you get a feel for speed vs accuracy vs length, and the effect of different types of repetition. This will change rapidly at first, then settle down, then change again as you increase your target speeds.
This is for your own use. Be as specific or vague as you like.
Reading skill is as important as writing skill. Track it!
Finish reading the entire book before writing words not taught, unless the book says otherwise. Later rules often contradict the general rules in early chapters.
Your goal at this stage is to become familiar with the rules and the building blocks in a variety of settings. (Paraphrase of Leslie) Do not memorize the fine details of the rules. You will absorb them by reading. Leslie goes so far as to say that if teachers are asked about the details and reasons, they should ask the student to wait until the end of the course for an answer. (Leslie’s students had the luxury of plenty of reading material demonstrating each new rule.)
Make a chart of letters by shape, including preffixes and suffixes, so you can look them up quickly.
For each new word:
Use the key instead of struggling with a word. When you can read 9/10 words reasonably well, try reading the entire sentence a second time before using the key. Then spell and say as before. When you can read 19/20 words reasonably well, use the Column Method described later. Leslie recommends you keep one finger on the shorthand and the other on the key.
Reread each passage until you can read it without referring to the key, pointing to each word. It is ok if you inadvertently memorize it, but be sure to look at each word.
As you gain experience, look for letters that often occur together, and think of them as a single letter. Eg TR and SH. Do this for all words as needed. Eventually, only do it for words you struggle with or that demonstrate a new rule.
This process will help lock in the shapes of each letter and combination, and the outline of the entire word. Doing it out loud involves senses in your throat, mouth and ears, which enhances learning. Leslie recommends against tracing outlines at any stage. Swem recommends it for 5 minutes to finish each hour of studying. (Leslie and Swem both worked directly for JR Gregg.)
Don’t worry about deciphering difficult words at first. They will all be difficult! For now, seeing the building blocks in a variety of settings is more important than practice deciphering.
Continue to use the key frequently, until you only struggle with 1 word in 20.
The column method works well if you suspect a penmanship issue, or are not sure which of several sounds or abbreviations are intended. It also works for checking if a proposed abbreviation has other possible interpretations.
Make one column for each letter. The first row is the letter in shorthand. The following rows are your best guess at what it might be, roughly ordered by probability, written in plain text. Then work through all the combinations by brute force.
You will have to adapt it a bit if combinations of letters create word parts.
Your goal at this stage is for your hand to be comfortable with the building blocks in a variety of settings, not to build speed. That will come later. (Paraphrase of Leslie)
Read the passage, if it exists, in the same way as before, then copy 4x using the 4-column method. Read, correct, and practice problem areas after each writing.
If you do not have a sample to copy, you will have to make your own. Be extra careful checking it.
Your hand will be unstable at first. (Leslie) Work only until you stop improving, then take a break. We can only improve so much each day, and working longer will not help.
Begin with very short passages (only 20 words) and build up to 100.
Stay at this stage until your hand is comfortable and there is not much difference in your penmanship between copies.
Every teacher manual I’ve read agrees: Mark the transcript, not the shorthand.
95% accurate means someone who is familiar with your penmanship, or yourself in 6 months, can read 95% of the words. You might add “uses the appropriate abbreviation for your chosen level,” but that is still a far cry from perfection.
It is impossible to perfectly predict your accuracy at any speed. It will change with difficulty of the passage and practice with that passage. Use your best guess.
Progression milestones are 4 passages out of 5. Do not let the occassional difficult passage hold you back.
Your accuracy at lower speeds will increase as you increase your barely-readable speed.
Do not strive for perfect notes. That will slow you down. Besides, what is perfect?
Graph paper can help you practice correct sizing, especially for horizontal lines. It can also backfire and make you try to be too perfect.
Consider using it for copying at first a precision drills when needed, but not as a regular practice.
This method works well while you are at the copying stage, and later for penmanship practice, or if you cannot take dictation. It also helps you build hand speed separate from brain speed.
It will not, however, help you build speed. I speak from experience.
Make four columns by dividing two pages into two columns each, so you can see all at the same time. Copy the passage from the book into the first column. If you are creating your own material, write your first attempt in the first column. Do not go to the margin; you will need space for corrections.
