[senco-forum] using comic sans

Not quite sure where 'research' came from. 

Amanda had commented that a school felt they got more responses when  they
used Comic Sans.  We switched from Baskerville (I think) to Calibri 11pt and
have had a lot of excellent comments, but it's not just about font and size.
It's about 'white space' on the page.  For example we use Calibri, but at
1.20% line spacing, which makes a tremendous difference.

I doubt that there are any research papers which shows Comic Sans as being
the preferred font for worksheets, since there are many different
combinations of fonts that could be used very satisfactorily

With no commercial interest, if you can get hold of a copy of Office 2007,
or have a look at an installation, one excellent feature is that Microsoft
seem to have done a lot of research and have provided a large number of well
balanced font combinations for their templates.  There are some very
interesting and unusual offerings.

Alex

PS you can always bribe the techies to change the boring default TNR 12 when
they do their installations :)

-----Original Message-----
From: Colston's LSU [mailto:colstonLSU at lwight.eclipse.co.uk] 
Sent: 07 November 2007 18:55
To: aph at misnet.co.uk; 'Amanda'; 'senco-forum'
Subject: RE: [senco-forum] using comic sans

Help!

Today I sent an email to my colleagues suggesting they may like to try comic
sans or Arial for worksheets (almost everyone except the Librarian) uses
Times New Roman 12.

I have received an rather pointed response from a colleague asking me to let
him review the research literature on fonts and why Comic sans is preferred
so:

Can anyone point me in the direction of research papers which show Comic
Sans being the preferred font for worksheets etc?

( And I thought I phrased the email tactfully as a suggestion - obviously
not!)

Thanks for any learned references....
Lindsay

-----Original Message-----
From: senco-forum-bounces at lists.becta.org.uk
[mailto:senco-forum-bounces at lists.becta.org.uk]On Behalf Of Alex
Hammerstein
Sent: 05 November 2007 19:28
To: 'Amanda'; 'senco-forum'
Subject: RE: [senco-forum] using comic sans

Not sure specifically about Comic Sans, but definitely you will get a better
response with a reader friendly font.  We have switched the font in our
distance learning material, and have received a lot of positive comments
about how much better they looked, and our stats showed that since we
changed the students are completing the work in a slightly shorter time.

A

-----Original Message-----
From: senco-forum-bounces at lists.becta.org.uk
[mailto:senco-forum-bounces at lists.becta.org.uk] On Behalf Of Amanda
Sent: 05 November 2007 19:10
To: senco-forum
Subject: [senco-forum] using comic sans

Hello
  I have a vague memory of someone telling me that a school got many more
replies to letters if they used Comic Sans as the font.  Can anyone help me
with this please.

  Amanda
  Secondary SENCO
  Cornwall