Getting into Gregg again

I am writing this post with the hope of learning what others are doing or have done to revamp their GS skills.

Here’s my story.  I began learning Gregg Shorthand several years ago.  I started right here (the old site).  I went back and forth at first between simplified and anniversary.  After a few attempts to begin and then deciding on a different version, I finally settled on anni.  I went all the way through the functional method manuals and into the functional method dictation manual.  Somewhere along the way, like lesson 22,  I stopped studying.

I still write in GS Anniversary but am very slow.  So what i am doing is starting again by going to the beginning of the FM Dictation manual and moving through it.  I am taking serious the first four lines of review making sure i understand the principles.  I am following this with reading the entire lesson until i can get through it with ease.  Then I am copying the lesson once.  Finally I will take dictation first from part of the lesson and then graded matter. The graded matter will give way to easy business letters.  My goal is to get through the FM Dictation manual and have a speed of over 100 wpm.

If you have or are planning on re-uping your GS study i would love to hear what has worked for you or what your plan is.


Previous post:
Next post:
4 comments Add yours
  1. I think you are doing exactly what it is supposed to be done — taking each lesson of the FM dictation book and doing a thorough review, along with the corresponding principle from the regular manual. I'm not sure how slow you are writing — 60 wpm is the minimum speed after the regular manual. (If a student cannot write at 60 wpm after finishing the basic manual, more that likely the student went too fast through it, not applying the "mastery before speed" rule). Getting to 100 wpm is very doable once you know the principles backwards and forwards.

    1. When i first finished the manual i was up to 80 wpm. That is why i posted. By not keeping up the practice my speed has dropped, though i haven't timed myself lately. As i read the teacher's handbook there is an assumption that students have not practiced since the final class of the beginning course. Yet they plugged on anyway. I think your point is that I grasped the basic principles while i was in the manual which i did and still do. The areas i need to continually brush up on are brief and special forms as well as word endings and beginnings. This is exactly what the FMD book assumes and includes in the first four lines of each lesson.

    2. The 60 wpm standard is the same for Simplified, and I believe it is the same for all series. I have to check with the TMs of the latter series. The reason for that is that since you have many more BFs and phrases in the earlier series, this causes hesitation in the novice writer — the Simplified writer have less of a memory load, so would write the same outline with less hesitation. The difference will come at higher speeds, where writing the slightly longer outlines will have an effect on the overall rate of writing, unless the writer compensates with developing their word carrying ability — remembering what was dictated a few sentences back. However, word carrying ability is not developed overnight — it is something that takes constant practice, so don't expect to be writing at 120 wpm after a year of shorthand! If you write at 100 wpm after a year, that would be very good.

Leave a Reply