Check your work and make corrections. Choose a few words you struggled with, copy them a few times, then copy the passage again. Aim for a slightly uncomfortable speed, at which your notes are readable and follow the rules, but are not perfect.
Then copy from the first column to the second, check your work, make corrections, and practice difficult sections. Then copy from the second column to the third, and the third to the forth. Check your work, make corrections, and practice difficult sections after each copy.
The 1st column needs to be accurate, since it will be the model for the others. Accurate means readable and following the rules, not perfect penmanship. Go as slow as needed to reach this level.
Speed up a bit for the 2nd column. Counter-intuitively, shorthand is easier to write neatly with a bit of speed.
Speed up even more for the 3rd column. Go so fast that your writing is only 95% accurate.
The 4th and final column should be slow enough for 98% accuracy, but no slower. Your hand will remember this copy most. Too slow will teach slow writing. Too fast will teach inaccurate writing.
It will take a bit of practice to learn how fast to write each column. The speeds will increase over time. Some passages will be easier or harder than others. Find speeds that usually work and don’t worry about it.
Some people do this in rows, leaving four rows between each original copy, instead of in four columns.
Leslie recommends that students take dictation with the shorthand image in front of them. Having the key in front is especially useful when they are new to dictation and trying to apply several new skills at the same time. All students – fast, slow or lazy – will reduce their reliance on the text as their confidence and speed increase.
Writing too small will slow your writing, since you need to be more precise. Too large will be awkward for your hand. Aim for a comfortable, flowing size. There are a few Gregg articles about size, with samples from expert writers. One fits 500 words per page, another fits only 100.
To Start: Draw straight lines on paper, a full inch apart, and copy the previous paragraph, in cursive and/or print at whatever size your hand likes. Then measure the height of several letters. Typically lowercase letters are 2-3mm and uppercase letters are twice that. If your longhand is larger than average, then your shorthand will probably also be larger than average, and vice versa. Adjust a bit if needed to keep the lengths distinct.
Repeat this test with shorthand before and after every few writing sessions. Your hand will change when it’s tired, and as it learns the shapes better. As you become more consistent you can reduce the frequency.
Consistency is more important than exact lengths. All tall letters should be the same height.
I only learned about this test a few years ago, and tried it after decades of writing Gregg. I discovered my hand was happier, accuracy better, and speed faster when my large letters were 8mm instead of 7.
Experiment with skipping lines. Even if the size doesn’t change, it sometimes gives your hand a bit more freedom. Again, repeat the experiment after some experience, and again later. Results may change as you get more familiar with the shapes, and as you build speed.
“The actual size of the characters may be varied according to circumstances, such as the goodness of the light and the writing materials. The minuteness of any kind of writing is limited by the size of the smallest characters. In Orthic the small size may be made as small as desired, and the small circle may be reduced to a dot, but it is best to make the small characters about one-twelfth of an inch long (2.1mm), and the large ones at least twice as big.” — Clarey, Orthic Revised, General Rules
As you repeat a section at the same speed, your writing will improve, then plateau, then degrade. Stop when it plateaus, usually within 5 repetitions.
“Anything that is dull and uninteresting is of doubtful pedagogic value. Also, excessive repetition generally results in progressive deterioration of the outlines practiced.” — Gregg Shorthand Functional Method Teachers Handbook (1936), from stenophile.com .
Vary the speed. Slow helps precision. Speed helps fluency and reduces hesitation. You need both. Play with the speed and see what happens. Our brains and bodies remember the first and final repeats more than the middle ones. They should be as fast as possible without losing readability.
Work on difficult areas, slow and then fast, works better than repeating the entire passage. 8 Things Top Practicers Do Differently
Be very careful making your own material until you finish the book.
Modern books for most systems have enough practice material in each chapter that you won’t need any new material until the core theory is covered. Some systems have theory in one book and practice material keyed to the text in another.
Orthographic systems such as Orthic and Teeline quickly teach an acceptable way to write all words – just use the alphabet. You can start writing after learning the alphabet and combinations, or so they say. I recommend you wait a bit, since the next few pages usually teach simple but powerful ways to reduce writing. You do not want your hand to get stuck on the Fully Written versions.
