ambidestrous or late settling?

[Dunwhingin]

My dd age 4 is doing really well in the nursery attached to our prep school of choice. Her report last week said that she had improved massively with numbers and letters -she has always been well ahead on the creative, imaginative and practical but not so good on the writing, numbers and basic adding type stuff.

she draws reasonably well and is starting to get on with cursive script but changes hands all of the time. Her main teacher is quite relaxed with this but the classroom assistant has been caught twice by me telling her to 'put the pen in the right hand' namely her right hand one

my dad and husband are both lefties naturally, dad was made to change as every one was 65 years ago.
she writes the same with both hands, there really isn't any difference at all, except that they are going to need to use different posture strategies for the left side which they don't seem to be doing.

I need to have a word with the CA first I guess and her teacher to ensure that they aren't pushing her towards right handedness too

any pointers on how long settling will take? is this really late? she is only just 4

My ds is 5.4 and has only just settled into left-handed ness. We were told not to worry - this is considered just about within normal.

It's great that she draws well and is getting on with writing.

I agree, have a word with the CA and teacher.

thank you, I was just wondering especially as both the teacher and CA said that everyone usually settles by now.
She has great pen control its just the cursive script they are teaching (its far more complicated than the system we were taught) isn't looking as good as the others as I guess each hand gets equal 'practice' lol

Cursive script at age four is very hard. We live in Belgium where children don't start to learn to write until age six, and then they go straight into cursive script, and have usually mastered the basics within 3 months.

Have you asked her which hand she thinks is best?

Which hand does she use to brush her teeth, open the door, pick things off the ground?

DS didn't settle until nearly 6yo. So normal for him!

she honestly does everything with either hand, there is no automatic left or right in the rest of life,

I agree the script is very hard, they have always signed their name every morning - copying over shadow print, at four this changes to cursive form and they are actively learning the letter forms and the 'journeys' attached to them in preparation for the reception where this continues to have them writing for pre prep. it is honestly the only element that isn't 'learning through play' and it is hard for lots of them.

My daughter settled on her drawing hand quite late, but she always scooted the on the opposite side to her RHed younger brother.

One thing you can do is to encourage games and activities which get the child to cross their hands over the body midline. Apparently these help the brain to lateralise.

There is a website with loads of ideas, I think it is this one:

www.ot-mom-learning-activities.com/crossing-the-midline.html

I was worried about it when my daughter was 3/4, but I think just because so many people said it was late. As you'll see here, lots of children are 'late', and it isn't an issue.