Aibu does anyone else have a five year old who writes like this?

[ConkerBonkers]

I am blown away by Charlotte's handwriting, she is only five. Surely this is preternaturally advanced? Link below.

My own DC who is also five cannot write like this, and I thought his writing was great...feeling bad about my homeschool skills!

Please put my mind at rest!

news.sky.com/story/george-charlotte-and-louis-make-cards-for-granny-diana-on-mothers-day-12245781

My own year one DD could write similar, both in neatness and accuracy of spelling - but she’s definitely top end of her class. So when I saw it, I just thought “good on you, Charlotte” I’m always delighted when she shows character. I hope she gives them merry hell as she grows up!

I work in a girls prep school. The y1 teacher just tweeted her classes Mother’s Day poems. Out of 11 kids I’d say 3 or 4 are comparatively as neat as Charlotte’s. Only 3 aren’t joined, and they are all printed legibly.

I suppose it’s possible that the teacher and TA sat and wrote them all and made them look a bit childlike so they looked good. Or, more likely, some year 1 girls with lots of input and small classes can write neatly when they want to!

I wouldn't dream of comparing my child's handwriting with that of a privileged one who has the best education money can buy.

That's obviously not her writing! At 5 😂 Why would anyone think it is?!

@Sunhoop

That's obviously not her writing! At 5 😂 Why would anyone think it is?!

Because my slightly younger girl has the motor skills and motivation to do work of the same quality assuming she wrote a rough copy and had spellings checked.

My DC is fussy about her work being neat, so would very much take the time to get stuff right, we've had tantrums about it not being perfect often enough...

She doesn't do cursive because neither of her schools teach cursive letters, but from motor skills demonstrated by her drawings would absolutely be able to reproduce that style if that was what she had been taught.

There's also the difference between first attempt without an example to copy (some letters are backwards and you get phonically plausible but wrong spellings) and the "best" work or if she is copying spelling words from a tablet (current homework)

As an ex-primary teacher it’s the correct punctuation, including an apostrophe, that I find surprising.
My 5 yr old nearly could copy that neatly, but it no way generate the writing. Tbh she can’t spell her own name!
I’d say I had a few each year, with direct support and copying the words, would manage that.

Not a surprise at our school at all. Some boys write cursive so beautifully (not my DS!) and girls are said to have even better handwriting.

twitter.com/dplpreprep/status/1357045638622564354

I wrote long stories in cursive script aged 4, was a freak child who read at the age of 2 though. I wouldn't say it's average handwriting for a child of that age, but not impossible.

Wow all the jealous ones commenting! Yes it probably is her handwriting. I care for children who went to private schools and the youngest who is 5 writes just as neat as that. It’s not difficult to imagine a 5 year old with expensive education learned early on how to write neatly 🙄

My lovely best friend at school always had lovely handwriting. You could stare at it in wonder. By her own admission though, that's far as it goes. She's got lovely handwriting but is as "thick as mince". (Her words and she isn't really but she's not academic by the standards we're judged on!)

I taught in a school where handwriting was considered important. This would be expected by Y2 with perfect cursive by Y3. Kids whose letters were the wrong size or not joined properly had special catch up lessons. I now teach Y11 who can't write like that! It seems good but not exceptional. I also suspect it was copied.

My dd had very advanced handwriting and reading too. Her writing was like that at 5 1/2 years and when she started school at 4 1/2 they told me her reading was 8 years and 7 months. I taught all of my 3 children to read and write before they started school but my 2 sons were not as good at hand writing as my dd or Princess Charlotte, but all of their reading was very advanced. My dd could also make a 100 piece jigsaw puzzle at around the time she started school at 4 1/2. When my children were young children tended not to have computer games to play so they made jigsaw puzzles, did tracing and dot to dot, colouring, drawing and reading books. I am a teacher but stayed home until they started school, do taught them for about 3 X 15 mins each day.

It's lovely neat writing but it looks similar to some of the children in DDs year 2 class from what I've seen (birthday cards etc). My friends DD is Yr2 and they've taught them cursive from reception and her writing looks very similar to this.

🤦‍♀️ I don't know why I thought she was 7 - so yes it is very neat for 5!!

Yes. She’d be a Y1 and I’ve taught Y1 children who have incredibly neat cursive writing, but I would imagine that the correct punctuation and spelling may well have been achieved by copying the ‘rough draft’ sentences neatly onto the card.

I thought Princess Charlotte was six.

It's very nice and, most importantly, readable! My son wrote like that at that age (he's 31 now and hand writing is barely legible :-).

It doesn't take a private education to have neat writing. She's almost 6. The very best in the year 1 class have writing like that at my school- an ordinary C of E in the North. I'm guessing her mother is very neat in everything and Charlotte is similar. There's a little girl like that in every class. And it will have been drafted out first then written up neatly in her best writing I'm guessing. My own dd could write like that in Y1- she had excellent fine motor skills and could produce accurate drawings at an early age too.

This is my 6yr old's handwriting! (Year 1)

I’m more concerned about the content - not sure why you would get a child to write letters to a Grandparent they never met . I never met 2 of my grandparents - they died when my parents were a little younger than William and Harry were. I would have found it odd to do that and there was plenty about my own childhood that was not ideal

We have a couple children in year 1 that write beautifully. My DS is 17 and can’t write as well as little Charlotte! (He has SEN).

@GNCQ

It's cursive writing.

They don't normally even start teaching that until a child is 8 years old.

It's no way Charlotte's writing.

Not true, my DD is in Y1 and has just started learning cursive at school

I've got 4, all grown up, and I was just saying at the weekend that one of them had amazing handwriting at 5. It was very like hers. His writing isn't like that now, I think A levels and his degree made it a bit more rushed and he's never gone back to lovely handwriting.

My handwriting is terrible, always has been, I got punished for it in school, back in the 50s it was all about punishment. I think it is one of those things that some people are just good at.

I think handwriting isn't as important as it was.

My 19 year olds writing isn't that good!

It's good for 5 but I would expect it to be with her educational background.
I wrote in very neat cursive at 5 as did our eldest, our youngest is heading that way but is only 4 so although neat is still a bit wonky. Some kids are better at different things earlier than others.
My DH is 45 and is nowhere near as good as princess Charlotte but he is a dr, it's often illegible and frankly looks like a drunk spider is crossing the page.