Handwriting questions

[2007mama]

For those of you who have had handwriting struggles(maybe that's everyone?), I have a question. DS is 5 and we are working through HWOT. At first I really harped on holding the pencil correctly and forming the letters exactly the way they show, but it made him incredibly frustrated. For the lesson, he will make the letters correctly, but later on, I have watched him write and even though the letters look OK, he is writing them a different way. For example, he often starts letters at the bottom (i, N, M, for example). Does it matter which way he writes it? I want him to learn to do it well, but at the same time, if I try to correct him he gets very upset. I have held off on the lesson teaching the number 8, because he makes a nice, legible 8 by making two circles. Should I try to teach the other way? Also, he makes o and 0 backwards...but does it matter?

 

He is a lefty, and I am thinking of getting him a pencil grip (I was watching a thread about this just recently); do pencil grips work ambidextrously?

 

I hope this question makes sense! Thanks for any advice! :)

[misty.warden]

For those of you who have had handwriting struggles(maybe that's everyone?), I have a question. DS is 5 and we are working through HWOT. At first I really harped on holding the pencil correctly and forming the letters exactly the way they show, but it made him incredibly frustrated. For the lesson, he will make the letters correctly, but later on, I have watched him write and even though the letters look OK, he is writing them a different way. For example, he often starts letters at the bottom (i, N, M, for example). Does it matter which way he writes it? I want him to learn to do it well, but at the same time, if I try to correct him he gets very upset. I have held off on the lesson teaching the number 8, because he makes a nice, legible 8 by making two circles. I do my 8 this way most of the time, no one has corrected me so far. :tongue_smilie:SWB makes a big deal about the correct formation of letters and "not being lazy" about your handwriting, but IMO having standardized handwriting is less important than my child not hate writing. I like the approach HWOT has, but I think the font they use is ugly and most of the corner starting ones (K, M, etc) are very oddly shaped.

 

Should I try to teach the other way? Also, he makes o and 0 backwards...but does it matter? It might for cursive, since those letters require a counterclockwise motion for correct connection to other letters, however I have seen people write cursive very strangely (as in not the accepted formation of letters) and it seems to work for them.

 

He is a lefty, and I am thinking of getting him a pencil grip (I was watching a thread about this just recently); do pencil grips work ambidextrously?

 

The ones I use (Stetro bought from Learning World) are ambidextrous but only fit standard size pencils, not the fat preschool ones (which HWOT doesn't use to my knowledge.)

I'd say unless you're doing the "real lesson is following directions exactly no matter the subject" thing, let him develop his own style outside the lessons as long as it's legible.

 

I hope this question makes sense! Thanks for any advice! :)

 

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[momtoamiracle]

I have the same issue. My son, 6, insists on starting many letters on the bottom, despite I'm there telling him, NO NO NO! THE TOP!

 

 

I'm getting to where I don't care. HWOT did not work for us. I sold most of it and gave the rest I had away. I'm going to go with something else. I honestly don't think it matters if it starts at the bottom or top. I think lot of cursive starts at the bottom anyway...

[theYoungerMrsWarde]

Dh is ambidextrous, and has gone back and forth learning on his left and right. He wasn't taught consistently, and got very frustrated when they tried to correct his (almost unreadable) handwriting at the middle school and high school level. Because of this, I make sure ds5.9 writes his letters correctly, about 80% of the time he's doing free writing, and 100% when he's working on school work. I try to be gentle but firm. A pencil grip helps a lot.

[La Texican]

I expect my kid to do it right during the HWOT lesson. I memorized the buzzwords to say how to form the letters. When he is writing something else I don't correct every little thing he does, but I ocassionaly pick one letter to correct and remind him how I would like it done. He mostly does it all correctly out of habit now. I guess I'm saying I want him to form the letters correctly out of habit and to write freely out of practice so I just make small corrections and not every time. I do the same with his reading. Sometimes I make a big deal if he's skipping lines and remind him to use his finger and sometimes I let it go.

[alisoncooks]

I have the same issue. My son, 6, insists on starting many letters on the bottom, despite I'm there telling him, NO NO NO! THE TOP!

 

Same here, for my 6.5 yr. old girl. And writing her "o" letters clockwise AND from the bottom, instead of the "proper" counter-clockwise.... And writing many other letters backwards. *sigh*

[Tracy]

What I didn't understand when I started handwriting with my oldest is just how difficult it is for a kid to concentrate on pencil grip and letter formation at the same time. Have him learn letter formation first by using his fingers. Start with finger tracing and then move to writing in the air then in a medium, such as sand, salt, finger paints, etc. Once he is very comfortable with letter formation, you can give him a pencil and work on grip, and even proper paper orientation and posture.