Older phonetic books are a challenge. Work through the core theory and available samples BEFORE writing new material. Often an outline that seems correct now does not follow later rules – to the point that you wrote the opposite of what you intended. Then be very careful to proof-read all your writing and make sure you follow all the rules. Making your own reference book will be very useful for these shorthands.
Beware of creating your own abbreviations, or even simplifying spelling, before learning the entire system. Forkner and Gregg both say to leave out vowels, so Can -> CN, right? Several chapters later, they say that Can -> C, and CN means cannot. All your old notes are wrong. For the next year, every time you try to write Can your hand will write Cannot, and every time you read CN you will wonder if you wrote Cannot correctly or Can incorrectly.
If you aren’t sure where the core theory stops and optional theory begins, read more of the book, not to learn, but to see which sections are core theory, which are optional but useful, and which can wait. Some books separate those nicely. Some mix them together.
Quickly reading the entire book will also give you advance warning of additional sizes, positions, and shapes that you might confuse with the earlier shapes if not aware. First read to see what exists, not to learn.
Once you finish the core theory, choose a passage about 20 words long. Write it, then proof-read it carefully. Your sample needs to follow the rules, but the penmanship only has to be readable, not perfect. Re-read the core theory (or your summary of it) often, so you use all of it for your samples.
Modern books have enough accurately written samples that you know the theory is correct. Luxury!
Make a small binder of reference material, and add to it as you learn. Make sections for:
Update this book at the end of each homework session – after your hand is comfortable with the new shapes. Sort the contents of each page in any order that makes sense to you. The order does not have to be perfect.
When a page is filled, rewrite it spread over two or more pages, to make room for more. You will find that you need shorter explanations and fewer examples for familiar rules each time.
Making the binder will help you learn the rules, and will also give you a quick way to look them up.
It is tempting to build a dictionary of all new words. I found this a waste of time. At first, all words are new to you. After reading a few passages, you will realize you’ve memorized some words, are familiar with others, and still have to build most from scratch. After a few more passages, some that were only familiar will now be memorized, and some that you had to build from scratch will be familiar. Building blocks will follow the same progression. This is a natural process, and will happen with very little extra effort.
No matter how much practice you get, and how many words reach the stages of memorized and familiar, there will still be many thousands of words that you have to build from scratch. Practice using the building blocks in a variety of words, instead of memorizing vocabulary or building a dictionary.
That is not to say word lists are never useful.
As stated earlier, a list of all the words you encounter is a waste of time, but lists can be useful for other reasons.
The best way to learn lists is spaced repetition. Each time you successfully remember a word, promote it to a longer review frequency. If you struggle with a word you previously mastered, demote it.
Some people use a deck of cards, one card per word, longhand on one side and shorthand on the other. Leitner Box is a famous system for managing repetition using cards. Apps such as Anki have virtual cards and keep track of which words should be repeated and how often. There might even be a shared deck for your system. I find the physical cards use too much paper and are hard to carry. It takes too long to scan and enter each word for a computer version, and your hand doesn’t get practice with each repetition. (I used a program similar to Anki to study music vocabulary, which was text-only and easy to enter. I got 100% on that section of the exam.)
For shorthand, I prefer the accordion column method. Write the longhand in one column and shorthand in the column beside it. Fold or cover the paper so you can only see the longhand. Write the shorthand in the next column, uncover the key, and note the mistakes. Adjust it so you can only see the shorthand. Write the longhand in the next column and note the mistakes. (You can save time and paper by saying the longhand but not writing it. Say it out loud and follow with your finger to avoid shortcuts.) Now repeat the process with only the words you didn’t get first try. Repeat again, until you have gotten each word correct more often than you got it wrong.
Copy the words you did not get correct the first time to a page with tomorrow’s date. You will work on them again then. Copy the words you got correct the first time to another column (or page), marked with the date you want to review them. Words you always get correct the first time need to be reviewed less often.
The goal toward which you are striving is to reach the point where you can take new matter at your top speed and write it as well as you would after taking it two or three times. Of course, no matter how much skill you may eventually acquire you will occasionally “flunk” an outline or a phrase. In reading it back you will correct it, but the fact that you wrote it incorrectly the first time should be no cause for worry. It is done by everybody. Your aim should be simply to bring these errors down to a minimum. — Swem
That’s a far distant goal. Start where you are — with hand and brain that need to practice a passage before speeding it up.
