Handwriting practice game - that actually practices writing neatly/slowly?

[drspouse]

DS has awful handwriting (and poor motor skills generally).
School seem to mainly practice strength/other motor skills/threading and leave him to form his unreadable letters that he's stuck in the habit of (they all have about 10 tails on them too because school insist on cursive ). I've been reading around the subject and it seems like this won't really help (and he has a very strong grip thank you very much!)

He probably has dyspraxia (trying to work out how to get a diagnosis or if there's any point) and he also has ADHD so everything has to be highly motivated and very very short.

We're using handwriting books that have letter families (curly caterpillars etc.) and also the Write from the Start books to practice the shapes but I'm after something a bit more... fun... and a bit less schooly

E.g. is there anything on a tablet with a stylus or anything where you move a pen over a wooden surface or something like that? Where you get feedback if you do it right or not?

We find that some of the phonics games (e.g. Hairy letters) that have writing with a finger are a bit random in what they accept as correct (he can do a lovely letter and it beeps at you or a really dreadful one and it accepts it). And he's reading OK so is a bit beyond those at the moment.

He does like writing on our blackboard at home but won't accept any correction on that either so he just practices his spiders instead of actual letters and of course now he is convinced that is how the letters are supposed to go.

I don’t really have suggestions for games that reward slow/correct letters but I’ve done a lot of work with ds on writing so thought I’d share some suggestions that might/not be useful.

Shoulder stability was a big factor for us as fine motor skills are effected by this so we did lots of activities to build shoulder strength like
Pulling ropes/ climbing frames/ monkey bars/ wheelbarrow (using one and pretending to be one)/ catching and throwing/ crawling through tunnels and under chairs/ painting walls with a sweeping brush and water/ washing windows and my car.

He had a strong grip too but leaned very hard so we did activities that gave strong sensory feedback before attempting writing to wake up his hands so he didn’t need as much feedback from the pencil

Theraputty/ modeling clay/ fondant modeling/ squeezing water out of a small towel/ tug of war/ pulling beads apart (can’t remember what they’re called)

Sometimes we’d practice super soft writing with tissue paper in a frame (small idea deep frame) and try and not let the pencil go through the paper.

For letter formation practice I came away from pencil and paper completely and used other materials like

Pastry, play dough, spray foam (smear it and write in it), sand etc. I kept corrections to a minimum. We might do two “j”s and I’d ask him which one was the best one.

For homework I made sure he had his feet flat on a firm surface (a box as he didn’t reach the floor), was sitting up straight and had his freehand on the page for stability.

I don’t know if there’s a anything helpful in all that,

I have read up quite a bit about this and they are doing all that at school anyway. The evidence is that only practicing the actual skill you want to develop is going to improve it, there is very little strength needed to write.
So he needs to practice actual writing.

Our school uses the jolly phonics app which I understand has this activity. I haven't downloaded it as DD is doing ok without, but other parents have said it's brilliant. Uses different groups; rainbow, shooting stars etc but theory is the same.

Following for help as my ds needs help with his handwriting. Dyspraxia has been raised by the school and if he doesn’t have add/adhd I’d be surprised. No diagnosis here either though.

@toomuchfaster that sounds helpful.
I've just read something that says it's helpful to remind them of the moves as they write (up and then down a bit then over the top etc). I kind of do that anyway but I think we need an app developer to make a proper app!

Apologies for the random post; dd2 is struggling with her handwriting & I'm placemarking so this shows up on my TIO :)

Following. DD struggles with writing. Ido think that the insistence on cursive these days is a bit like trying to run before you can walk for some children - I much prefer the way we learnt.

Nelson's handwriting practice books and tracing paper. 5 minutes a day, no longer. Old school.

I like the way DD is being taught. The school explained they start with cursive straight away as it means the children only learn how to write once. Before they did this, the children learnt to form letters in their own way in reception, then had to relearn cursive in Y1. The teacher explained children have to learn cursive, joined up writing as it means spelling and imaginative writing is easier as they don't think about how they are writing, just what they are writing. Printing each letter separately stops the flow of the thought process. I don't know what evidence there is to support this, but it makes sense as she described it!

@drspouse realised that is not what the app is called. Will find the letter and a link for you.

I agree that for the majority of children cursive straight away is fine but for kids who struggle, 'interrupting the thought process' is exactly what they need - a little break between each letter. Just my opinion of course.

DS has no hope of even getting one cursive letter right let alone a thought process, it's a disaster for him.
Tavannah We do practice but it's "homework" so it's a struggle to get even 5 mins.

Could he write to someone?

That way it's more fun than just endlessly copying letters, but he has to make it legible so they can read it.

He could write to Granny/a cousin/a relative he likes.

He could write an invitation to a friend to come a playdate/picnic/party.