[Tidbits of Learning]

For those of you who have had handwriting struggles(maybe that's everyone?), I have a question. DS is 5 and we are working through HWOT. At first I really harped on holding the pencil correctly and forming the letters exactly the way they show, but it made him incredibly frustrated. For the lesson, he will make the letters correctly, but later on, I have watched him write and even though the letters look OK, he is writing them a different way. For example, he often starts letters at the bottom (i, N, M, for example). Does it matter which way he writes it? I want him to learn to do it well, but at the same time, if I try to correct him he gets very upset. I have held off on the lesson teaching the number 8, because he makes a nice, legible 8 by making two circles. Should I try to teach the other way? Also, he makes o and 0 backwards...but does it matter?

 

He is a lefty, and I am thinking of getting him a pencil grip (I was watching a thread about this just recently); do pencil grips work ambidextrously?

 

I hope this question makes sense! Thanks for any advice! :)

 

I haven't read through replies, but for lefties you want to make sure they aren't hooking their wrists. I would correct starting at the bottom b/c it slows down writing. As for writing the o and O backwards, lefties normally pull the pencil towards themselves so I think that is totally normal. They will cross their t and f and such by pulling the line right to left. I wouldn't stress numbers if they look alright.

Sing the Where Do You Start your Letters? At the top! song and practice with air writing and such. Do you have the teacher's guide? It gives a lot of guidance that isn't all on paper for multi-sensory learning of letter formation.

I firmly believe in using FAT pencils at this age. It really helps with grip. We then move to the Laddie pencils before we move to skinny pencils. When I was a kid, we used FAT pencils through 1st grade and beginning 2nd grade moved to a laddie pencil and then a skinny pencil while learning cursive...it worked back then...so I stick with it now.

Edited November 9, 2012 by OpenMinded

[boscopup]

I think you need to slow down and do some more large motor writing (sky writing, finger writing in salt/sand/shaving-cream, etc). Your son actually sounds like mine when he was 5, and he is right handed (my lefty is the baby, and he seems to be figuring out proper writing on his own without problem :tongue_smilie:). I had to remediate my oldest when I pulled him out of school at age 6.5. Writing was hard for him the way he was forming the letters. I went back to the beginning and taught him to make his letters properly. The problem for him was that no one had made him do it right in school. The teacher had 16 other kids. She couldn't watch every stroke of my son's letters. She taught it properly, but he just didn't follow through.

 

It took a lot of time and patience, but he now writes correctly, and it's a LOT easier for him.

[Tracy]

For example, he often starts letters at the bottom (i, N, M, for example).

 

I just want to mention that if you teach cursive with a font that starts on the baseline, then every letter starts in the same place. There is no memorization, no fancy ways to remember where to start. Everything just starts at the bottom. I am so glad that I learned about this in time to teach it to my younger child, because he is really struggling with writing (where my first did not struggle at all), and cursive minimizes the struggle.

[La Texican]

I also broke all of the pencils in half for a long time. I think they sell little golf pencils at HWT. The shorter (broken) pencils did help. We didn't do the air, sand, or shaving cream tracing, but we did separate the letter formation from the pencil control. We did lots of dot to dots and how to draw lessons.

[2007mama]

Thank you all for the replies! I think from what I'm hearing here, I will try to correct him gently. He just told me handwriting is his least favorite subject, so like the first reply said, I don't want to crush the desire to write out of him. I'm not super worried though; as much as he complains about it, he goes through a small forest's worth of paper, writing stories, mail, coupons, etc. :) And I like the HWOT method, because when I see him forming a letter strangely (like today it was a d, started at the top and looped around like a backwards 6), and I can just say, "don't forget, d is a magic c letter!" And he knows what it means and can do it correctly. He can actually make letters that look pretty good...it's just the process that needs work. We do have some little pencils but he still holds them in this crazy grip, pinched between thumb and middle finger with the pointer halfway up the pencil. So I ordered some grips and I hope that will help, and in the meantime maybe I will just make some worksheets from the HWOT page to focus on a few letters at a time. If I feel really crazy I may try the shaving cream letters someday. :) We are renting though, and my husband said NO SAND in the house. Writing on the iPad is usually about as messy as we get, poor kids!

[Tanikit]

I expect my DD to form her letters correctly - if she is writing by herself then obviously I am not there to correct it, but it seems to have become a habit now. I would correct the o formation because it is hard to continue writing if you do it backwards - the reason for letter formation being the way it is is to make handwriting faster and more fluent which also helps with neatness and legibility.

 

As for pencil grip I have only recently noticed that my DD is not holding her pencil correctly - while her grip appears ok she is putting too much pressure on her wrist and pressing too hard on the paper so we will step back and fix this. I know people whose pencil grip was not correct and no one corrected it and it means that they even as adults cannot write for long and get problems in their wrists so it is important. My own pencil grip is not what is taught but it works as there are no areas of pressure anywhere and I can write neatly for a very long time.

[JDoe]

do pencil grips work ambidextrously?

 

This does:

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001SN8HP8/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i03