Journalists – Teeline Shorthand – – in the UK – VIDEO.

In the UK, Teeline Shorthand is now more commonly taught and used.  Teeline is the recommended system of the National Council for the Training of Journalists.  In the UK, journalists learn shorthand.

Previous post:
Next post:
13 comments Add yours
  1. I didn't catch the length of the course. Yes, that is impressive.

    The positive attitude of "You can do this!" and encouragement to put in the necessary work were the points that I particularly noticed.

    I have heard teachers of skill subjects begin with "this is difficult." A lot of their students seem to give up hope before they've even tried.

  2. When I started watching the video, I didn't get what was the big deal about writing 100 wpm, but then I realized the length of the course, and my jaw dropped!

  3. Another question or two (of course).

    Does anyone else remember the SpeedWriting advertisement which was something alone the line of "16 weeks to 115 wpm"? If that's the case, for one less week, you get 15 more wpm, right?

    Did the video ever say how long these students spend learning shorthand in class each day? Is it 5 days a week for 17 weeks? And how much homework is given each night? If it was intense enough, I wonder if someone could write 100 with Anniversary or, probably better, Simplified in that same time frame.

  4. I tried Teeline ages ago. It's definitely fast to learn. Hill kept the arbitrary rules (or rules that only make sense after several chapters) to a minimum. All the letters are distinct so penmanship isn't an issue (as opposed to that slightly-waved line after a loop that may or may not actually be straight). Orthographic rather than phonetic spelling. Students are encouraged to develop their own outlines on the fly, so less hesitation thinking of the correct outline, at a possible loss of long-term readability. I'm not sure how many hours per day. I've heard the current Teeline tops at 140wpm, but there are several competing texts.

  5. Here's more info on the program:
    http://newsassociates.co.uk/nctj-course-elements

    20 weeks to do what normally takes a full year at university. 40 hours in class per week, plus homework (other comments say an hour a night for shorthand) 4 subjects a day.

    "You will study the core subjects of the NCTJ curriculum – Reporting, Portfolio, Shorthand, Law, Public Affairs and either Sport or Subbing – and you will have the option of adding another subject to your final certificate."

    The shorthand theory is 6 long hard weeks (so you know it thoroughly), then speedbuilding. Some pass 100wpm half-way through, others require more than the 20 weeks.

  6. Yes, I've seen those advertisements in my collection of old Workbasket magazines. I glanced through the SpeedWriting textbook in the library years ago, but didn't pay it much attention. Any idea how legible it was afterwards? It looked like words were abbreviated pretty drastically.

  7. When the times spent in the course are added in the equation, I don't think that the achieved results are exceptional. From what they advertise, they will be writing at least 100 wpm for 20 weeks, or 800 hours. Out of those 800 hours, the theory is covered in 6 weeks x 40 = 480 hours, so the 320 hours left are for speed building.

    Compared that with GS, one semester theory is 15 weeks average in college. Shorthand classes were 5 credits with a dictation lab, that would be 6.5 hours (five one-hour classes plus a lab of 30 min 3 times a week), or 15 x 6.5 = 97.5 h for theory (round it to 100 h). Adding that to the second semester dictation course, it would be another 100 h, that's 200 hours total. With a speed building course as the third semester, it would be at most 100 hours. So three semesters of Gregg would be approximately 300 hours of instruction, and in theory, you could be writing at 150 wpm at the end of the speed building period. Granted, there is also the own student's study time that it is not counted, but from the looks, something does not add up — even if we add 500 hours of individual study time, Gregg is still the best deal. Am I missing something?

  8. OK, doing the math again, :-). Twenty weeks is 300 h of shorthand (3 hours/day x 5 days/week x 20). Theory covered in 6 weeks, or 90 hours. That is comparable to a semester of GS. So they dedicate 210 hours, the equivalent of two additional semesters of GS in speed building, and still come out a little short from what an equivalent Gregg course would in theory achieve. Nevertheless, I think the course seems to be good, especially since Gregg classes are practically nonexistent! So they have to be commended for that fact alone.

Leave a Reply