Question for teachers regarding left handed children writing with pens.

[Myliferocks]

My DS is 8, in yr 3 and left handed
He was recently given a handwriting pen by his school to use as his handwriting is now considered 'good' enough to write in pen. He came home really excited and couldn't wait to use it the next day.
When he came home the next day he said it was difficult to use and he kept smudging his writing with his left hand as he was writing.
I suggested he spoke to his teacher the next day to see if she had any suggestions to help him not smudge his work as I was sure she has taught left handed children before.
He came home after having spoken to her with the result being that she couldn't help him therefore she said he had to go back to writing in pencil.

Do any of you teachers out there have any tips for helping a left handed child write without smudging as his teacher didn't have any?

prettybird DS holds his pen between his thumb and forefinger and kind of makes a fist with his hand which then goes across where he has written iyswim.
It's quite hard to explain but it's none of the positions in the nib link Talkinpeace posted on page 2.

oh good, that's great to hear :)

That's good. I'm glad they sorted it for your ds. I'm a hook handed leftie, and I was given an ink pen at school, which I smudged. After being told my hand writing was diabolical, I was switched back to pencil and never got a pen again until I started secondary school. It's nice to hear that teachers do it a little differently these days!

Yep hook handed leftie here. We were only allowed to use fountain pens, biros were banned.

Is anyone else really disappointed not to have LH DC? I really wanted at least one of mine to be LH but they are all RH! Most disappointed!

Me too fluffy. I expected at least one of my dc to be LH.

I'm No5 on the nibs link, I remember being taught to angle the paper that way at primary school.

fluffygals My cousin and his wife are LH and both their DCs are RH, they were so disappointed. My cousin told me to tie DCs right hands behind their chair to encourage them to be LH! We struck lucky with DC1, but DC2 is a RHed disgrace, fingers crossed for DC3.

Ha Louisiana, my mum had her left hand tied behind her back at school, to encourage her to write with her right hand.

Hi Myliferocks:

Not a teacher, but ran into similar problems with biros.

DD1 and teacher frustrated (also tired of blue hands (or worse) at end of school day). We opted to buy a stabilo left handed pen from a big-name newsagent (found on many highstreets) but also can order through amazon. Range of colours - she went for pink (girly, so boys won't be interested - and distinct - so can't easily 'go missing' in class, as her pencils always did).

Teachers were fine with her using this - because from Y3 at our school pupils are allowed to bring in a pencil case of their own with their own supplies (kids love it, and suspect it saves the school a lot of money on supplies).

Because of the curved shape, it forces the child to hold the pen in a certain way and that did seem to help DD1 improve her writing. She now can use a range of pens (now Y5) - so it helped through that switchover from pencil to pen as far as we're concerned.

HTH

Oh one more thing:

Find out if your school/ LEA has a left-handed writing policy.

Basically left-handers should be allowed to write freely, not cramped up because they're knocking elbows with a right hander.

It simply requires some thought about positioning the leftie in a place where he/ she won't knock elbows.

I've just downloaded one set of guidelines randomly from google search - but this gels with what we ultimately informally organised at our school: www.lyndhurstfirstschool.co.uk/page/?pid=139

Just out of interest.

Do Arabic speaking/writing right handeds have problems? Anyone know?

I'm left handed and 29 and didn't know it was classed as a "special need" @ me!!

I am a left hander who gets fed up with people treating it as a handicap, thistlelicker. The main handicap is the right handed mother!
I once got so fed up with it that I started a discussion elsewhere - with much older left handers (ones who were made to feel different at school) and they all agreed that they were completely normal!
Children who are left handed pick up this attitude from parents and trot it out as an excuse. As a teacher I have been given it for messy work and they come out with 'I'm left handed' - I then politely wait for the rest of the sentence but that is it- there is no more! So I say 'and.........?' Which completely throws them because there isn't an 'and'. I then tell them that I am left handed, and there is generally another teacher in the school (it is common)and we write neatly.
I have had to put up with my mother saying I look awkward cutting bread etc - I tell her not to look!
You need simple solutions like not clashing elbows with a right hander or angling the paper a bit.
I can't understand why those of us who are older, when it was more frowned upon and there was no access to products for left handers, manage fine ( in my survey everyone got on in life quite happily) and yet younger ones are calling it a special need and wanting policies on it.
I am quite happy to be left handed, I don't feel remotely handicapped and I am not a special need. I merely use a different hand in what is largely a right- handed world. I like being different.

I have 3 children, only one is left handed and he is far and away the neatest. I remember at school when I first wrote in ink it was the right handed boy, who sat next to me, who looked as if a demented spider had crossed his page!

I agree exoticfruit that it isn't a handicap. DD is 17 and has never had a problem being left handed and DS has never had a problem before this issue with the pen. Yes it isn't a handicap but if being left handed was causing an issue with him writing with a certain pen then in my mind you just switch the type of pen. Job done, no fuss, issue solved.
My complaint with the school was the fact that there was no compromise over the type of pen that he used. To me it should be a case of any child using a pen that was best suited to them not the school which in my DS's case is a biro.
Some people can write fine with some types of pen and some people write better with other types of pen.