He could write to a sportsperson/TV character he likes, and if no reply comes you can write one back to him to keep him motivated.

You can tell him that in order to get tickets for cinema/theatre/sports event he needs to write a letter requesting them.

Tell him he can write a treat for himself on the shopping list, but you'll need to be able to read it in order to get it for him.

Could he write to someone?
He's happy to do this but his letters are still completely unrecognisable, written as quickly as possible, and he won't accept any instruction or suggestions. He can write about 3 words (he managed to write "thank you" and his name on his birthday thank you letters and draw a picture, and then to fill in the friend's name, but I had to write the friend's name again and I am sure they only worked out it said "thank you" and his name because they knew it was a thank you letter and they knew who it was from.

So he's just reinforcing his existing wrong letter formation.
He also writes on the shopping list and we do use it as phonics practice but I would never be able to read it; if I asked him to practice correct letter formation in order for me to be able to read it he would just have a tantrum.
He couldn't write enough sustained writing for any of the rest of those suggestions (his limit is about 3 short words).

What about if he traced them?

Tracing the word 'chocolate' in order to get chocolate must be more motivating than just copying a load of C's for ages.

He could also write all the letter ideas with just three words to start with.

'Hi Granny' 'Sam' on the back of a postcard.

'Mary Poppins Please' to Vue for his cinema tickets.

'I like Ryder' to Paw Patrol.

He also doesn't have to write it in one go. He could just list off all the things he's done to Granny. So he could write three words a day 'I did football' or 'Monday - football'.

What if you let him experience the consequences of his writing being illegible? Rather than telling him 'I can't read that' maybe let him write a letter and Vue can write back and say 'Thanks for your letter Sam, but we couldn't read which film you wanted to see, could you write it again?'

He does trace them but again tries to be as fast as possible, he thinks it's all colouring in so goes over them again and again. Once he's finished tracing a letter, we ask him to try writing it independently and he goes back to the spider format.

I don't think he'd even remember having written to Granny if she wrote back and said she couldn't read it (he didn't really remember having written his thank you notes when it came time to hand them out 2 days later). He certainly couldn't remember what he'd tried to write (he doesn't remember what he's tried to write, the second he's finished writing it, with it right in front of him).

(This is why I want a game where he has to get the movements right or it won't reward him, and why I want it to be a game, so it's not me telling him).

How old is he? It sounds like the legibility of his handwriting is really the least of his issues. Maybe leave it a while and come back to it when he has more intrinsic motivation?

Sorry, I don't know of any stylus based games. I think you're very unlikely to find one that excatly recreates the experience of pencil on paper. As you said, he needs to practise the skill as is, and not related skills. Pencil on paper.

He's 7 - and the more he practices the wrong patterns, the worse it will get. If he can practice the right pattern, that should help.

At the moment, we need to work on behaviour, yes, but unless we stop him from writing "wrong" this will just get worse. We've made quite a bit of progress in reading, maths is slow but getting there, and we're making a start on his social skills. So, apart from behaviour, writing is the big one.

I very much doubt he will be coming up with any intrinsic motivation in the next few years!

It sounds really hard.

What about dot to dot? Would he be interested in that?

I honestly don't think if he has no motivation to write properly, doesn't remember what he has written and will have a tantrum when corrected that there is going to be a game that will solve it.

I think pp suggestion of writing in sand/foam/soap is a good one and no less 'the skill he needs to practise' than writing with a stylus on a tablet.

At my child’s school they do a lot of pattern drawing (can’t remember what it’s called) such zigzags, cursive eeeeee, cursive cccccc, different shapes all repeated in different configurations which I believe is all to help with handwriting.... when it’s done in different pencil colours it looks gorgeous and encourages them to take pride in their work.

He does really like dot to dot and we have some success in getting him to do that carefully. I wonder if I can find some letter formation dot to dot also?
I think I missed the foam/soap suggestion and that might help actually. He is reluctant to try tracing with a finger on the page (probably because he wants to get his writing over with AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE so wants to get straight to the pencil part) so may be more willing to give it a go.

Airy that does sound good; the Write from the Start book is similar but it is not nearly as pretty, hmm, I wonder what I'd Google to find something like that?

It’s an “old school” approach like Tavvanach suggests, but a friend who is an OT recommends the resources that Warwickshire NHS have developed for schools, which are available as free downloads on their website.

That looks really interesting - glancing at the "which programme" he's at level 1 on some things but needs level 5 on others - I very much doubt he'd "pass" level 1 if we did it all, the problem being that school are not going to wait for him to be able to sit in a chair properly, before expecting him to write, and he's not going to wait either!

(ooh and interesting - tracing doesn't help - bother!)

I'm sorry, but I can't find the info on the app we are pointed to. Have asked on group chat.