Start dictation when your hand is somewhat comfortable with your system’s shapes and you can copy with 95% accuracy. Dictation will push rules from your brain to your hand faster than copying.
Graduate to Swem’s Course, modified as described later, when your final speed reaches 60-80wpm, and unmodified when you reach 80-100wpm for 5 minutes. Experiment. You may be ready earlier.
Read, correct, and practice problem areas after each writing.
The normal sequence for each exercise is:
The stages are:
Correct your work and practice difficult areas. Make copy if accuracy was below 90% — but only once. Copying the same material helps accuracy, and is better than nothing if you cannot take dictation, but does not build speed.
Keep the good copy in front of you during dictation, and look at it when needed. You will gradually use it less as speed and confidence increase. (You can continue to use the column method by making the good copy in the left column and using the rest of the columns for dictation.)
Be prepared for slower speeds when you increase stages. It will take a few experiments to find your new starting speed.
Choose a speed that usually allows for just under 95% accuracy. If you regularly achieve over 95% on the first dictation, increase the starting speed.
If your first attempt is below 90% accuracy, repeat this speed once, but do not repeat any other speeds.
20wpm for 1 minute is suitable for your very first dictation ever. Your writing will be horrible, but will improve quickly as you get used to the process.
After your first hour of dictation, do not repeat any speeds but the first.
Most teachers do not clarify whether a 1-minute passage is 1-minute at the initial speed or the final speed. Use the average and don’t worry about it. The relative difference will shrink as your speed increases.
Remember to correct your work and practice difficult sections after each dictation.
Swem recommends that your first dictation of each passage be so fast you can barely manage with great effort. I don’t think that does any good until you know the theory well.
Increase the speed by 10wpm, make corrections, and increase speed again until you are down to 90% accuracy. This is your overshoot speed. It will force your hand to go faster for the easy parts, and show you which parts need attention, even though they seemed fine at slower speeds.
Repeat your first take of a passage only if it was worse than 95% accuracy — readable, not perfect. This will only happen right after you increase starting speed. Do not repeat any other speeds, except maybe for your first hour of dictation.
Do your best to keep up and get at least something down for each word. (A sentence with one inaccurate word is better than losing the rest of the sentence. A hint of a word is better than nothing.)
Take a final dication at the highest speed you expect to get 95% accuracy. Be brave! Make corrections. If you achieve that, you’re done. If not, slow down once more so your final take is reasonably accurate.
4-6 takes should cover the entire sequence. If it takes more, then experiment! Maybe you can increase a speed or step size. Too many takes of the same passage will reduce variety. Too few will not give your hand and brain time to master the new content.
Note that your starting speed will drop drastically when you reduce preparation, but your overshoot and final speeds will be the same. Work hard to build your starting speed back up, so there are fewer steps between that and your overshoot speed.
Some books recommend only 3-4 takes per passage, but that includes preparation at home if appropriate to the stage, and does not include overshooting (which I find extremely useful).
Continue to experiment, so you notice when you are ready to increase speeds.
For each passage, except the first few after a speed increase, pick one challenge (rotate through them):
After each increase, adjust the other speeds so starting speed is 10-20wpm below final speed, and overshoot speed is 10-20 above final speed. Aim for 4-6 takes per passage. It’s all a bit of a guess. Some passages are easier or harder. Sometimes you have good or bad days.
Stay at each stage until your first dictation is 95% accurate at the following speeds:
If you increase duration before reaching 100wpm for 1 minute, you will have to do your own math for the pyramid, or use a different method to increase endurance.
Your starting speed and accuracy will temporaily drop after when you reduce preparation.
You may want to switch to Modified Swem shortly after switching to reduced preparation. Experiment. Their method builds speed faster, but won’t work if your first attempt
Increase your duration when your speed reaches 80wpm and 95% accuracy. See later for methods.
One session in four should be experiments instead of the normal exercises, as described later.
Remember to keep a diary and experiment. These are experiments and maybe practice, not tests. Use the results to decide what to do next.
