Russian handwriting is quite florid and can be difficult to write, let alone read. As you may have noticed from studying the alphabet, several letters change their form quite significantly. It is not necessarily important to be able to write and read Russian handwriting, but it is advisable to practice it occasionally. However if you are planning on taking any tests for Russian proficiency such as the TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language), you will need to learn Russian handwriting since there are written sections on these tests. If you don't care about writing in Russian cursive, you can simply use normal block letters or italic letters.
Notes on Russian handwriting
1. The letters л, м, я must have an initial downstroke before being joined to the letter that preceeds it. Notice these downstrokes in the Russian word земля (earth) below.
земля
2. Notice that for the letter ш, the last stroke of the letter ends at the bottom where as in the English 'w', the last stroke of the cursive letter ends at the top. As an example, the Russian word машина (car) is shown below.
машина
3. Make sure your small form of г looks different that the small form of ч.
Below is a description of how to handwrite each Russian letter. The numbers on each diagram indicate the order of the strokes and the general direction of where they start.
