Possibly trivial but dd doesn't hold her pen properly

[ShowOfHands]

Oh it's dull, it's very dull I know but I'm stuck on the bed bfing a baby going through a mammoth growth spurt and I've wasted hours on pondering the permutations of David Mitchell and Damian Lewis both in the same room at the same time and I've segued onto pens and ink.

So, I digress...

DD doesn't hold her pen properly. Neither do I. I remember berol handwriting pens and thwacks on the knuckle with a ruler. Didn't work. I still hold my pen incorrectly. My writing is extremely neat and apart from an odd dent on my finger from the weird way I hold a pen, it's not holding back my ability to write shopping lists or doodle pictures of gingerbread men doing the hokey cokey (I didn't just lie here thinking about David Mitchell and Damian Lewis after all).

DD holds her pen really, really oddly. It looks remarkably difficult. The teacher commented at parents' evening that they're gently trying to correct it but that was it. I'm not entirely sure if I should be reminding her more. Make her hold a pen 'properly' and she really struggles to write, leave her and she goes back to her unerring grasp and seeming ease.

My Mum suspects I held my pen oddly as I wrote quite young and couldn't manage the proper way. I think dd's probably the same. She started writing at 3ish and tbh I paid no attention at all to her pen grip.

Should I be thwacking her on the knuckles with a wooden ruler? I don't have a wooden ruler btw.

Is it actually a problem?

I don't think it is. I did try briefly to correct my DD's grip, but then I realised that I was doing it more because I thought I should, rather than it benefiting her. She writes neater than all 3 of my boys who hold the pen correctly.

As I suspected. My writing's never been affected by my odd grip. And apart from the fact that I'll never be able to use a fountain pen (made signing the marriage register difficult), I don't think I'm suffering unduly.

I don't hold mine properly either and remember being corrected, which didn't change how I held the pen, just made me feel 'wrong'. I don't know whether it's a problem for your DD and it's only anecdotal evidence but I grew up to get an MA in drawing using the very same pen/pencil grip (sorry for non-stealth boast, only saying 'cos relevant), so I'd tend to be relaxed about it.

Oh well it's definitely fine then. An MA in drawing and the ability to draw hokey cokeying gingerbread men. It's almost an advantage.

Do you use your MA Pears? Sounds like you must be pretty talented. I used my MA once. To make a joke about me being The Three Degrees. Without it the joke wouldn't have worked.

:o She'll not go far wrong. You've used yours to better effect than I have mine :o

My son has never held his pen properly. The way he holds it looks really odd and not even that easy to do !
He can write though - so who cares ?

You could try her with one of those pencil grips?

DD can't hold a pen properly and writes/draws with her ring finger and little finger - all very odd looking. We have OT coming to assess her soon but as long as she finds a way to do it, it's fine by me.

David Mitchell the comedian or the writer??

Going to go against the grain here: I hold my pen incorrectly, and it has hindered me. I can't write quickly so struggled with exams, I have never properly recovered from a minor wrist injury because the way I write places stress on the injury, and I used to bump into the paper of anyone sat next to me.

I guess it depends how your DD holds the pen. I hold it higher up the pen, with my thumb over the top, then tucked into my hand. I also bend my hand round and over what I've just written.

I would try to gently correct her. It's far easier when they are young to learn. The physiotherapist I saw for my wrist tried to teach my how to hold a pen properly, but it felt so odd and was such hard work I soon gave up.

It is possible that she has weak hand muscles and that because of this she has chosen to hold a pen differently.( My Ds does have weak hand muscles and we are doing exercises to correct it. It has helped the actual handwriting which was awful and now we are working to improve stamina) It may be nothing though. If you are concerned about it could you get referred to an OT who can look at it and decide if it is of concern or not?

I do wonder if it might be too late tbh. She writes pretty well and her way of holding the pen is coming v naturally to her now. But she is also only 4 so I suppose if I were to tackle it, now would be the time. Her teachers do remind her in writing practice and I try too but she just can't write anything holding the pen that way and she gets frustrated. She can write fairly speedily for her age but I guess it's no indication of what might happen later. I'll just gently remind her. I just wondered why I'm bothering tbh, if the teacher mentioning it meant that she thought it might be a problem. I can't explain how she holds the pen, far too odd. I hold it with my thumb over the top, almost making a fist. I also write v quickly though neatly. I think I may have improved on the accepted way tbh

The comedian, definitely the comedian btw.

And I'm not sure making a crap joke once and occasionally knowing the answer to obscure European lit and/or Freudian psychology questions counts as good use of an MA.

My DD holds her pen oddly too! I haven't really bothered to try to correct her TBH, because she writes well and can form her letters and I thought that if I try and change her she might find it more difficult. She is also 4.

I hold my pen correctly as my mum wouldn't let me do it any other way.

I asked my sister (an ex-primary school teacher) whether there would be any implications of holding a pen the "wrong way" and she said no, lots of people do. You can get pens/pencils that encourage a tripod grip.

Sorry, the bit where my post says that I can hold my pen correctly sounds a bit "ner ner" . I meant to add that I don't feel like I've particularly benefitted, although my handwriting is ok.

Dd1 didn't hold her pen right until she got to school. Then she was so keen to please her teacher she would have done anything she said.
Ds wouldn't even hold a pen (except to pretend it was a sword) before he got to school. Now he holds it beautifully after only a term at school.

If you want her to hold it properly get some "chunky crayons " from early learning centre which force a child to hold them in the "correct" way . Hth

I held my pen incorrectly until I was about 10. As a consequence, I wrote slowly and it was very messy. I can clearly remember my mother telling that if I changed the way I held my pen she would buy me a much coveted pencil case I wanted. It worked. Clever mum.

I have a four fingered grip rather than the "standard" three and my handwriting is fine, dispite the professionals at the time trying to correct it as part of my dyslexia "training" :) those grips to put on pens are ace but didn't work without one! Didn't help my spelling either and my mum dismissed the concept or at least didn't bother enforcing the idea. My husband is left handed and has a "standard" pen grip but his writing is awful because he was never shown how to do left handed writing so has to twist his hand around to prevent him smudging what he has writtern and it doesn't always work either! He makes me do the christmas cards.. or a clever ruse perhapes?

So long as you child can write effectively, I am not sure it matters but then working out what disadvantages there are to her style might be more difficult!?!

My 5 year old DS had a terrible pen grip at the start of reception in September and it affected his handwriting although he had started writing very young (2) and had been doing a lot of writing since then. I thought it would get better of its own accord but it didn't. However, I read online a tip for encouraging proper grip and it worked instantly. I still have to remind him to hold it properly sometimes but he knows what to do and self corrects a lot. His handwriting has come on a lot.

The tip was simply to ensure that before starting to write, the pen(cil) is laid on the table with the tip towards him. The first time we did that was the first time he held the pencil correctly - I was amazed!