Dedicate 1 sessions in 4 to experiments. Do a few passages for each experiment, to give yourself time to get used to it. You will not fit all experiments into a single session, so rotate through them, or follow your curiosity.
Do the first attempt even slower — slow enough for practically perfect — then build speed as before.
Do less preparation than usual.
Push the final speed until accuracy drops to 80%, then drop 20wpm for the final dictation.
Try something longer, with the same speed experiments.
Follow Swem’s advice and start with a fast dictation, so fast you cannot quite keep up, followed by a practically perfect one. As you get better, you will find this approach works better. Switch when appropriate, or use a mix.
It might take a chapter or two for an earlier chapter to sink in, but if that doesn’t work do not hesitate to review older chapters.
Do your best to record at least something for each word, and leave a gap for the correction. This will feel wrong at first, but most of the sentence with a hint for the word is better than missing the entire sentence. After the first dictation (or meeting), play with options and, if you expect to need a reminder, record your favourite in the back of your notebook. (You’ll be surprised how often you need a reminder.)
When you record spelling, note clearly whether it’s correct or best-guess.
Avoid the temptation to make abbreviations. Shorthand speed comes from using the building blocks well, not creating abbreviations. (See section on Klein’s motion picture studies.)
Some writers leave larger margins and use a mark instead of a gap to mark needed corrections. Experiment.
Tension and aiming for perfection are the biggest causes of slow writing. Relax! (Yeah, saying Relax doesn’t work for me, either.)
Treat each attempt as an experiment, not a test. There is no pass/fail, just information about what type of practice to do next. It is ok to slow down for a bit if you pushed too hard, too fast, or you are having a bad week.
Dictation that is slow enough to be 100% accurate helps you write accurately. It does not help you build speed.
Fast dictation helps you build speed, shows you which words need practice, and helps you write easy words faster so you have more time for difficult words. Doing all your work at this speed risks penmanship degradation and loss of accuracy.
Leslie recommends pushing until your accuracy drops to 80%. I think that’s a bit high. Use 90% for your overshoot speed, 95% for good-enough, and 98% for practically perfect. Adjust a bit depending on the speed-building method and what works for you.
Work at a variety of speeds, even if you think you only need practice at one speed. We are often poor judges of what we actually need.
End each session by writing either perfectly (tracing well-written shorthand) or writing as fast as you can while remaining accurate.
For now, the only reason to care about speed is to know what speed to attempt next, and possibly bragging rights.
Speed depends on many factors. Check with your school, testing agency, or professional association for their rules, early enough that you can be sure to meet them.
Counting Words. Gregg says 1 word is 1.4 syllables. Pitman says a word is a word. German shorthands count syllables, not words. (You’ll know why if you speak German.) I don’t know what different text reader programs use. For now, while speed is just a setting on your computer, use that.
Accuracy. Most professions care only about the transcript, not the shorthand. The only exception I found was UK Journalists, whose shorthand notes are sometimes used as legal evidence. Even then, the shorthand does not have to be perfect. It just has to support the transcript. When learning, 95% accuracy passes. As your speed with that accuracy increases, your speed at 100% accuracy will also increase.
Amount of Preparation. Eventually, only your speed for unprepared material will matter.
Length of passage. Speed goes down as length increases. Eventually you will write at close to the same speed for 1 minute as for 5, but not yet.
Steady vs Burst and Pause. For now, take steady dictation. Practice with bursts and pauses once you reach 5 minute duration and close to professional speeds.
Familiarity with the Material. An office stenographer is unlikely to have a brief form for “If it pleases the court.”
Type of Material. Even a court reporter will have very few brief forms for poetry.
Most text reader programs (aka test to speech) are too fast for early dictation, or are not properly calibrated. These are pretty good:
Previous generations of students succeeded with 10wpm steps through 80 or even 100wpm. I would use that size step both for increasing target speeds and repeating a passage, until you reach at least 80wpm. Larger steps are more likely to break you out of ruts and to highlight problem sections. Smaller will give you more successes and confidence.
If you cannot reach the target speed, try dividing the passage into two sections instead of reducing step size. Prove to yourself that your pen can move fast enough.
However, sometimes a smaller step makes more sense, especially at the higher speeds. Experiment. If the larger step doesn’t work, try a smaller step, or try an even larger step.
