I’d always used notebooks for shorthand. Sure they varied in size over the years from the standard reporter’s pad to bound notebooks resembling the types flipped open by police officers at crime scenes. The one thing they all had in common was paper. So when I began to hear fellow shorthand practitioners waxing lyrical about Wacom’s range of tablets, at first I assumed they’d stepped back into the dark ages and had taken to writing on great slabs of stone. Ultra-traditionalists, chalk and slate. The Flinstones. The fools. But, as time went by, it emerged that tablets were no longer made of a naturally occurring aggregate of minerals but high grade plastics and lots of smoothe glassy bits. So this was what they’d been harping on about. Installing the software is simple enough (as are the instructions). The pen, though it felt a little light and a tad chubby, sat correctly in the hand. Setting up the pen to interract with the screen was similarly simple. Then came the sheer thrill of writing shorthand across a 19″ screen rather than a notepad page. Great. A computerised manifestation of Teeline grafitti. But something occured to me. What about Pitman? Because of the importance of stroke ...

Anybody who has ever learned shorthand has, at some stage, experienced the “speed plateau”. It’s not a nice place. No matter what you try, it seems you’re stuck with a certain speed. We blame our hands (they just can’t go faster), we blame our brains (it just can’t go faster) we may even blame shorthand (why did I learn this lousy system in the first place). First things first. Plateaus with shorthand speed are natural. You’ll get them in pretty much any activity you could think of – sprinting, piano playing or ping pong. I believe plateaus are where knowledge and skill consolidate, levelling and steadying the ground for further progress. The key is to use our plateaux as a srpingboard for the leaps forward we are about to make. If we don’t do this, we run the risk of our plateaux becoming a rut. So what’s the plan? Essentially, breaking out of a plateau is a two-fold process – consolidating what you know and pushing yourself onto pastures new similtaneously. Sound difficult? It needn’t be. First, establish your maximum speed – the speed at which you can only just keep up with the speaker, where you only get down a hint of an ...

Imagine the scenario… Your editor gets a letter threatening legal action over an article published some months ago – they are claiming the article is not only defamatory in nature but their client has been repeatedly misquoted. Understandably, your editor is nervous and demands to see your shorthand note of the interview and all notes taken down at the time in relation to the story. It’s a situation no journalist wants to find themselves in, but sadly it happens from time to time and, if you don’t pay attention to the way you organise your notebook, it can be disastrous. shorthandYour notebook (if you can find it amongst that swollen bottom drawer stuffed full of notebooks which have not been taken home or destroyed) is your best line of defence against legal action, and can carry a great deal of weight in court. What follows is a set of simple guidelines that all notebook users should take on board. We’ll start with a golden rule: think of your notebook not as your workbook but as evidence on which a major defamation trial depends. What I mean by this is that you need to think not only about your notebook’s practicalities, but also about the ...

This is surely a first for shorthand on the web – a newsheet web-page rendered entirely in shorthand. Prof Waldir Cury runs the excellent Taquigrafia website in Brazil and is an expert shorthand practitioner. Keen to help his students improve their shorthand skills, he has now taken the plunge and developed an entire web page in shorthand. And he now plans to release a new newspage entirely in shorthand each month! In his note to the MSN Gregg Shorthand group, Prof Cury said: “I invite you to take a look at the new page of my website: a whole page in Shorthand. “Its name: “Shorthand Newspaper”.  Every month a new page will be launched.  The aim: to help the online students to develop their shorthand reading. “I hope you like the idea.  And I also hope that many other shorthand website owners will do the same, so that we can have in a very short time many shorthand pages like that – using different systems. “The system used in the “Shorthand Newspaper” is the Maron System, a Brazilian one.  So, I hope you will like it.” Waldir – for what it is worth I think it is an inspired idea and the only thing quite like it ...

Okay, so they’re not the most fascinating items in the world (for most people), but choosing a good pen can play a vital role in ensuring your shorthand flows smoothly, your note is neat and legible and your wrist doesn’t ache after prolongued use or practice. Moreover, as Shorthand World found in testing some of the following pens, picking the best point can boost your speed by up to seven words a minute. In preparing this article, Shorthand World asked a number of experienced shorthand practitioners for their views and recommendations. Here are the four pens which stood out from the rest. Pilot V5 Extra Fine Needlepoint Rollerball Blue Box of 12 The Pilot V5, is an excellent pen. The ink runs smoothe, feels great in the hand and glides over the page. On our test, this pen improved shorthand speed the most – a staggering 7wpm over the standard disposable ballpoint at 100wpm. A great buy. Bic Velocity Gel Rollerball Pen Comfort Grip Retractable 0.7mm Tip 0.3mm Line Blue Ref 820566 [Pack 12] Again, this is a great pen. The gel ink is smoothe and it feels incredibly comfortable in the hand. Although on our test the improvement on speed was not as ...