Exactly Myliferocks- everyone is the same, they have pens they can write with well and ones they don't like. This is the same whichever hand. I had to write a bereavement letter last week, I made sure that I found a pen that I can write nicely with- if I am merely writing a shopping list then any will do.
I first took exception with a blogger- she was HEing her DD and thought schools couldn't cope with left handers. I commented that they could cope very well because it is unusual not to have at least one left hander on the staff and you have to be at least 65yrs(probably70) to have had your left arm tied down in school!! I said that the main difficulty is the right handed parent who sees it as a handicap. It didn't go down well- hence my poll of left handers who were all happily left handed without it being a handicap.

louisiana no worse than lefties have had to suffer.

my mum and dad both lefties, I'm the only one of 3 dds to be leftie.

a woman I know has instructed her dd's nursery to make her use her right hand, because she's currently using both hands equally. this is in full knowledge of the fact that her own dad was forced to use his right hand. when she told me, I told her off. it was a gut reaction as I was so shocked.

This is all because right handers perceive it as a handicap or inferior- rather than a normal alternative.

I was born in 1976.
I myst have been lucky in my school assignment because I never had any issyes with being left handed.
in fact, I was told it was an advantage in rounders and netball (being placed on the side of the court to be at an advantage over a right handed player in the same position - they don't expect that)
but I don't recall ever having a discussion about it until 3rd year senior's where a boy had a hook hand and there was a discussion from two teachers that lefties wrote like that. cue 3 otger lefties in the class going "I don't!"

exactly exotic.

I said left-handers had special needs not because I was implying it was a disability but because they need to be taught differently for some things from right handers - the key word is 'different'. I have been in so many sports situations where the teacher/coach will say, 'any of you left handed?' and then proceed to give them specific instructions because they need to do things differently. Would you rather that were not so? Left handers are in a minority (even if they aren't in this family), and outside of sport children tend to be taught assuming they are right handed. That does not always work for left handers and then they need special teaching, thus have a special need. Special needs policy is there for children who need something different from the norm. The head at our primary told me that a very able mathematician in the family had special needs because the standard syllabus was not appropriate, and thank goodness for that. I'm sorry some of you take offence at the term special needs. I will give up trying to help.

Hi all but especially to exoticfruits

Not trying to treat this as a handicap in any way. Just think it is different and including ultimately the grip with which you hold pencil/ pen.

DH & DD1 are lefties and DD2 & I are righties. Have no opinion one way or the other which is better and certainly DD1 has out of this world hand/eye coordination as compared to DD2.

However DD1 came home with a bloody (and I mean bleeding), raw arm from a completely unaware teacher placing her against a cement brick wall for writing. DD1 found teacher very difficult so didn't say anything, although I told her to do so. She also got yelled at in class for not writing very much and when she told her teacher her arm hurt, teacher said, "Don't be such a baby."

I approached teacher (after 4 weeks of this) and explained DD1 was rubbing the wall and ending up with bleeding gashes and because it was painful she wasn't writing much. Teacher said that it was up to the children to seat themselves. I approached head who told me it was ridiculous to insist that my child was positioned specially for writing. I rang LEA and asked them what was their left handed policy having researched policies in other counties of England. We discussed that my child was coming home injured from her 'Big Writing' sessions.

A phone call was made clearly, because shortly thereafter I received an e-mail stating that DD1 would be positioned so that she was not cramped or bumping elbows whilst writing.

So no exotic - I'm not saying it's a handicap - but it does take planning when navigating shared spaces with a bunch of inconsiderate right handers and an unthinking right handed teacher. Link her for TES article on left-handedness (www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=312516) & guidance on left-handedness to teachers: www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/How-to-be-on-their-side-Left-handedness-312517/

Dh is 53 this year and he was made to write with his left hand behind his back to stop him using it.

Fortunately his mum was a teacher in the same primary school and came across him doing this.

His teacher had a strip torn off her - he mum doesn't miss and hit the wall to mix metaphors

So it's not that long since some teachers were still trying to force left handers to write with their right hand.

I never had any problems at my school with writing with my left hand.

You are going to come across a few teachers who have no idea of the problems but generally it is common sense-nothing more.
I would agree with the sport but at least they allow for it these days. When I played hockey all the sticks were for right handers and so it wasn't surprising that I wasn't any good-I dare say the top team players wouldn't have done much good playing the wrong way around! However games like tennis were a distinct advantage when your opponent thinks that they are forcing you into a backhand and they play straight for a strong forehand. Fielders in rounders have to suddenly change position, if they are switched on enough. Its swings and roundabouts I suppose.
Right handed parents and teachers are the problem-it seems to veer from total unawareness and 'making a fuss' to perceiving it as a handicap with policies. It is somewhere in the middle and just needs common sense. I want people to be aware that I have different needs-e.g. irons where the flex comes out of the back and not the side but I am not odd or special needs-I just am part of a minority and quite happy with it.
What parents shouldn't do is trot it out as an excuse so that the child says 'I am left handed' and then hasn't a clue what to add when you say 'and so......?'

and so....

Please allow me to sit so I can extend my left arm fully when I write. [in the same way you automatically do for right-handed people]

Please allow me to move the mouse to the other side of the computer so I can more easily operate the mouse. [in the same way you allow right handed people to have the mouse on the left-handed side].

Please allow me to write with a reverse slant instead of telling me it's wrong.

Please allow me to us a pair of scissors that I can manage to cut effectively, instead of telling me 'Oh you're left handed, you'll have to have someone cut up the material for you when they're finished'.

Please allow me to tilt my paper/ workbook at a different angle to right-handed pupils and allow me the table space to do so.

Please don't teach me guitar right-handed.

Please don't insist I play sports right-handed.

Please don't tear up my homework in front of me because I made a table of data with the traditional first row data on the far right and then filled it in against headings from right to left.

Please allow me all the courtesies you extend to right-handed people without thinking.

sorry that should be first column of data not row.

[these have all happened to DD1 in Y3/ Y4]