There is no benefit to repeated failure.
Watch your accuracy as you practice. At first it will get better, then plateau, then degrade. Stop when it plateaus. More practice after this point will do more harm than good. Usually that is five or fewer repetitions.
Observe where you begin to fall behind in dictation. The problem outline is probably a few words before that. The problem is in preparing to write the outline, not in the execution. Questionnaire and motion pictures studies by Klein (described later) show even expert writers do not know which outlines they write faster or slower.
Try including a few words on either side of the problem. This will prevent hesitation as you approach a word that worries you.
Vary the speed. Slow helps precision. Speed helps fluency and reduces hesitation. You need both. If you made your own outline, consider changing it.
Our brains and bodies remember the first and final repeats more than the middle ones. They should be as fast as possible without losing readability.
“Anything that is dull and uninteresting is of doubtful pedagogic value. Also, excessive repetition generally results in progressive deterioration of the outlines practiced.” — Gregg Shorthand Functional Method Teachers Handbook (1936). stenophile.com
A rut is when the brain or body gets used to going a certain speed. Increasing speed beyond your capability and then slowing down will quickly break a rut. A plateau is when the brain or body simply cannot go faster until several new neural connections form. Trust that those connections are forming even if you see no difference. Keep the pressure on for speed, but also include a variety of speed, accuracy, and duration so those connections form properly. Eventually the last nerve will connect and your speed will increase suddenly.
(Dr. Kenneth H Cooper, The New Aerobics, 1978, compares building muscle nerves and blood vessels to building new roads. The entire network must be finished before any of it can be used.)
Be prepared to stall every time you increase the speed. Some increases will be worse than others. Leslie recommends pushing all passages to 20% error rate. Swem recommends even faster. “Push the speed up to twice as fast as you can actually write it, and make an heroic effort to get something down for every word. It will not be good shorthand that you write, but it will serve to jar your hand out of its habit of sluggishness.” He warns not to attempt this before 140wpm, no more than once a month, and to “always end a session of this sort with a goodly amount of precision practice to offset the shattering tendencies of forced speed.”
Push each passage as far as it will go, but do not waste time pushing it farther. Some are harder than others. (If more than one passage in five is hard, you are going too fast.) It is better to practice all the building blocks in a variety of combinations than to perfect a few.
In the same vein, some are easier than others. Use these to practice going even faster.
The total repetitions for easy and hard passages will be about the same. The only difference is your final speed and accuracy. (That may change when you graduate from this course and move to Swem’s.)
Blanchard, Factors of Shorthand Speed.
Vary daily plans, 5-day plan of theory, transcription, phrasing, sustained speed (concentration), and forcing speed.
When you teach, teach instead of test.
Increase the Student’s power of concentration. Mistakes made during the 4th and 5th minutes are due to concentration, not shorthand knowledge. “Give the maximum number possible of 5-minute takes.”
Liberally preview material until 140wpm is reached. Use new matter for testing only. When you dictate new matter to students who cannot write more than 140 words a minute, you are testing, not teaching.
Only 3 dictations of previewed material, so the final is 20wpm above the initial. More will be necessary if material is not previewed.
| Cricket | Swem |
|---|---|
| Squeeze in what you can. Several shorter sessions works better than infrequent long sessions. | 7 x 1-hour sessions per week; double up some days to create a rest day each week; never more than 2 days without practice. |
| 10 minutes per hour read your old writing. | Not done. |
| 15 minutes per hour (re)read theory. | 15 minutes per hour (re)read theory |
| 1 minute passage, as many as will fit in the session. Increase duration when reach 80wpm. | 5 minute passage, 1 in each each hour-long session. |
| Preview appropriate to stage. Final stage is with no preview. | No preview. |
| Read, correct, and practice problem areas for all attempts. | Read and correct first attempts only. Practice problem areas after all attempts. |
| Start passage at a speed you can usually reach 95% accuracy. | Start passage at a speed at which you must exert yourself. Swem does not specify an accuracy. |
| Not applicable. | Slow to practically perfect. |
| Increase until above target speed. | Increase until reach starting speed, which will be much better than the first attempt. |
| Decrease to target speed for final attempt. | You will probably be able to take it even above the speed of the first attempt, and by now the hour will probably be up. |
| Finish every session, no matter how short, with penmanship practice. Alternate methods between sessions. | Finish every session (sessions are an hour) with 5 minutes penmanship practice tracing textbook with dry pen. |
| 1 session in 4, experiment with other speeds. | For 2x30-minute sessions/week, start dictation at highest readable speed, Correct but do not write again. |
When you are confident with the theory, move from Cricket’s Beginner Sequence to Modified Swem’s. Alternate for a few excercises if you worry you moved too soon.
