Obviously, there are still times when printing by hand is needed and while I am not a proponent of dropping handwriting all together, I do wonder about the necessity of cursive and extensive daily handwriting practice when typing is not a part of my daughter's curriculum. Is there something about the importance of handwriting I don't know? I am considering giving her typing instruction (using a game program) and having her do less handwriting practice to account for the time used in typing instruction.
She is home schooled and this would all be legal in our state/country - but isn't the prescribed way to go with her school program. The school program we signed on with expects her to practice handwriting 20 minutes a day 5 days/week. I would probably have her do handwriting 2 days/week and typing the other three.
She also does a lot of writing for Language Arts, history and science so it isn't as though she doesn't have ample opportunities to use her handwriting for practice because SOME of these assignments must be turned in to her teacher and then the state and in her handwriting.
EDIT TO ANSWER A FEW QUESTIONS AND CREATE A LITTLE MORE CLARITY based on the wonderful answers and comments I've already received:
She is six, but has the hand span of a seven or eight year old because she is LONG in shape - including her fingers. If she were interested in Basketball, I'm sure she'd handle the ball pretty easily.
She reads at a fifth grade level or higher, but is in a second grade writing course.
She already knows how to print quite well. She has not mastered the skill, but certainly writes as well as some of my former middle-school students did AND can keep up with her grade-level peers when she attends classes in person. It is cursive that is in question - and even then, I still think she needs to learn it, I just question the amount of time spent on practicing it when no time is spent on typing skills of any sort (nor does the school program offer it at ANY point in the curriculum - not even high school).
She/we speak English, she speaks some Spanish and is learning German. We have QWERTY keyboards in our home currently.
She is quite proficient with computers otherwise (although we haven't done anything with spreadsheets or with programming). She has actually helped me trouble shoot once or twice with glitches we've faced with her online classes. She is a little too good at navigating things if you ask me actually. So this really is about typing skills (to avoid the hunt and peck method) not computer literacy.