8 year old doesn't/wont/can't see point of writing...

[Stylelostinlabour]

Just had parents evening ds doing great apart from he just won't put the effort into written work and the teacher even said its like he doesn't see the point, she admitted to even getting frustrated by him - which I understand as it's painful trying to get him to write stuff down. He has a private tutor once a week but he doesn't seem to be improving.

I've run out of ideas - what else can we do to get him to interested in writing?

My 8 year old hates writing because it looks awful and everyone is on his case about it...

His teacher suggested tracing, which he is loving. I bought some tracing paper and a £2 book about drawing comics and have created a monster. He really enjoys tracing (as long as the paper is taped down so it doesn't move) and has writted a ?12 page comic book with promise of several sequel(s)!

I figure anything that gets pencil to paper must be improving his fine motor muscles.... when he gets bored of this I will introduce him to manga style drawing and see if that interests him.

Good luck.

My DS (nearly 8) is similar. He complains of pain when writing sometimes too.
I requested an assessment with a paeditrician as i was concerned about this and the fact that he's clumsy. He saw a paed who said he wasn't bad enough to be classes dyspraxic, but referred him to be seen by a specialist teacher who observed him in school and ran tests on him. He was diagnosed with a "specific learning difficulty in writing, spelling and fine-motor control".

The specialist teacher made lots of recommendations that school and I are following up on.

He has to do Word Wasp, learn to touch type and school are letting him draw mind maps rather than making him write stuff out in full. He has a problem expressing himself on paper, so it's better to put down lots of points rather than stressing over a single sentence. We have a whole raft of OT exercises to do too.

Additionally he has a vision problem which wasn't picked up by a high street optician. We had to see a behaviour optometrist. He is having therapy and is coming on in leaps and bounds.

Oh thanks for the replies - is minor motor skills are basic and he is rather clumsy, as in he's for every spilling food down him, struggles with holding a knife and fork...

Something to look into - thanks

I would speak to a GP then if his fine motor skills are poor too, and push for a paed referral. He may need OT. We were recommended Junior Caring cutlery - it's brilliant and really hekps with tidier meal times x

He may not want to write if it's hard work for him....