A while ago, I was asked by a graphic design student whether there was a special piece of software that translated keyboard-input type into shorthand. Sadly, I don’t think there is. But what got me was the fact she was interested in using shorthand in a graphic design project. Now, I’ve got a passing interest in design and imaging and it got me thinking…and creating. Sticking with my native Teeline, I decided to create a desktop wallpaper – purely for my own fun and use. But I thought I’d share my (fairly miserable) efforts with everybody. What did surprise me was how nice shorthand outlines are to use as a shape as opposed to the more utilitarian purposes I put them through each day in my work. Anyway, enough of all that, here’s my stuff. If anybody is mad enough to want any of these as a wallpaper simply say so in the comments section and I’ll get some linked up to the images below. [caption id="attachment_45" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Teeline Tree"][/caption] [caption id="attachment_46" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="My Desktop Reflected"][/caption] [caption id="attachment_47" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Shorthand Can Be Art"][/caption] [caption id="attachment_48" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Teeline Burned"][/caption] [caption id="attachment_49" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Shorthand Spew "][/caption]

After writing a previous post I got thinking about other shorthand-related videos that might be out there on the WWW. So, I searched for “shorthand” on YouTube and awaited the results. I’m not entirely sure it was such a great idea. One of the top results is a slightly bizarre nine-minute advert for Edison shorthand machines. Basically the plot is this – chaos in the office, Edison machine aquired, everybody happy (and as the ad tells you, it’s not even 5pm!). Then there’s a shorthand class, the camera work is somewhat fuzzy, dictation material is read out and then read back… The clearest videos I came across was a lady reading back her (very neat) notes to camera, and some rather nice note-taking from Portuguese dictation (like the use of the pencil, not sure about the ever increasing shift from the left of the page, over the margin, to the right) and this one with ball-point, again, from Portuguese dictation. In fact there’s another one, from the same uploader, which gives an excellent view of shorthand being taken down – this one is actually really good, the outlines are the right side the hand movement appears exemplary. Then there’s this very short lesson in Alpha ...

Thanks to the contributor who raised the following points and questions: Do reporters really need shorthand in this day and age? An age of hi-tech wizardry and miniature digital recording devices? I understand that its pretty much mandatory to get 100wpm to get a reporting job in the UK - but in the US it's not and you have loads of trainee reporters starting their careers without shorthand. I think they only learn shorthand if they are inclined to do so - and many are not. What do you reckon? Shorthand's days are numbered? My personal view is a little old fashioned - shorthand has survived thousands of years and it's got a few more years left. You're right to point out that the requirements for getting a reporting job in the UK and US are different. You do need shorthand to get a newspaper reporting job in the UK - and for good reason, too. First, an editor has an element of legal leverage if a reporter is accused of making up a quote (which is often levied at reporters when those involved in stories don't like their words printed in black and white). The editor can check his reporter's shorthand note, waive a certificate ...

1. Sleep well the night before - go to bed early and avoid doing any shorthand the evening before. 2. Remember to check AND DOUBLE CHECK your transcriptions before you submit your script. Oh, and write your transcriptions out clearly - many students fail not on their shorthand but on their transcriptions, so make sure the transcription can be read by an examiner! 3. Half an hour before the exam, loosen and relax your hands, fingers and neck with light stretches and joint rotations. During the exam sit with a straight, but forward-slanted back. Despite the urge, don't hunch over with bunched up shoulders - it constricts your breathing and blood flow. 4. Breathe well and try to keep your mind clear of distractions. 5. Once the passage has been read out, read back your shorthand notes before transcribing them. Mark any outlines you are uncertain of. 6. When transcribing, leave those marked shorthand outlines out of your longhand transcription - only try filling in the blanks afterwards, when you can confidently compare your notes with what you think the word might be. Remember, the context of the piece itself might just solve the riddle. 7. Triple check your transcription for any errors which may have ...

Shorthand World readers frequently ask us which are the best books for learning shorthand. There are hundreds of excellent books out there which will help you learn or improve, so choosing from them is no mean feat. But we’ll have a stab at naming our top ten books for Pitman and Teeline. To find out more about any of the books below just hover your cursor over them! Teeline Fast (Teeline) Teeline Revised Edition (Teeline) Teeline Gold: Speed Ladder (Teeline Gold) Teeline Gold: Word List (Teeline Gold) Teeline Gold: Student Pack (Teeline) Shorthand Pitman 2000 (Teach Yourself) Pitman 2000: Shorthand Short Course Pitman New Era Shorthand: Anniversary Edition Pitman 2000: Shorthand First Course (Pitman 2000 Shorthand) Shorthand, Pitman’s: New Era: Facility Drills (Anniversary Edition) But what do you think? What are your top ten books? Why not drop us a line to let us know!