Read the full article for details.
Swem wrote his course for advanced writers, who could write at 80-100wpm for 5 minutes. Make the following adjustments until you reach that stage.
Keep a diary as before. Watch for changes, ruts and plateaus.
Swem uses speed descriptions, but does not give accuracies. I would say:
Again, accuracy is measured by the transcript, not by the shorthand. Your exam speed, should you take one, may be lower, depending on the requirements of the exam.
Instead of doing two extra hours each week, do the following:
For reading, Swem recommends:
I’d simplify that to alternating days.
For writing, Swem recommends using long passages only (remember he thinks you already built endurance):
I’d simplify that to 3 days of fast/slow/build and 1 of readable notes with no repeats.
Continue with 1-minute dictations until you reach 80-100wpm for 1-minute, then build endurance as below.
Alternate days of short/fast and long/slow dictations until your long speed reaches 80wpm. At that point you are ready for Swem’s course with no modifications.
If your textbook has material keyed to each chapter, trust it. Both Cricket’s and Swem’s methods for dictation practice automatically give you more reps and higher speed for easy (short) passages. If you notice in advance that a passage is short, consider raising your key speeds to save repetitions.
Leslie and Blanchard agree that speed will decrease as length increases, but not by how much. They disagree about when to start longer dictations and how to make the shift.
My best attempt to reconcile them is:
Do not work on duration until you are using the modified Swem’s method and your starting speed for 1 minute is 80wpm.
Begin building duration by using Blanchard’s Pyramid (below). Only use it until you are confident you can build a 5-minute passage up to 60wpm.
Alternate days of short and long dictations until your starting speed for 5 minutes is 80wpm and you are using the Swem’s course with no modifications. Then reduce short dictations, but do not abandon them altogether.
After that, use the modified Swem’s method.
If your long-dictation speed lags more than 20wpm below your short-dictation speed, use the pyramid again to prove that you can do the higher speed, then return to Swem’s method.
Occassionally experiment with even longer dictations, to build more endurance.
Leslie and Blanchard agree that speed will decrease as length increases, but not by how much.
| Leslie | Blanchard |
|---|---|
| — | 30s at 100wpm |
| 2-3m at 120wpm | 2m at 90wpm |
| 5m at 100wpm | 5m at 80wpm |
| 10-15m at 60wpm | — |
Beyond that? Advice varies.
Leslie recommends increasing speed on 1- and 2-minute dictations, which will automatically increase speed on longer dictations. He does not say how much to practice longer dictations, implying that we do not need to practice them at all. He believes lack of endurance is actually lack of speed.
Blanchard recommends that, once you build to the longer dictations, you stay with them. He recommends a pyramid method combining short fast takes with slower longer takes on the same material. “Mistakes in the last half are not due to lack of skill, but lack of endurance.”
Swem assumes you can already do 80wpm for 5 minutes, and says nothing about shorter passages.
None of them discuss erratic speeds.
Blanchard’s example assumes students can write at 100wpm for 1 minute, proves to the students they can write for 5 minutes at 60wpm, then increases their speed to 80wpm for 5 minutese.
