Me no write gud: Where can I find a certain paper, and how can I learn to write like a grown-up? (details inside)

For Part 2: Slate had an http://www.slate.com/id/2227680/pagenum/all/this week about a columnist's attempt to improve her own handwriting and help her daughter write like a grownup with the http://www.bfhhandwriting.com/ method- it looked interesting, and the before/after examples suggest it might actually work.

I don't know of anything pre-made, but you could always check for a print-yourself template over at http://www.printablepaper.net. Ah, they have http://www.printablepaper.net/category/penmanship.

I will print out paper with really dark lines, half a space off from my college-ruled, on my printer. Then I slip mine underneath, and they appear faintly through the page to guide my script. Bonus is that you can pull out pieces of the college ruled and give them to people and they'll never know you used a guide. :) Cheap, easy.

Regarding handwriting - if you want to just make your handwriting more readable, the simplest (and fastest) way would be to just switch to printing. You will find it a bit slow at first, but soon you will be up to the same speed. I take notes in lectures/talks in a half-printed, half-cursive way. But if you actually want to improve your handwriting to be more elegant/professional-looking, then the best thing would be to go back to grade school and practice your cursive writing by copying out letters, then words. I've been tutoring an 8 year-old lately, so the shapes are fresh in my mind, but if you've forgotten them, here's a http://www.drawyourworld.com/handstyle.html with instructions for classic cursive (http://www.handwritingforkids.com/handwrite/cursive/animation/uppercase.htm, http://www.handwritingforkids.com/handwrite/cursive/animation/lowercase.htm). It actually works best if you follow the exact stroke orders. After you've mastered cursive, then start thinking about how to make it your own. Perhaps you would like a more angular style - lengthen your letters, narrow the circles. When I first mastered cursive, I thought my handwriting was too girly and childish, so I purposely developed a somewhat choppy cursive for myself by not following through on the connectors after some letters, like Js or fs, and introducing a few printed bits.

I'd really like the college ruled because it always looks funny when I am in a management meeting writing on first grader's training paper. Nobody notices this. I use graph paper in meetings, and the only time anyone notices is when they need to borrow a piece. If you're really picky, you can have pads of paper made quite inexpensively at any real print shop. They'll even print the lines in a very faded blue or gray or whatever you like, at whatever dimensions you like. It's expensive for 2 pads, yes. But get 200 and it's almost no different than buying normal ones at the Office Depot. They last forever, after all.

My favorite, favorite pads of paper are http://www.keenzo.com/showproduct.asp?ID=775745, with graph lines on the back that are dark enough to show faintly through the front -- but that aren't visible when the paper is copied. I started using it in college and now hate to use anything else. It really, really keeps my sometimes-awful handwriting in check, and helps keep my outlines nice and clean as well. it comes in various colors -- I use the white with brown lines -- and sometimes it's hard to find, which is when I make a trip to my campus bookstore and stock up. [The company who makes it also seems to have changed a couple of times, which makes it even harder to find online.]

I can’t find any good examples online, but I remember some notebooks in France that have faint red lines going down the middle, as well as some vertical lines – sort of like a wider celled spreadsheet.

Alllllll kinds of printable papers can be found http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/, penmanship guide paper in the Writing and Note-taking section.

Thank you so much for the awesome ideas! Any thoughts on learning to write like a big boy?