Italic handwriting

Truthfully, I'm at a loss to understand why we teach our children to write as we do. Traditional "ball-and-stick" letters are pretty ugly even when well-formed, and I know nobody who is proud of their printing or writing based on this foundation. Yet there must be arguments for it?

Academic arguments aside, there's the fact that my own daughter's writing is simply too messy for words. So I decided to teach her italics this summer—not to mention that I need to learn them for myself. I was surprised at how hard it was to find a good link on the subject on the web, but eventually landed at the ultimate destination, a small website that communicated in few words many things that I wanted to know. I recommend a visit; I cannot excuse my ignorance of the author until now, but can at least encourage you to read his text. http://briem.ismennt.is/