To think no one helped develop our fine motor skills and we all turned out fine?

[Maybeitstime2021]

Just had a post on my FB with activities to do with your child to develop their fine motor skills before starting school in September, why is this a thing? I’m pretty sure we all learned to do our coats up and hold a pencil ok when we were kids without these activities?

I don't know whether pre-school groups for developing fine motor skills are a good thing or not. I think they could be a great way of socialising and if they are fun for the children, then why not?

However, I do tend to agree with the poster who said that certain aspects of parenting have become a little like a profession. This again is fine, as long as they are not mistaken for specialised provision.

My eldest son , for example, really struggles with fine motor skills, and did not learn to tie his shoelaces until he was 16. He was seriously challenged by colouring (in fact, he used to eat the crayons) and, when he got a little older, he would destroy his work because he could not do what the other children could do. He really did need help from a variety of sources, including an OT.

I am really thankful that tablets and computers were around for him, because this meant he could type his work instead of struggling with illegible handwriting and, with some adaptive hardware, he could design fantastic images on the laptop.

So yes, perhaps the groups can be fun and useful, however, if children really struggle with fine motor skills, they will need more personalised and specialised support

I attended a lecture for piano teachers where some examples were described of what children used to do in play to develop their motor skills in general, and which are not commonly part of modern play. These include touching the tip of each finger to the thumb in turn as fast as possible, bending the hand to try to touch the inside of the elbow, crossing fingers (all) with the ones next to each one, playing “Here’s the Church, here’s the steeple” and getting around a room without touching the floor, standing on one leg with eyes closed, skipping, braiding, shoelace tying, buttoning up clothes, crochet and knitting.
These examples were given to explain why a lot of modern piano pupils might need to work on their hand flexibility as most piano teachers wouldn’t have given this loss of dexterity any consideration before, and needed to think about ways of developing it in their pupils.
Thinking back, one of my earliest memories was my Grandma teaching me how to do blanket stitch, running stitch and cross stitch, and my Dad taught me how to tie shoelaces before I went to school. We had plasticine, wool and dolls with tiny clothes and associated small fastenings Etc. I suspect most pre-schoolers these days have far more sophisticated toys (and screens) to occupy them - sadly these don’t all help develop the skills needed for school...

DH has rubbish handwriting (he's 36). He was told it was because he was a boy and he didn't try hard enough. He had to do his exam papers at GCSE and A Level in block capitals so they could be read. I do any formal written stuff for him now (his job requires hand written letters occasionally, in fountain pen on unlined paper...)

DD has terrible handwriting. She is 10. She is given lots of opportunity to practice, was given a pen when it was realised her handwriting was better in pen than pencil. They are looking for a reason for it and its never been presumed to be laziness or carelessness. Her hands aren't strong enough. Incidentally, she can sew, tie knots and other fine motor skills.

The knowledge of problems is better now. Its not presumed all children are the same.

The issue of us expecting less of our children is completely different.

Firstly, the phrase pencil control made me laugh for no reason.

I think screens have blown kids’ worlds to shit actually. I believe this will be recognised in time to come. I know many people will say that there’s a lot to learn on screens. But I think all our brains are being turned to mush- mine included! I used to have sat nav and reversing cameras on my car and when I downgraded, I’d lost some of the driving and mapping skills. They’ve come back now but it is frightening how we are slowly being drugged into mindlessness by increasing reliance on tech. This is reflected first on the very young and as they grow up, on the world in general. We are the last lot to have known a pre tech world.

I attended a lecture for piano teachers where some examples were described of what children used to do in play to develop their motor skills in general, and which are not commonly part of modern play. These include touching the tip of each finger to the thumb in turn as fast as possible

Was that one ever a part of play children used to do routinely?!

My father was born in 1917. When he went to the Technical School at 14 he and a couple of other boys were given extra handwriting lessons. He always used a semi print style (lower and upper case) as an adult, but we could read it!

Grey12
I hate these kind of "I turned out alright" comments. The truth is YOU turned out alright but other people didn't! They struggled a lot! And that is where these ideas come from

Agree.

I developed dexterity but not in circumstances people would want to hear about. I survived childhood by a narrow margin and had little to offer my earlier children because I had no clue about 'normal' and had been pushed into very early marriage that was equally abnormal.

I was so proud to put them into school with coats, I'd never had a coat. It rained you got wet. You got wet, you stayed wet until enough evaporated. Next morning you pulled the damp clothes off the floor next to you pulled them on and wore them till either dryer or wetter again. Hanging them wasn't even an option.

