Handwork is something we begin to see less and less. Even in Japan the younger generation of today prefer machines and there is no question that writing Kanji stimulates the brain. The difference with writing, you use your hand to form the letters and connect them, thereby more actively engaging the brain in the process. Typing on the other hand, involves just selecting letters by pressing identical keys.

Recent research illustrates how writing by hand engages the brain in learning. During one study at Indiana University published this year, researchers invited children to man a “spaceship,” actually an MRI machine using a specialized scan called “functional” MRI that spots neural activity in the brain.

The kids were shown letters before and after receiving different letter-learning instruction. In children who had practiced printing by hand, the neural activity was far more enhanced and “adult-like” than in those who had simply looked at letters.

After all writing is a useful cognitive exercise and in the video you see a person hand engraving in an old fashioned way.