Happy 4th of July! This is my favorite time of year and not just because it's summer vacation! Besides, summer vacation doesn't keep this teacher from stalking Instagram for activities that my first graders would love to do during the school year. No amount of writing about the event will help unless you are able to take a fresh, redemptive perspective on it. This is an advantage that grateful people have—and it is a skill that anyone can learn. Most parents, teachers, occupational therapists, and other experts agreehandwriting difficulty is becoming an increasing problem with our children these days. That’s why today, I want to share with you 13 of the best tips for improving your kids handwriting from occupational therapists.
So, teachers have an increasingly important role as contributors to student happiness. It can be said that a truly happy student is likely to excel in his academic pursuit. A., (1990), Motivation: what teachers need to know, Teachers College Record, Volume 91, Number 3, Spring 1990.
Handwriting Help Teach To Be Happy Birthday Wishes
Do you struggle to read your kid’s handwriting? Does he or she seem to really have a hard time writing letters, copying off the board, or finishing homework because of messy handwriting? Well, Momma, you are not alone.
Most parents, teachers, occupational therapists, and other experts agree…handwriting difficulty is becoming an increasing problem with our children these days. That’s why today, I want to share with you 13 of the best tips for improving your kids handwriting from occupational therapists.
So what exactly is the problem?
Handwriting Help Teach To Be Happy Birthday
Practice makes perfect, right? Why is my kid’s handwriting not improving?
There are many, many factors and skills involved in children being able to write neatly and legibly. Fine motor control, hand strength, visual motor/visual perception, correct grasp, posture, attention, and more, are all factors that can impact a child’s ability to perform handwriting tasks. If a child has not first developed these necessary skills, they will not be able to write legibly.
More information on pre-writing skills can be found here.
Why do kids seem to have more trouble with handwriting now?
There are lots of reasons kids today are struggling with simple coloring and handwriting tasks than ever before. I won’t get into all possible reasons, but let’s talk about a couple of possibilities.
- Technology
- Our children today are growing up with technology all around them, allowing for more “passive” play and entertainment from a very early age. There is more instant gratification, flashing lights, and simple one-touch push buttons…and much less physical manipulation and motor play.
- Sleeping on backs or in carriers as infants
- Because of the SIDS movement “back to sleep,” many babies are spending the majority of their time as infants on their backs or in carriers/seating devices. Babies need to spend time in the prone position (“tummy time”) for proper development. When a baby is on his tummy, he leans to prop up on elbows, then push up with his arms. The prone position increases head/neck extension, upper body strength, body awareness, visual development, hand development, and more.
- Less physical activity or outdoor play
- When kids get physical activity or outdoor play, they strengthen gross motor skills (which refers to the larger muscles in the body). These gross motor skills play a large role in the development of the smaller muscles, or fine motor skills required for handwriting.
This post contains affiliate links, which means I receive a small commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase using this link.
Best Handwriting Tips from Occupational Therapists
Handwriting Help Teach To Be Happy Wishes
Here are 13 of the best handwriting tips for kids from Occupational Therapists:
- To get kids to put their letters on the line, I made mud paper with the bottom line darker, and told them their letters have to be stuck in the mud. You can find it on Therapy Fun Zone here.
- Tonya
- Use of gray space paper from OTSchoolhouse.com.
- Jayson
- Use of different heavy pencil weight with adopted grasp.
- Sumit
- Touch all the lines. Uniform letter size translates to legibility.
- Chaya
- Depends on the age of the child. For young kids, I start off with a 3 inch circle with a color boundary and a broken crayon to color just inside the circle with few mistakes. Then once they have the hand control, we would move on to letter formation or sizing using lined paper. I like to color the lines: green line, blue line, then red line. Green means “start” or “go.” Blue means “middle” for most lower case letters. Red means “stop” or “don’t go below the line” (with exception of the following letters g, j, p, q, y). Also i encourage to use small pencils and no erasers. So they can explain their mistakes.
- Jessica
- To improve pre-writing skills needed for handwriting, make it fun! Adding sounds to the motions makes handwriting fun and will improve success. Horizontal lines go “zoom” like a car, “zip” for vertical lines. Talking through the motions helps kids remember how to create letters and shapes. Circle can go “round and round” or “circle, stop”. Kids learn in different ways and incorporating different approaches into handwriting tasks improves carry over. Use colors or markers, make sounds and talk through the motions and most of all have fun!!
- Brittany
- Start by teaching the skill BIG (vertical surface such as white board, or sidewalk chalk etc).
- Megan
- I play a game with Kindergartners. Short/tall/scuba diver. The kids have to stay seated if I say a lower case letter that sits below the dotted line, stand for the tall letters, and sit and clap for the letters that fall below the writing line. They really get an understanding and an awareness of where the letters should be on the line, they love it! In order for them to write the letters correctly, they need to have some understanding of the position of letters.
- Maureen
- I love making the kiddos hold playdoh in their palm to develop a static tripod grasp.
- Anna
- I always tell the kids, “Think before you write. Slow down and relax your hand.”
- Emily
- If you have a child that is having difficulty with spacing and sizing, you can draw a box for the child to write words in. This will help the child learn to decrease letter size and spacing to fit the box.
- Wendy
- Focus on letter sizing and space between words to improve legibility; triple-lined paper works best when working on letter sizing.
- Suzanne
- I really enjoy using Handwriting Without Tears with the different multi-sensory activities and music. For children with Autism, the TV teacher program seems to be very effective.
- Patti
More Resources to Improve Kids’ Handwriting
So those are 13 great tips to improve your kids’ handwriting, from the people who know handwriting the best…occupational therapists. Here are some other great resources for fine motor skills and handwriting:
- How to Improve Handwriting Skills with Kids from Growing Hands on Kids
- Handwriting from Therapy Street for Kids
- Handwriting for Kids from OT Mom Learning Activities
Handwriting Help Teach To Be Happy Birthday Card
What’s the best handwriting tip you’ve tried? Let me know what has worked for you!