I worked so hard for them to have coats and spent so long finding second hand that looked like it might not be, it never occurred to me to teach them how to button them up! I used to get down on my knees and button them in as part of ready to go inspection, in an act of misplaced love; your mum says, you're clean enough, and good enough, and your buttoned up with that all around you.
I couldn't teach them laces or ties or plaits, I had no idea my self. They went dexterous by chance because I gave them every small skill I had. I'd taught myself basic sewing and drawing, so they got needle skills, scissors, and pencil through that, and random things because I thought playing was their right, but I would have been so grateful to have known what I could have done, and how, and where I could get help.
I learnt by trial and error, having enough children to practice on until I started to understand but no one ever really said, just some criticisms from school, to guess from.

The internet's a game-changer, and yes it can add to worry as well, but over time I see more and more clueless parents with plenty of gear and no idea, and what happens as their kids grow up.

Yes some families need social skills as well as other things actively spelling out to them, some because they're neglectful, some because they've been neglected, but sadly both seem to be often the one's least likely to have anyone actually do it.

@Celyon I’m sure your kids appreciate all you did. Your post made me want to give you a hug.

I’m pretty sure we all learned to do our coats up and hold a pencil ok when we were kids without these activities?
Of course we did. But we all grew up before the iPad was invented.

@Howshouldibehave, well, it was when I was growing up: me and my siblings used to compete to be fastest! It was a bit like a physical version of a tongue-twister, which was another favourite game when the weather was too inclement to play outside... I’m sure we also played it in Primary School, along with clapping/chanting games.

[quote RedMarauder]@KingdomScrolls my DP is dyspraxic and can ride a bike. Plus I know people with balance problems who have learnt. It has taken them longer to learn than other people e.g. years. Some cycling instructors have shown they simply don't have the ability to teach them so they have been taught by extended family members or friends.

Oh and if you have room to store a tricycle then get one of those instead. You will be able to have a basket between the back wheels so should be able to carry a decent amount.[/quote]
DD2 is dyspraxic and cracked riding a bike this year (aged 8). Steering and pedalling together can be a bit of a work in progress but she can ride it. She has phenomenal amounts of resilience though - absolutely terrifyingly determined - she'll either run the world or be a supervillain.

She's the sort of child for whom all these fine motor skills activities are really useful though - poor upper body strength, really poor hand and finger strength (low muscle tone) and then dyspraxic motor planning difficulties on top of that. I'd have screenshotted the post purely as I'm always on the lookout for different things to do to mix it up a bit and help her - her current favourite thing is to set up those puzzle balls for us to solve and trying to make them "really hard" and that's doing wonders for her hand strengthening without us having to formally work at it.

Howshouldibehave Yes. I grew up with 'seen but not heard' and stay sat where sat with permission required to move from it. There weren't generally things allowed to play with, so I fiddled quietly and discretely with small pieces of rubbish, little stones, and fingers and tongue (inside closed mouth) I wasn't taught the fingertips to thumb game, but automatically did it, sometimes both hands at the same time, sometimes opposite. Also did it running up and down the thumb joints, crossing fingers over as far as they'd go, splitting and pairing them, anything that the movements were small enough not to irritate, but large enough to do something with. Also wiggling ears while looking stationary!

UnRavellingFast Thanks. I feel bad about it, but they've been pretty forgiving and are all good at making something from nothing, which they're beginning to appreciate more as the world moves on.

I agree with you about the increasing push to be reliant on tec, and how it saps older skills, but at the risk of tin hats I think we're needed to in order to keep a future form of capitalism that's heavily A1 based, on track.
What's really noticeable to me is the low concentration levels, and difficulty moving between screen and real interaction I see in a lot of people.

Some of the five year olds my friend teaches struggle to turn the pages of picture books.

Once you get outside or at least away from screens, you really appreciate what an inadequate ersatz version of reality screen life is. But it provides immediate gratification and with all the lockdowns and social distancing, it’s easy to fall into the habit of living through electronic devices. That goes for children and adults.

I’m not sure about the use of all this technical terminology when it come to discussing children, though. If mothers from earlier times could eavesdrop on the conversations about fine motor skills and socialisation that mothers engage in nowadays, they would feel like they were listening to attendees at a conference on early childhood.

Society has definitely encouraged mothers to take a more ‘scholarly’ approach to child-rearing recently, to live more in their left brain hemispheres, the left being the hemisphere that likes to compare, categorise and compete.

