Working with your own child is not always easy. This can be because a parent is keen for his or her child to do well and may become anxious or even impatient when progress seems slow.
Sometimes it may appear that the child is being uncooperative on purpose but this is almost always when he or she finds the task difficult or does not understand. Children who succeed at what they are trying to do are nearly always keen to repeat it and show how well they can do it.
Most parents notice the moment when their young child first finds a pencil, pen or crayon and starts to make marks with it, either on a piece of paper or, if you are unlucky, on the wallpaper or the furniture. This simple skill is a very important first step towards the skill of handwriting.
Children vary quite a lot in the age at which they show an interest in making marks on paper. Some children who spend a lot of time watching television or the computer screen may not play actively very much as they are so fascinated by what is going on – on the TV or the computer. Others who enjoy active play where they use their hands may soon become quite adept at using a pencil or crayon earlier and even begin to draw recognisable pictures.
If you or your child enjoys drawing this is also a very good entry point for handwriting as it gives valuable practice in guiding a pencil. If you can draw even quite simple pictures your child will enjoy watching you and perhaps guessing what your picture will be. He or she may even like trying to copy what you are doing.
Parents are sometimes encouraged to teach their children to write at least their first names before they begin school. The most important first step in learning to write is for the child to learn to follow the right ‘movement pathway’ of each letter from the very beginning. This because our writing system precedes left-to-right, correct formation follows this principle and also ensures that the letters begin and end in the right place for moving on to the next letter and, later, for joining. If young children are allowed to form letters ‘their own way’ these habits of incorrect formation easily become established and may be very difficult to correct later.
When little fingers get the habit of forming each letter the right way handwriting becomes much easier. If you are not quite sure how each letter should be written it might be a good idea to ask the school; they are quite likely to have alphabet sheets with the letter formation illustrated.
There are several ways to help a young child to write the letters correctly and one is for the parent or other adult to hold the child’s hand gently and guide it in the right way. At first it might help if the adult has previously written the desired letter lightly in pencil, perhaps with the starting point marked, so that the child then only has to go over the letter following the right path. If the child has a long name, such as Christopher, it may be better to write and practise the shortened version ‘Chris’ to begin with, until you feel that your child is able to tackle the whole name.
A child who can write the letters of the alphabet reasonably recognisably, forming them correctly, has made a good start towards doing well in future written work at school.
Not all children are given a good start with their handwriting. Some may suffer from changes of schools or teachers during the early years. Others may have missed out in some other way. Others still may simply find handwriting especially difficult.
A child who has never crawled in the early years or who finds things like dressing, putting on shoes, tying laces, catching a ball or hopping or jumping hard to do, or who seems a little bit clumsy generally, is likely to find writing more difficult than others. A child who fulfils these criteria might benefit from some sessions with a paediatric occupational therapist. Either the school or your GP could arrange a referral.
When older children have very untidy or illegible writing nothing at all is achieved by critical comments, either written or spoken. Children who have poor handwriting are usually well aware of it but have no idea how they can change it for the better.
The first step to improving handwriting is to look carefully at a page of the child’s normal writing and try to decide exactly what is making it untidy or hard to read. Focus on what is going wrong and practise just that for a while. Do everything you can to help your child succeed and be quick to praise him or her for good efforts.
Problem: The letters are not resting on the baseline.
Try this: Let your child practise the patterns, especially the third and fourth, on lined paper, making sure that the bottom of the pattern touches the base line each time.
Problem: The ascenders (sticks) on letters b, d, h, k, and l for example, are not tall enough.
Try this: Use double-lined (tram-lined) paper if you can get it, otherwise ordinary lined paper. First write out the sentences:
‘The boy had a kite in his hand.’
‘Take this ball home to Dad.’
‘I must not let the dog get out.’
Now ask your child to put a red dot on the top of all the tall letters. Ask your child to copy the sentences for him or herself, making sure that he or she begins each tall letter high enough. Write the sentences several times on following days. Practise the fifth pattern lots of times.
Problem: There are no spaces between the words.
Try this: Write or type out the sentences in the box for your child and ask him or her to draw a pencil line where the spaces between the words should be. Now ask him or her to copy these sentences but leave a space between each word so that it makes sense. Now write the letter ‘o’ in each space. Write them every day until you get them all right first go, putting in the spaces where they need to be.
It is important for your child to understand that ‘sitting’ all the letters on the base line, making the letters with ascenders taller than the other letters and leaving a space between each word are important if writing is to be easily read, so this should happen all the time, not just when writing these sentences.
Make sure that your child has a comfortable seat where he can either rest his feet on the floor or on a small stool or other object and a table at the right height. Encourage him or her to sit upright, squarely facing the writing with both hands on the writing surface, one to write with and the other to steady the paper. A right-hander should rotate the paper slightly to the left and a left-hander rotate it to the right.
Get your child a good pen that he or she finds comfortable to the hand. It can be a good ball-pen, a fibre-tip or anything which functions well and gives a good line. A pen with a fat ‘rubbery’ barrel is often good to grip. If possible buy pens in shops where they allow you to try them out.
There are many enjoyable activities which help young children to develop the strength and dexterity of their fingers which are necessary for holding and controlling a pencil. These could include modelling with dough or plasticene, doing simple jig-saw puzzles, tracing, colouring, threading beads, finger-painting, following dot-to-dot pictures, playing with sand and any other games which involve controlling and manipulating with their hands and fingers.
Children who are not interested in undertaking such activities by themselves will often enjoy them if a parent or perhaps an older brother or sister will join in. Do not worry if your child does not yet hold the pencil quite correctly but encourage him or her to hold it so that the point can be seen and is not covered by the fingers
