Helping a Yr1 with writing

[Swedes2]

My DD spends a lot of time writing stories at home. Her vocabulary is excellent and her stories are creative and full of interesting facts and observations. BUT. Her writing is poor. She often confuses d and b and does S the wrong way round a lot. I don't think her writing has improved at all since she's been at school. Also she doesn't leave any space between words so reading back is impossible a bit of a challenge.

How can I help her improve? I'd be really grateful for any good ideas. I must admit I've been waiting for the teachers to help her with this, but it's becoming obvious that it isn't going to happen. So what do I correct and what do I ignore? I don't want to discourage her story-writing AT ALL so I'm reluctant to wade-in with my untrained advice.

PS What do they do at school all day?

Swedes2 - I have no issues with drilling either - I did plenty of Marion Richardson drilling and, while I have many reservations about the French education system, I was thrilled to bits in anticipation of DD doing all that drilling and am thrilled to bits with her absolutely gorgeous fountain pen handwriting!

Maybe your DD would like to have a penmanship tutor?

DD's school do drilling as you describe; I remember being so bored by it as a child, and my handwriting is atrocious now... her handwriting is extremely neat though, so perhaps that is the answer?

I would be reluctant to get a child this young a conventional tutor, but for my younger brother who could not form letters correctly by the end of YR1 my parents found him a very good tutor (ex-reception teacher).

I was always very jelous of his lessons because he had to do things like correctly write letters in a plate of sherbet with his finger. If he got it right he was allowed to lick it! The sort of thing that really motivates a small child even if it makes the anti-chocolate fingers brigade screech.

It made all the difference and tellingly nearly two decades on he still exchanges Christmas cards with that tutor.

Everything I've ever read on the subject (not from the French angle though) says age 7 is the time to see real improvement in mirror writing, not 5. My DCs who started school in the US (English speaking) started formal phonics when they were 5/6 and were given formal writing exercises at the same age.

They had a handwriting workbook where they initially tackled individual letters by tracing dots for a few lines and then one line of writing their letter beside a printed one, then for the final line they wrote the letter freehand. When they were at home and scribbling by themselves they wrote probably 95% of the letters the right way round. At school they were allowed to write a few words here and there. It was all very wobbly in the beginning.

CaptNancy Is she at a state primary?

MrsHoarder - that sounds a very happy outcome. I feel uneasy about engaging a tutor but I haven't decided quite why I'm so uncomfortable with the idea. I very happily pay for her to have piano lessons.

OP, my ds is in yr 1 (June birthday) and your dd sounds v advanced compared to him, and I'm not remotely worried. Like your d, my ds occasionally gets b and d confused, and finds finger spacing difficult - unlike your dd, he has v little interest in writing and stories are never voluntary, and never more than a sentence or two if required for homework etc. He's just too busy with lego etc.

I think if your dd enjoys writing that is fantastic - from memory of my older ones, I think in year 1 reversing letters is still fairly normal?

I don't think you need worry yet. clearly if these haven't resolved by year 3, then worry, but now I wouldn't panic. :)

She isn't swedes.

If you're uncomfortable with hiring a tutor, perhaps do things with her for a term or so, and then review? I'm sure those 'drilling' sheets could be downloaded from somewhere, or books available with them in from WHS or amazon etc.
One thing that was emphasised to us by school was the importance of starting each letter in the correct place, and to encourage the correct formation of the letters- there are sheets with a little dot at the point on each letter where to start that may be of use (I'm sure you've seen them).
We had a set of workbooks from Thhe Book People (so very reasonably priced, I think poss £6 for 10 books) that were published by (??will check later) Oxford that have lots of letter practice in them (some books cover numeracy, shape, colour etc, some literacy)- they might be useful to use at home, and they're very easy to dip in and out of.

CaptNancy [choicewibbleemoticon] I have reams of paper resources and iPad apps at my disposal, I lack the expert guidance which is what she needs.

Breadandbutterfly - DD is a November birthday, so she is far from young for her year.

Please try to overcome your irrational prejudice reluctance to engage a tutor . I know other Anglophone parents at my DD's school who didn't want to engage a tutor for English and bitterly regret it several years down the line. I know my circumstances aren't the same as yours, but the issue of not feeling comfortable with your DC's achievements and what school has done to promote them is the same one.

Where would I find such a tutor?

Have just thought- is she being raised bilingually?

I was lucky and had met a fellow MNer who happened to be a primary school teacher who was tutoring EFL and asked her and it moved from there. But other parents I know have employed primary school teachers from other private schools, or newly retired teachers. Or try your local classified mag. IME, you need to know a little about early literacy (phonics and writing) to ensure that the person you employ is up to date.