The math gets a bit wonky if you start at a different speed. This chart assumes you have already read Blanchard’s article, Building Speed by the Pyramid Plan .
| Step | 100wpm Start | 80wpm Start |
|---|---|---|
| Target Speed | 80wpm | 60wpm |
| 1 | Select easy 400 word passage, 5min at final speed | 320 words |
| 2 | Homework. Limited preparation. | Same. |
| 3 | Review homework. | Same. |
| 4 | Dictate at 60wpm for 5min = 300 words. | 40wpm, 200 words. |
| 5 | Check work. | Same. |
| 6 | 4 x 1/2min takes, 100wpm, 200 words | 80wpm, 160 words |
| 7 | Same in single take, 90wpm | 70wpm |
| 8 | Check work. | Same. |
| 9 | Repeat step 6 for 2nd half. | Same. |
| 10 | Repeat step 7 for 2nd half. | Same. |
| 11 | Rest, then entire 400 word take at 80wpm. | 60wpm, 320 words |
| 12 | Check work. | Same. |
The entire procedure, after the homework, should take only 30 minutes.
You have now written a 5-minute passage at 20wpm less than your 1-minute speed. (It was 4 minutes at the faster speed, 5 at slower.)
It appears that Blanchard is ok with a high rate of errors for this passage.
Blanchard is very clear that the pyramid plan is only to be used when the gap between speeds for short and long dictations is too high. Go directly to a 5-minute take the rest of the time.
Take a 5-minute passage, lower your starting and practically perfect speeds by 20-40wpm each, and go for it. You’ll soon learn what those speeds should be, te same way you learned when you started Swem’s method for 1-minute passages.
Use a 2-minute passage, lower your key speeds, and build as usual. Repeat with a 3-minute passage, then 4, then 5.
As above, but use the same passage each time, just adding more to the end.
As above, but add to the beginning, not the end, so you finish with your strongest material.
As above, but repeat the same 1-minute material multiple times without pausing.
Even though Swem does not say to, you should continue to experiment work on shorter and even longer passages, in addition to the recommended 5-minute passages.
Increasing your 1-minute speed will help if the speaker sometimes speaks faster and sometimes pauses. Two dictations with the same average speed can have very different top speeds.
Increasing your endurance will prevent you from running out of steam after 5 minutes, especially if you are running behind. The (Gregg) Expert Shorthand Speed Course recommends 10 minutes dictations to prepare for a 5-minute competition.
Leslie reports on a motion picture study by Klein. Experts took dictation at 220wpm for five minutes. “Good school learners” took dictation at 140wpm. They also answered a questionnaire.
Do not place too much faith in your observations of which outlines are faster or slower. Instead, pay attention to where you fall behind in dictation.
“Of the three experts, Dupraw and Rifkin were better able than Swem to tell with what relative speeds they wrote the combinations. When the total number of instances and occurrences of all the combinations is used, it is seen that Dupraw was right in approximately half the instances; Rifkin, in seven-tenths of the instances; and Swem in but one-fifth of the instances.”
All writers’ pens moved at approximately the same speed while writing. The difference in overall speed was in the time spent not writing. The learners’ pen speed was 333-440wpm, with as little as 31-42% of the time spent actually writing. The experts’ pen speed was 417-447, with 47-53% of the time spent writing.
“The students paused about five times as frequently as the experts in writing the combinations of this study.”
There was no consistency between number vs length of individual pauses between experts, only in the total time paused.
In one 10-second section of the film, Swem, who as stated before, is constantly analyzing his writing processes, paused 11 times, whereas Dupraw, who seldom attempts to analyze his writing habits, paused but 3 times.
Thus the one expert, taking dictation at 220 words a minute, 80 words a minute faster than the dictation of the learner, wrote with a pen speed of only 415 words a minute, compared with the pen speed of 451 words a minute of Learner No. 3, taking dictation at 140 words a minute.”
I hope this advice will help. Let me know how it goes and if you would recommend any changes.
Most of this advice comes from books I read over the years without noting the source.
I did, however, remember to note a few. They are are available on stenophile.com, and also at the links given (most of which are on Stenophile’s DropBox account).
Often a study buddy, penpal, or mentor a few levels above you can make a big difference. Many groups have a quote of the day or week, where you can see and discuss how different writers handle the same passage. Comparing methods and abbreviations from other systems, in moderation, can help you understand yours better.
* Beryl Pratt on YouTube. Berryl teaches Pitman, but the recordings can be used for any system. Beryl is an excellent teacher.
Thanks to: Shorthand Discord V2, especially @vevrik, @stenophile, @richard for ideas and review. Reddit Shorthand, especially u/BerylPratt whose site has excellent advice
cricket
Still very fluid and hard to track.