Pushing Handwriting?

[Mergath]

My dd is starting her K4 year, and I'm not quite sure what to do about handwriting. She has figured out how to make most letters on her own, and spends a lot of time writing "notes" for people. However, I noticed that she writes quite a few letters incorrectly.

 

I thought this would be a good time to start doing some gentle handwriting practice, but she'll have none of it. My concern is that, with all the writing she does on her own, she's going to have a lot of bad habits that are ingrained and will be very difficult to change later on.

 

Should I really push her to do at least a little handwriting every day, or should I just let it go?

[SonshineLearner]

I'd do handwriting without tears... insist on direction, but not necessarily perfection :) Pretty stickers or whatever for when she chooses to do them correctly. Seriously, it's pretty important to me.... worth bribery :)

[Tracy]

Make it fun. Have her write her letters in different media (shaving cream, pudding, sand, salt, etc.). I have a 4yo that is a bit of a perfectionist and cannot tolerate criticism at all. So I offered him miniature M&M's or mini chocolate chips for each letter that he writes, and that is sufficient to overcome most of his difficulties. I did that for about 6 months, and now he is comfortable enough to do his words on a white board without any treats.

[ItoLina]

My son started doing the same thing right around 4 years old and I got him HWOT. He was not AT ALL into the workbook, but loved all the other components, especially the wet, dry, try thing with the chalk board. So, we just did it that way last year, and this year, in his K year, we are doing the work book along with the other stuff. Most days he does it willingly. When he doesn't want to, I resort to bribery with a chocolate chip.:001_smile:

[skeeterbug]

Absolutely push correct letter formation, but don't expect her to remember how to do it correctly the rest of the time. Insist on it during handwriting instruction but it could be a while before she is consistently doing it correctly all the time.

 

I'm also a fan of HWOT. If you have an ipad they have a new app for the slate. A salt tray is good for practice too.

[Ellie]

I wouldn't push a 4yo.

 

I would, however, help her to develop correct pencil grip, and to learn to draw circle and lines "correctly": circles beginning at 2 on the clock, up to 12, around and down; vertical lines starting at the top and going down. You can have her do this with her finger dipped in chocolate pudding, or Cool Whip. :-)

[ErinE]

I'm a fan of HWOT; both kids (a reluctant writer and a lefty) did really well with it. I recommend a little handwriting every day. When starting out, the child did only a few letters at a time, but done perfectly. Once the kid got to full sentences, I would pick one letter to focus on if I felt the results were sloppy. I'd write three perfect letters, narrating the process. Then, I'd ask for three perfect letters from the child, narrating until the kid insisted he or she could do it perfectly.

[srs]

I decided not to worry about it with my 5yo, figuring that writing can lag behind other skills, and I got HWT thinking it would be for later. Then suddenly she was interested and is working through the book now. However, my daughter was not doing a lot of other writing or coloring. She was just into cutting until very recently, so not too many bad habits had formed.

[Clear Creek]

I wouldn't push a 4yo.

 

I would, however, help her to develop correct pencil grip, and to learn to draw circle and lines "correctly": circles beginning at 2 on the clock, up to 12, around and down; vertical lines starting at the top and going down. You can have her do this with her finger dipped in chocolate pudding, or Cool Whip. :-)

 

:iagree: I gotta say that I'm with Ellie on this one. I only taught the above, not correct letter formation, until the age of six. Both of my daughters have beautiful handwriting now.

[lea_lpz]

I also suggest HWT K.

[Jess4879]

I agree with the pudding idea. You can also put paint/pudding in a ziplock and let her "write" on the bag. We also used a dish of salt and DD wrote letters in the salt. You can start leaving little notes for her too, focusing on the letters you notice she is writing incorrectly. Alphabet letters are great too. You could leave words on the fridge for her and tell her what they say.

 

I wouldn't push her but I wouldn't necessarily leave it either (I'm a big help, aren't I??) If she's wanting to write, she's showing that she's ready, IMO. So I'd just find a learning style that appeals to her and give it a go.

[Tracy]

I agree that you shouldn't push handwriting on a 4yo. But when you have a child that is making up her own ways of writing the letters, she is developing habits that you will need to break later. There are lots of simple, easy, gentle, fun ways to encourage proper letter formation before those bad habits become ingrained. When my ds started to write his own letters just before his 4th birthday, I started making large letters on cardtock paper using lentils that he could trace with his fingers. We did this for just a couple of minutes each day. After a couple of months, he became familiar with how to form most of the letters, and we then started writing them in a salt box. At this point, it was a little more work, so we spent a little more time (maybe 5 minutes) but did it only 3 days per week. Now when he writes on his own, though it is not completely correct, it is certainly much closer to correct. And since he is very sensitive to criticism, I have no doubt that I have saved him many future tears by teaching him early in this very gentle way.

[Mergath]

Thanks for all the great advice, everyone! I think I'll try having her do some of the fun stuff you guys suggested. I know she'd like writing letters in pudding. :tongue_smilie: