penmenship

[chaknine]

Is penmenship kind of like art, either you have it or you don't? B has always had terrible handwriting. Cursive is not looking so hot either!! Better than the print, but the teacher says she needs to work on it. She also is left handed. Does this make a difference? I did notice when I went to help the teacher that some of the children had beautiful cursive writing already. (3rd grade)!! Her print improved some when we added stimulants!

[sportsmom]

This is what I say to penmanship and printing YUK! LOL My son is in 7th grade and still is having a hard time writing in penmanship---when he prints he writes big. But this is something I want to work on with him this year (wish me luck something else to work on this school year LOL)

[Mayleng]

My older son had horrible cursive as well, so I did the Handwriting without tears Cursive writing with him and it has improved tremendously. I am working with my younger ADDer (going into 3rd grade) now on and it is a great program and not expensive.

go to: hwtears.com/ch.htm my son's school OT also says it is a good program.

Teaches the right and easy way to do cursive.

[chaknine]

Mayleng do you buy the teacher/ parents guide also? I think I am going to buy this! Thanks!

[Mayleng]

chaknine said:

Mayleng do you buy the teacher/ parents guide also? I think I am going to buy this! Thanks!

I did buy the teacher guide but it is not really necessary. I did buy their paper also, because it is the same format as the book, so I can give extra writing practice to my son and he writes on those papers as well as the book.

[chaknine]

I ordered it! I will let you know how it goes!

[Dakotah]

You will love it! I use it with my son and he has finally started printing! Before HWT he couldn't do any writing. It is such a simple way of teaching a child how to write. Best of all it is made up of VERY SHORT lessons. We only do five or ten minute "lessons" maybe five times a week. It isn't adding another thing to your plate- if you get what I mean! Good luck!

[swmom]

To me, handwriting is a fascinating topic. I can tell if my child is having a crummy day by the look of her handwriting. It'll be messy, missing parts, below the line, awful. If she's feeling good and confident, her handwriting will be perfect. Before she started meds, her handwriting was the pits. After meds, she seemed to suddenly be able to do it. It was literally amazing.

RE: concerns about handwriting struggles. I used to worry about my daughter's inconsistent handwriting, i.e. neat, messy, neat, messy. But then, I realized that for her generation, eventually they're not going to be doing much handwriting. Keyboarding will be what matters, eh? We've started to focus our attention
on using those keys correctly, if you know what I mean.

[chaknine]

Good point about the keyboarding!! I still would like to see her cursive improve some, but your right it is not the end of the world. I also think it is a clue that her meds are not working like they should for her, we have the issue of it being worse if she is not able to focus, it never was great but it seems to be worse. Maybe it is just getting back in the swing of things.

[eaccae]

DS (going into 4th) has dysgraphia. We tried the Handwriting Without Tears program a couple of years ago but it didn't work out. I broke it out again this summer and it went over quite well (I think that maybe there was just so much going on when I first introduced it). Anyway - just from using it the books (we are using both the printing and the cursive) - his penmanship has improved. It is still not great but it is actually legible! I had a meeting with the school and his teacher last week before the start of school and they have agreed to let him use the regular Handwriting Without Tears paper for "Writer's Workshop" and other things. And he will be using it for homework as well. I think the paper alone is helpful!!! They have been using D'Nealian at school which is AWFUL and if someone has dysgraphia - it can make it even worse! The principal at this point agrees that it doesn't matter what he is learning as long as it is legible. Just remember - even if she practices 5 minutes a day with it - she will still improve - I think they key is not to force them to do too much - DS (who HATES practicing handwriting) doesn't mind at all with this program. We started off slowly and now he can do a lot at one time.

I hope you will both like it! Good luck!

(I do think that practicing keyboarding is good as well). If your dd does have dysgraphia - in the later grades she may be able to type a lot of her work! And as swmom said - they will be doing a lot of typing anyway - good to get started now - Learn to Type 3 Home version is a great typing program)

[Mayleng]

eaccae, my older non ld son learnt D'Nealian too, and that was when trouble started for him. His handwriting was horrible until I made him do HWT cursive 2 summers ago.

My younger ADDer is doing great on his cursive. We do one letter a day, and his writing is really coming along. Joining all the letters to make words is coming easy for him now. I love their paper.

Oh, a good typing program for kids to keep their interest too is "Read, Write & Type" by the Learning Company. It is fun and not too expensive. My kids are doing it now too.

