It appears that the Staedler 309 Handwriting pen has been popular with schools for several years. It’s also said that this plastic nibbed pen creates a slight resistance to the paper. The effect being that it reduces the speed at which you write, hence the reason it is often the pen of choice in schools.
The Staedtler 309 has a moulded grip area, a pocket clip indicates the ink colour, they are available in blue or black.
This pen has a fine fibre tip, & does write quite nicely. I tried to test if it did slow down my writing but found this a difficult one to gauge, it is a fair time ago since my school days I no longer recall my earliest writing experiences. In my day to day writing I don’t tend to think about the pen or paper, my mind is usually otherwise engaged thinking about what I am going to say. I did however for the purpose of this review consider how the pen moved & whilst the noise was a small distraction there could have been a slight resistance.
The “Dry Safe” ink apparently means that you can leave the cap off for up to 14 days without it drying out, not sure why you would do this, but I did leave it uncapped overnight & can confirm that it performed as well the next day. Whilst I haven’t experimented with stain removal on this occasion, I did find a report from a teacher. Apparently her primary school class was given the task of testing the Staedtler 309 for a competition, one enthusiastic competitor held a tip against his sweatshirt long enough for a large blue patch to appear. Following a visit to the cloakroom, she was able to remove all traces with the help of washing up liquid.
Another child friendly aspect of these pens are the ventilated caps, the four slits on each side of the cap are designed to reduce the hazard of choking should the cap be swallowed.
All in all a good all rounder no smudge or snails trails left on the page & for me a simple to use no nonsense pen.
Thanks for your comment Fayre. Its interesting to note that students are still learning how to write, let alone use fountain pens! I’ve read lately about schools using computers more & more & “old fashioned” writing is taking a back seat.
I have tried this pen – I teach handwriting (independently, not in school) and it is something I have used whilst trying to stop young writers pushing too hard on the page before moving them onto a fountain pen (which might not take the pressure many young writers use without springing the nib.)
It isn’t my favourite of the bunch from a grip point of view, but the tip and the ink work nicely to help train students on their way to a fountain pen.