5.1 can't write name, should I be concerned yet?

[Sops]

ds is 5.1 and has really poor writing skills and has made virtually no progress since he started school.
He can just about write his own 5 letter name, but it is not exactly legible. He always gets the 'S' the wrong way around and the other letters are very poorly formed. He tends to turn the paper as he is writing too so the letters end up in a kind of spiral. I'm sure most pre-schoolers could do better. He doesn't do much writing (none at home, limited at school i think) despite us buying him lots of 'enticing' pens, pencils, books etc. I'm not sure if his reluctance is a cause of him not progressing or a symptom.
We are dealing with some much bigger long-term behavioural issues (anger management problems, won't follow any instructions, suspected pathological demand avoidance) right now but it just occurred to me that fine motor skill issues might be part of the wider problem we have and I wondered how he compared to the 'average' child.
Also, SENCO said he doesn't need any input because he is doing fine academically. His teacher says he is very bright, articulate and imaginative. Shouldn't a 'bright' child have mastered writing his own name after two terms of school? In other words, I want to know if he really IS doing fine academically.

You mentioned motor skills, do you mean his are lacking? Both fine and gross motor skills are involved with writing - he will get uncomfortable sitting at a table if his posture is bad.

I'd be concerned.

Not by the letter reversals. But I think an average child will learn to write their name after 2 terms of reception.

Even my DD who has fairly bad problems learning to read and write (I got very excited a few weeks ago when she spelt 'it' correctly - and she's 8) - Even she learnt to write her name in nursery.

Often kids with ASD also have dyspraxia type stuff. So I would suspect problems with his co-ordination and fine and gross motor skils. (My DS with ASD has this)

To be able to write you need good fine motor skills to hold a pencil and move it properly, but also you need a strong enough core to sit up and strong enough shoulder muscles to move your arm.....

I suspect it is another symptom of his suspected ASD, and that he very definitely does need help with his fine and gross motor skilss....

Teacher says he might still be in the 'gross motor phase', I'm not sure what she means by that.
He rarely sits at the table, he will fidget and get down repeatedly at mealtimes. Sitting still at carpet time is a big problem at school- has been since he started.

Not being able to sit still is another symptom of ASD.......

Thanks Indigo, I do suspect it's part and parcel of the wider issue. I'm hoping that highlighting motor skills might get school to take his problems more seriously. Although they have brought issues to our attention and acknowledge that there are problems which have 'potential to impact on his learning', they argue that they aren't impacting yet.
We've got an appt with teacher on monday after school. I think she particularly wants to discuss carpet time.
Our family support worker suggested they could bring in a teacher specialist at school.

Indigo, he can sit still if he's on the floor playing etc. just not at a table

Yes - because the cause of him not sitting still is vestibular problems (sense of balance) and Proprioception problems (sense of where you are).

Basically he doesn't know where his body is, so he thinks he's going to fall off the chair, so he keeps wriggling so that he can feel the chair so he knows he's sitting on it properly......

Schools often use MoveNSit cushions so that the kid can move but disturb the rest of the class less...

Get DS to hold his arms out and close his eyes and ask him to touch his nose. If he can't do that then he has Proprioception problems. ( My DS bought his finger quite close to his nose and then said 'I've forgotten where it is :( He's also asked me to squeeze his hands so that he knows where they are.... )

The good news is that retained reflex therapy cures/vastly improves all of these sensory problems......

Assume this is behaviour he can't control - ie there is an underlying physical reason why he moves all the time.

And don't let school use behaviour stuff to try and improve it (reward charts etc....)

Indigo, they have been using behaviour stuff to try to improve...
Guess what, it hasn't worked!
Will try that test tonight.

Guess what, it hasn't worked!

It's not really schools fault though. They can't recommend any therapy that might work - because they cost money.......

And anyway they know nothing about the different therapies....

School, the LEA and the NHS will never recommend anything that costs money and has to be done privately. They're not allowed to.

Only on this board will you learn about all of these types of things.......

Ignore your DS saying it's mumbo jumbo. What have you got to lose? Only money. Nothing important. What have you got to gain? Totally transforming your son. Everything.

BTW there's no dispute about refexes being retained. Every OT can test for them and agree that they've been retained. Nor is there any dispute that retained reflexes can be cured by OT. The only dispute is the effect curing retained reflexes has......

And that is mainly because the experiments are very hard to do. It takes a year or so to cure retained reflexes. In that year your son has grown up and also been at school and all sorts of things. So how can you prove that his transformation was definately due to retained reflex therapy?

It clearly is due to it, but the scientific academic people don't care about common sense.....

My son is 5.2 and is still struggling to write his 3 letter name! He gets lots of encouragement both at homeand school but just cannot do it.He is agood reader, very bright and imaginative and has no behavoural problems.His teacher says it is a weakness in his wrist which will resolve eventually. Of course I still worry espicially with year1 looming

Well if it's a weakness in his wrist, it might resolve eventually - but it would probably resolve quicker if he did daily exercises to strengthen it.....

he does,plus lots of lego and plasticine!

Is he interested in drawing, colouring in or painting? All of these use the same muscle groups as writing, and practice will help co-ordination of fine motor skills. You could try encouraging him to start with big, bold patterns and gradually move to more detailed ones.

Also, you could try games like "Operation" (and I think there's an easier "Junior Operation" too), or challenges like picking up beads with tweezers.

Thanks hehas got Buzz Lightyears operation and we often play with tweezers. we try the big bold stuff and he can do his name well on the fence! But he doesnt enjoy drawing or colouring, we have triangilar pencils etc.

Sops and Meliesmum
You can request that your GP refers your child to a paediatric Occupational Therapist for assessment. They will be able to diagnose motor problems and recommend excercises etc to help if necessary.