I think personal recommendation is probably a good start, though you may find it hard to find other parents who've engaged a tutor for this age. Professionally I've used agencies with some success, but I've found the personally recommended tutors superior tbh.

Seriously, OP, I still think you're stressing unnecessarily - correcting finger spacing is easy - the lolly stick idea sounds good but just lots of reminders, and massive praise from you when she remembers them, obviously. :)

Re letter formation, I did sit down with my ds and show him how to do the letters correctly, as I did with my older two - as above, loads of free materials online/in cheap 'learning' books. No need for a tutor, unless you're v busy of course. If your dd is forming her letters wrong (as opposed to mirror writing, which as above, will correct in time anyway), then yes, she does need to learn how to do it right. FWIW, none of mine were taught this at school, though - I think teachers are just too busy to do this usually, or certainly to give the kind of on-to-one focus needed - so I wouldn't worry your dd's school is exceptionally poor for not having done this. It took me few weeks of maybe 10 or 20 mins a night to get it right - I found grouping similar letters made it much easier, eg c, o, a, d, g, q (all start the same), r, n, m, h, b, p (ditto), v, u, ww, y (ditto) - makes it v quick and easy. A few lines of practice, with revision each night and star chart = easy job done.

I think you should feel v pleased with your dd's desire to write lots - wish my ds was more of a story writer like your dd. It's great she enjoys it and displays a good vocab. The mirror writing will almost certainly self-correct - the spelling will improve over time.

Really sounds totally - nothing to worry about in year 1 at all. :)

Swedes, I know a very good handwriting tutor if you are in Manchester.

breadandbutterfly - perhaps I am stressing unnecessarily.

sarahfreck - I'm not in Manchester. But thanks for the thought.

By the way, I have sat down with DD and tried to get her to use spacing and form the letters correctly.

She's been off school the last couple of days so I've had time to do some stuff with her. This morning she wrote a letter to the tooth fairy: And it has spaces. Kerrr ching!

On the envelope it says

Tooss Feres (with all the Ss the wrong way round)

And the letter says:

dear Tooss feres
I hav got (with the g the wrong way round) a woble toos so can (with the a the wrong way round) yoo get (with the g the wrong way round) a (the wrong way round) pene to 3 XXXX rob (she means road) and but (she means put) in und mi pilo. tank yoo. (then her name with the s the wrong way round and a b when she means a d).

Is that normal for a November born child in Yr 1? It doesn't seem to have improved much at all since she went into reception to be honest.

My reading of the situation is that her understanding of phonics is fine, but she needs to drill those letters. I think fluid understanding of the letter formations will help her reading too.

My dd in y2 was doing/still is doing all these things (though with huge input from me she is an excellent reader - bes in the class by a way - but she prefers sight reading to phonics). TBH, if she wrote to the toos feres it would be pretty similar standard to this, so your dd seems OK if she's in the year below.

I took her to a children's physio to be assessed, she has various fine motor difficulties to do with being left brained and right bodied plus some hypermobility. The school are now doing extra fine motor work with her (yours may not, I appreciate) BUT much more valuably I also pay a children's occupational therapist to come to our house once a week for an hourly session with her. Her writing is still bad but improving, she spaces now (I thought she NEVER would at one point) and she is becoming enthusiastic about writing. Very expensive but money well worth spent imo. Maybe that's a path to consider?

I think you're seeing the glass half empty here.

swedes2. My ds1 is nov born Yr1 and couldn't do that. Mind you he couldn't hold a pencil properly when he started Reception.

Loved the tooth fairy letter - v cute. :)

Sounds like your dd would benefit from revising correct letter forms for a and g - they're both basically the same. Start with a c, then once she can do that perfectly go onto an o - just a c continued. Drill again. Then go onto an a - an o continued with a tail. Repeat drilling of all letters to date. Then a d - an a continued up, and a g - an a continued down with a longer, wiggly tail. Regular repetitions - 1,2,3 lines a night, as much as she wants to do, and lots of praise - easy, painless progress.

The most common letters actually all start in one of a very few ways, so this way, learning similar letter forms together, once they know where to start, they can continue to do nearly all the letters. And only have to learn a few rules, instead of 26 different rules.

Just a thought. If you have iPad, iPhone or iPod there is an app called iwritewords where the child can practise letter formations.

sharongless - thank you. We have an iPad, iPhone and iPod so that will be very useful.

Hi swedes just wondering if any of the suggestions are helping? My DS is very similar to your DD, very good at reading but spelling and letter formation not great. He is in top band of class and had parents vending last week. The teacher said they are encouraging independent writing so that they understand the content of ht they are writing rather than learning by rote. DS is writing lots of letters to grandparents to try nd encourage this