How children learn cursive writing in school and how to help them at home?

[rrbrigi]

We just had our first parent evening where the teacher told me that I should help my son to learn writing at home. I was not surprise at all; I knew he could not write cursive letters. He can write most of the letter without the join in and out line. He cannot write letter in a row, he usually use a whole A4 page to write one or two word on it. But I am not worried I think he needs to develop his fine motor skill before we can go any further. And I do not think I would like to help him to write cursive letters at home before I am sure he has the ability (the fine motor skills). We get home one A4 paper with 3 letters that they thought in the school every week and I admit I have not done these sheets with him. I do not know what to do or I just would like to hear your opinion how you are doing at home? Preferably I would like to wait with handwriting at least until the last term, because I see that his hands are not ready jet, but my son writing at home a lot, sometime he write real words just not join the letter and he does not use lines (1-2 word per page), sometimes he pretend he writes and make lots of curly lines in an A4 paper and give me to read the story for him what he wrote. So he has something what he would like to write down, just his hand is not ready yet.



The other thing is that I do not know what to think or if it is normal. When I went to the parents evening I found out that sometimes they hold my son hands to help him to form the letter. Personally I do not agree with it, because even if he learns to write later but find out how to form the letter by himself give him better and deeper understanding about writing. And the picture what he has in his mind about the cursive letter should come from him and should not be modified by any other person. Of course the teacher can show him how to write that letter (show a picture for him, or write the letter in front of him, and let him to try alone, etc...), but I do not like the idea to hold his hand until he try to form the letter. That is not good for his concentration as well I think.

Shall I mention this to the teacher or just accept this is the method and live with it? Shall I start to help him write cursive letters at home or shall I wait until his hand is ready for the exercise?

Thanks for reading and any advice would be appreciated.