[chaknine]

I hope we have as good luck with the the program!! The typing program sounds good too, maybe we will do that next summer!!
shelli

[Brenda]

Steph is also a leftie.She smears pencil all over the paper and gets it on her hands.Her handwriting was terrible last year but it's better now.I have been working with her and just figured out she was turning her paper wrong.She still has a hard time not writing the same size and not in the lines but she is only in 1st grade.

The thing that i'm concerned about is worksheets.She starts in the middle of the page and jumps around from right to left.I told her to start on question #1 and then 2,3,4.She always skips around and then I have to show her the ones she missed.

I saw on a site where you could order a writing mat for lefthanded kids and it shows them how to hold their paper and pen and how to write the letters.I don't know if it would work.Here is the site.It's at the bottom of the page.https://shop.anythingleft-handed.co.uk/acatalog/Lefthanded_Shop_Left_handed_pens_46.html

[Mayleng]

My son, jumps all over the place answering questions too. I told him also to start at 1 and work his work sequentially to the last one, but he said it is boring. So he misses questions all the time. Drives me nuts. I wonder if it is an ADD thing.

[willoweezie]

This is a bit off topic, but Sage likes to read books aloud backwards Brenda, what you said about jumping around the page is what made me think about it. She will read the words on the pages from left to right, and (usually) wants me to read to her from front to back, but I've been curious why she would want to do this Maybe it's because they are familiar books and she just wants to liven things up? Dunno

Her handwriting is a good indicator to me of her mood/attention etc. as well. I think i mentioned in another post that she wrote the most beautiful alphabet, both caps and lowercase last week jsut because she felt like it. Other times, such as homework time she seems almost deliberately messy (protest, maybe?) She also has somewhat mild disgraphia, but we're working on the fine motor skills and seeing some progress with the OT.

[Dakotah]

This is a bit off topic too Since you are talking about OT and penmenship... If any of you are struggling with getting your child to hold their pencil right- break a crayon in half. Actually a little shorter than in half. It really works.

[sierra]

Is penmanship like art. That's an interesting question!

Both my sprouts can't do much better than chicken scratch when it comes to writing. One of them's a passing fair artist, the other can't draw a stick figure.

My own penmanship is pretty poor too. As for DH, I'd rather try to read heiroglyphics. He can't even make numbers readable on checks.

I went through a calligraphy kick back when I was a teen. That improved my handwriting when I cared to take the effort. Something about the stylus instead of a ballpoint pen or pencil. I got my sprouts calligraphy sets for Christmas last year. Thought it might help. They weren't interested in learning. Computers are just more fun than the fanciest pen sets.

[angel]

I so totally think that handwriting and skipping around is an ad thing!!! Morgan's handwriting is completely dependent on her meds. You can look at a paper and tell what time of day that it was written!!!! It is also a big indicator for me to judge how a med is working.

Just thought I would throw that in there. lol

Willow, good to see you. How is it going?

angel

[eaccae]

For adhders - penmanship does - to a point - have a lot to do with the focusing and the good/bad days. Penmanship is one of those weird things that is hard to figure out with adhd. For us - we always assumed DS's poor penmanship had to do with his adhd - but it really had to do with his dysgraphia. DH (ADHD) has dysgraphia as well - he is 36 but you can barely read his writing - it hurts for him to write to this day! But can he draw!! He went to college for Fine Arts. Something neurologically affects the handwriting but doesn't have an impact on his drawing abilities. Now with me - ADD (no H) - I have beautiful handwriting - I can print and write cursive with both hands easily - but don't ask me to draw anything!!

Okay - off topic again!! As for the jumping - I jump around a lot too. I actually read every magazine from the back to the front. I read a lot of books - but it is always hard for me to start from the front - I have a natural inclination to start from the back. ? When I write notes - I tend to be all over the page as well. But it makes complete sense to me. And I tie laces and bows backwards. It doesn't seem backwards to me but every single person I have ever met makes a big deal out of it. I do have some kind of processing thing that was diagnosed soooooooooo long ago when I was just a little girl - I don't remember what it was - "they" didn't do anything about it and it never affected me educationally - it didn't really cause any problems for me - but when I speak aloud - I apparently arrange my words in a way that makes complete grammatical sense but it comes out "backwards". I have learned to compensate for it and no one notices it that "knows" me - mostly people I haven't met will notice it. (i.e., instead of saying, "Let's go to the game"- I will say, "To the game let's go" - although in my head I say "Let's go to the game"). (It can get more complex when the sentence gets more complex - it's hard to explain because I don't necessarily hear myself doing it). But it doesn't affect my writing - it's verbal.