The school should also be able to make a referral

Can he spell his name out loud? Can he make it with magnetic letters? writing is actually quite a demanding physical skill, especially for some little boys who seem to struggle more with this.
you could try helping him write on a computer and he might really like finding the letters of his name on a keyboard. enlarge the font so he can see what he is writing, change the font sometimes for a little variety, if hes interested he can then 'write' other words with the keyboard. he might then believe he can actually write.. it could take some time...
it definitely sounds like its a physical/motor difficulty, try encouraging him to 'warm up' his wrist/hand/fingers before a drawing/writing task, squeeze his fingers together,stretch them out, roll his wrists around etc
also other activities to help might be playing with dough, plasticene, using a paintbrush and plain water to 'draw/write' big symbols on an outside wall and generally any exciting activity to develop strength and coordination in this area, good luck, i would also pursue outside help as advised

He likes to use the Argos app on my phone to search for toys. He can easily spell Lego ninjago, batman, and even had a good crack at Indiana jones the other day! He can easily spell lots of words.
He was in the bottom phonics group because of his writing, but his teacher moved him to the top one as he knows all his sounds. She says he is doing great there, except that he continues to really struggle when it comes to writing down the things he quite clearly understands.
When they have the whole class' pictures on display ds stands out clearly as the most 'immature'.
Whenever we play with playdoh, all he wants to do is direct what the adult can make on his behalf- on the rare occasions he tries he immediately gets frustrated and angry that he can't create what he wants.

Can he write his name on a big scale (e.g. on a fence or a concrete floor with a huge paintbrush, on a BIG piece of paper with a big marker pen etc)?

I only ask because my DS - very bright, fluent pre-school reader, could add and subtract 3 digit and negative numbers in Reception - was perceived as 'struggling' because he could not put any of this stuff down on paper when expected to.

He had decent gross motor skills, but very poor fine motor skills. To help him to demonstrate that he did know how to write and spell, he just couldn't 'get the words onto the tiny piece of paper' I used to do things like getting him to write HUGE e.g. on rolls of cheap 'lining paper' from a DIY shop, on flip chart paper etc. Once his school realised that it was not a cognitive problem but a fine motor skills one, they were actually really good - used to photocopy the spellings from a few years ahead up until they were really big (his weekly spelling sheet was the size of a flipchart!) for him to practise etc as well as giving him lots of fine motor skills training. By the end of Year 1, when he moved school, his writing was normal size and I'm sure that being allowed to show what he could do, even in a rather unconventional way, changed the school's view of his abilities and progress as well as maintaining his own self-confidence.

i'm in the same position so reading this thread with great interest. My son still cannot write his five letter name at this stage in reception and its beginning to worry me greatly. He has never liked any activities which promote fine motor skills, apart from maybe lego, and will do anything to avoid writing drawing colouring etc. I despair at him ever improving and dont know what to do :(

Sorry but I wanted to give you my own experience.

My DS1, Reception also, very bright child he could read at 18 months (simple words) and very inquisitive mind, however started reception not being able to hold a pencil. His fine motor skills were pretty shocking overall, he never did a drawing in his life (no matter how much encouragement, bribing, etc), and with lots of advice on here (see Mrz posts) and help from school we got him to write and form letters, with lots and lots of practice, help and support.

He has filled 3 books of letters and words and now after all that practice can write like my DD1 could when she started reception with no practice or help. Nobody has put a label on him but I'd say that now he's off, his confidence is up and can actually write words or at least have a go at writing - it's been a very long road indeed and a very painful one at times.

I suspect that if I hadn't inititated it all there would have been nothing happening at school and DS1 would be exactly the same as your DS1.

So I would say if you look at my previous threads and do a search on Mrz's there will be more info on there. Also there is a small element of boys not really being that keen on writing and needing encouragement and bribing to have a go. But it's much much better now that his confidence is up and he knows that if he has a go something legible will come out!

Hope this helped a bit....

does anyone else feel like the onus is utterly on parents to rectify these shortfallings? someone mentioned that one should be concerned if two terms in to reception a child is not writing their name but i find that any one-on-one specific "catch up" needs to be carried out by parents. there does not seem to be the class time etc to carry this out in class.

Emy72, I've tried searching for those threads but I can't seem to locate them- maybe I don't know how to use advanced search properly!
I would be very interested to know how you encouraged your ds to do writing/drawing when he was so reluctant. I thought that my ds was doing poorly due to lack of practice, but I can't encourage him in anyway as he gets more and more resistant, now matter how much fun I try to make it. Now, I'm beginning to think there must be more to it than that.
Indigo, I tried that test and he managed to touch his nose OK.
Loosinas, yes, the onus is on parents I think too. I have an appt to see ds' teacher this afternoon to talk about his failure to sit still at carpet time. We have discussed it several times throughout the year and as yet she hasn't suggested any actual ways they could help him. Mainly, just observed that it's a problem, and wondered what we thought about it. We have said 'Yes, it's certainly a problem. We agree' That's as far as we've got.
At our meeting with the teacher, Head and Senco they said as his behaviour issues are 'not yet having a negative impact on his academic learning (but do have the potential to in the future) we don't have enough evidence to refer him to the ed psych'
I told the family support worker that earlier this week and she said that problems with behaviour must be impacting on his ability to learn. She suggested they should at least get a teacher specialist in to see if they can give any pointers to help them. I will suggest that today, 'cos I've certainly got no ideas!

My son gets lots of extra help from his teacher and TA. They both seem to understand him very well and are always very positive about his abilities. They provide lots of activities for him at school and give me advice about what I can do to help him. His attitude is improving now-he actually wants to learn to write now! Idont really feel that the onus is on me,I help my DDas much with her work.