ICKI Manifesto: For Handwriting and Calligraphy in Education and Throughout Life
Itinerarios de Caligrafía / Kaligrafia Ibilbideak (ICKI) is sharing the “ICKI Manifesto: For Handwriting and Calligraphy in Education and Throughout Life”, which was presented in May 2026 at the Biblioteca de Navarra by Sonia Beroiz, designer and artistic director of the festival, and Glòria Jové from Lleida, a teacher, educator, and researcher in art and education.
The Manifesto places handwriting and calligraphy within a highly relevant contemporary debate: how we learn, how we remember, how we think, and the role the body plays in the construction of knowledge. Rather than proposing a binary choice, it advocates for a balanced use of technology while arguing that handwriting should remain an integral part of basic literacy, arts education, cultural life, and everyday practice at all ages.
ICKI invites us to view calligraphy as a practice of precision, attention, and autonomy. Gesture, stroke direction, rhythm, letter rotation, and the relationship between hand, eye, and thought all contribute to memory formation, the organisation of ideas, and an understanding of writing as a shared cultural code. From this perspective, calligraphy is not limited to the formal beauty of letterforms; it is a tool for developing graphic awareness, creativity, and a more meaningful relationship with time.
The document is organised into ten key areas that provide a framework for educational institutions, cultural organisations, health professionals, artists, designers, families, and the wider community:
- Cognitive development and stimulation
- Hybrid learning
- Cursive writing and movement
- Pause, attention, and critical thinking
- Autonomy in the face of digital dependence
- Interdisciplinarity
- Graphic awareness and the prevention of learning difficulties
- Writing as a cultural code
- Visual, spatial, and creative skills
- Wellbeing and lifelong development
ICKI advocates for the recovery of handwriting as a practice that supports brain health, wellbeing, and human development. Handwriting does not belong solely to childhood or the classroom; it is a skill that should remain active throughout all stages of life.
The Manifesto (written in Spanish) is open for endorsement by individuals and organisations who wish to support this call for handwriting and calligraphy to remain part of the education system and accessible to people of all ages. The endorsement form can be completed via the festival website:
itinerariosdecaligrafia.com.
The Manifesto presented in May 2026 at the Biblioteca de Navarra outlines ten proposals to recover handwriting as a cognitive, cultural, social and well-being practice.
MANIFESTO IN ENGLISH BELOW
ICKI Manifesto: For Handwriting and Calligraphy in Education and Throughout Life
1.
Recognise calligraphy and handwriting as essential tools for cognitive development and stimulation, as they promote greater brain plasticity than typing and activate more than a dozen areas of the brain.
2.
Encourage hybrid learning and working processes that combine handwriting with digital technology, restoring handwriting as a fundamental literacy skill and as the starting point of the learning process, since it supports and enhances learning, memory, and the organisation of ideas.
3.
Reconsider current teaching models in favour of a movement-based cursive handwriting approach, enabling a more natural, fluent, and personal style of writing, with or without letter connections.
4.
Reclaim this intimate act and expression of freedom because it restores our sense of time, pause, and attention, while also strengthening critical thinking, identity, and memory.
5.
Avoid complete dependence on digital technology and energy-dependent systems in order to reduce vulnerability, increase autonomy in the face of potential system failures, and help address inequalities arising from the use and misuse of digital literacy tools.
6.
Approach handwriting and calligraphy through an interdisciplinary lens, acknowledging the diversity of languages and forms of expression. As a cross-disciplinary practice, handwriting concerns society as a whole and has the power to foster connection, collective thinking, and meaningful transformation.
7.
Connect with the past and learn the forms of letters through calligraphy in order to develop graphic awareness—including stroke direction, rotation, number, and sequence—and help prevent learning difficulties.
8.
Recognise learning to write as a key element of education because it enables us to understand and use letters as cultural codes that can be memorised and used to encode information.
9.
Promote the teaching of handwriting as a way of developing visual and spatial skills within any creative practice.
10.
Restore the habit of handwriting as a means of maintaining brain health, supporting wellbeing, and fostering human development throughout every stage of life.
Members / Entities
By endorsing the Manifesto, you are supporting a shared commitment to the value of handwriting and calligraphy. Complete the form below to add your name to this call for handwriting and calligraphy to remain an integral part of education and lifelong learning.
Hey! I'm Maria Montes, a Catalan-Australian multilingual, multicultural designer, calligraphy-and-type educator. My creative practice is set by the principles of never stop learning, sharing knowledge and create emotion through my work.
I have been teaching calligraphy independently since 2014. My favourite way of learning is by teaching others. I offer in-person and online calligraphy courses, corporate in-house workshops, as well as private 1-on-1 tutorials.