In my experience parents evenings and reports can sometimes use technical terms that parents don't understand or query because they don't want to look stupid. So they'll know that weak fine motor skills are not a good thing but need help knowing specifics. When they look at a list like that they may feel reassured that actually child does things like sort little objects or plays with little Lego rather than Duplo so is on the right track. Our parents wouldn't necessarily know terms like gross motor skills.

Modern technology has made things easier to use with less physical effort eg playdoh rather than plasticine and modern parents are more likely to introduce skills later eg expecting children to cut their own food

DS1 has dyspraxia (and ASD which affects his willingness and tolerance for doing things not on his priority list, especially when they're frustrating and painful.

So with shoe laces, he already has a disadvantage, plus having small feet, shoes in his size have always been velcroed. DS2 has recently learned how to do his first lace-ups (his feet are bigger!)

Natural exposure to fine motor skills has declined. The DCs' Happy Land set was far clunkier than my 1970s "choke hazard" Fisher Price village. Gone are the micro machines (DS would have loved them) and Polly Pocket has supersized.
We did try years of crayons when out, but to avoid meltdowns it ended up with DS dictating to us as he found it too frustrating to make marks himself. Ironically he holds pencils well but with his processing issues he struggles with pressure and his hands hurt very quickly. We never got much out of paint/ dough, but he had an early talent for Lego.

At least being aware of all these issues, it was relatively easy to get a dyspraxia dignosis, and he had been exposed to the skills he needed and it wasn't deemed a parenting issue.

The past 16m have been bloody tough for parenting and especially over the winter, we had far, far too much screen time. Over last summer, my two lost inspiration on how to play and getting more normality back for a few months has inspired them again and they are playing better having got fresh external input.

The world has changed quite rapidly in a generation, and if you're not aware of these kinds of skills, have limited resources and are focused on easy survival then children do slip through especially where there's a localised culture of it. The opportunities are less natural than they were for previous generations, and need more effort for development.

They did, it just wasn't labelled so.

Was a child before screens but still have crap fine motor skills because I'm dyspraxic - my Reception teacher's report said "scissors - useless!" Although I could write well before starting school.

Let’s be honest - this is MN and most of the people in here are reasonably well educated and so their children are sling things like drawing, playing outside etc. Sadly this is obviously not a reflection of the whole of society. There are so many parents who think that giving their toddler a tablet to play with all day is the best thing ever - it’s technology, right? Who wants to mess around with dirty crayons, wooden blocks, mud, sticks etc... Sad but true. Just like the parents who wonder why on earth anyone would be giving their child water and fruit when they could be having lemonade and crisps...

I don't know which 1980s some of you grew up in but it seems different to my experiences.

I had velcro shoes, playdough and lots of screen time. Never played outside because of the traffic. So not that different to today.

I also remember learning to write in nursery school. I must have been 3 because I started school at 4 and my birthday is in August.

So I don't think the "past" was this great utopia when we were all rustling up a pair of curtains on the sewing machine in reception.

I don't know which 1980s some of you grew up in but it seems different to my experiences

I didn't grow up in the 1980s, I was fully adult by then

I agree with previous posters about the names changing, but the actions being the same.

I did what is now called 'baby led weaning' as did many others, but it seems like the juggernaut of modern spin wants to erase folk memory. Same for many other things.

But things have changed. We are living in an obesogenic society, and one in which the nature of 'play' for children has changed completely. Games were things you did, together in RL, not a solitary screen activity. The country was not so crowded, and the traffic far less dangerous. The changes in what children do is a response to a whole set of changes in wider society.

And because of those changes children, in numbers far greater than a generation or so ago, might need interventions (which come with their own jargon) which were rare beforehand

I did all the things I did with my DS to encourage independence before nursery but it wasnt called fine motor skills training.

Tying laces, doing up coats, baking, picking up raisins, doing up clothes, using silverware. Also independence in the bathroom and being familiar with the way lunch is. Teachers are there to teach not to dress and undress 20 children.

I did but I was diagnosed with dyspraxia at a young age so it was part of my development plan. My peers didn't have help as such that I can remember

Early years teacher here. Back when we were children fine motor skills development happened without anyone realising it because the world was a different place. Less technology, children generally more active. Stuff like plasticine more popular, I could go on. Fine and gross motor skills development is really important whether it's achieved through set activities, an active lifestyle without too much screen time or some sort of combination of the 2.