Writing left-handed

[redskyatnight]

DD (Reception) has recently started trying to write sentences. I've been encouraging her to use "finger spaces". But ... DD is left handed and I'd not appreciated until I saw her doing it, how awkward it was for her to put her right finger after the word, before trying to write the next word.

How do left-handers manage this? Do they just "imagine" spaces rather than using actual fingers? Are there are any other left handed writing "problems" that I should be aware of?

(Clueless otherwise right-handed family here)

[mrz]

It's much better for all children to "imagine" the space than put an actual finger there if they can. You can buy plastic finger spaces or make cardboard ones.

Better for a left handed child to sit to the left of a right handed child rather than to the right.
Cross strokes should be produced right to left so the child is pulling the pencil across the paper rather than pushing.

[poppyknot]

DD2 is left-handed and she seemd to use the finger spaces much less than her right-handed sister did before her.

She is on P4 now and one of the problems she is starting to have is when thety write with pens. Her hand goes across the work and smudges it. I had exactly the same problems when I was at school and remember the agony of writing with a cartidge pen (as we did in those long ago days!). We had been told that our writing would be neater and instead I produced an inky mess and a blue face.

I am still quite cack-handed (literally)in my writing technique and so find it difficult to show her a good way to write but having studied other left-handers it looks like having the page at an angle towards the right so that whilst she is writing she does not cover what has gone before.

Maybe have a word with her teacher - or maybe ask lefties that you know.

[TheFallenMadonna]

I still write with a fountain pen, and I push my pen, and I don't smudge. I think I angle the page a bit. Imagine the finger spaces.

[mrz]

I think biros smudge much worse than fountain pens

left
right

[shongololo]

my lefty....

had trouble starting on the right hand side of the page
Wrote backwards
Still, at nearly 8, transposes letters
commas and inverted commas are backwards
ticks are backwards

the key is apparently to get them to angle their paper so that the top is facing right - we righties have the top angled to the left.

There are also letters with cross bars which are better done right to left - so the horizontal on a T or an F or E should be done the opposite way to righties so as not to push, but rather drag the pen.

But l in all, teachers have very little trusk with "lefties need to be taught differently" when it comes to handwriting.