Should I speak to yr1 teacher about potentially left handed child?

[WibbleWob]

Hello, I’m wondering what is the best course of action here. I was convinced my child was left handed before reception, but they started writing with their right hand. They were “expecting” at handwriting in their end of term report. I did explain to their reception teacher I thought my child was left handed but they were of the wait and see approach.

Over the summer I’ve noticed that when writing/drawing for fun they will use their left hand again, but if writing with me they will use their right. It does look in incredibly awkward and letters are often back to front.

I will say that the school has an incredibly rigid/one size fits all approach so I doubt my child would have felt comfortable using their left hand if the teacher demonstrated with their right, and just automatically followed what others were doing. (State, non faith school, for what it’s worth.)

I’m wondering if I should contact the school early doors or perhaps seek a private OT appt? My child is adamant they should use their right hand. We do have a large number of family members who are left handed but it emerged towards the end of infants- I suppose things were less pressured then.

There's one part of your post that seems a bit surprising - the bit where you say "I doubt my child would have felt comfortable using their left hand if the teacher demonstrated with their right"
It doesn't seem all that likely that a young child would pick up on the need to use the same hand as their teacher unless the teacher prompted them in that direction, and surely no teacher would do that - they must know that it has to be the child's own prompting that dictates the choice.
Some children do just vacillate between left and right for a while, rather than having a strong consistent preference from the start.
If I were you I would mention it again at the next parents' evening, but without being overly concerned about it.

I doubt there's anything to discuss. The teacher won't be telling her to use her right hand, she's probably just still settling down to which one is dominant. Just tell her she can use whichever is most comfortable.

I have a left handed Ds .. The thing with right handed tend to do everything right handed , left handed tend to do different ways in a way that works for them .. it’s not the dark ages where left handed children hand left hands tied behind there back .. your child will write with whatever hand they want

I've never in over twenty years of teaching come across an adult who has encouraged a child to use their less dominant hand. Why would they?

If anything, I'd like a few more left handers because I have at least ten pairs of green and yellow scissors that never get a look in.

Both my kids are left handed. They work it out for themselves. I’ve never needed to inform their teachers. I think your kid will figure this out themselves.

There are supposed to be exercises and support for left-handed children (as writing can be harder and the world is designed for right-handed people). I found nearly all primary teachers I spoke to hadn't heard of them, though, and my DC still finds writing difficult as his hand/wrist tires easily.
Teachers did provide different pens to try, which helped a bit.

I used both left and right hand until I was about 7yo. Dm reckoned I would have been left-handed in a left-handed world.

But I don't think it was about the teacher. I think it was more that everything is set up to be easier if you are right-handed. I'll still write left-handed if that's easier, so if the right hand side is blocked, or I have a left-hander next to me and we're knocking into each other, or I'm using my right hand with the mouse (actually more often I'd swap to using the mouse with my left hand), or I have a pen which just feels better left-handed.
It is harder using left hand on an exercise book than a piece of paper too; I'd rarely use my left hand in an exercise book.

Interestingly when my oldest went to school the preschool noted down that they thought she was left handed. By the end of reception she still occasionally wrote left handed, but had mostly settled to right. She's nothing like as ambidextrous as I am.
Dd2 likes to tell people she's left-handed (she was born missing her left hand) although I'm not sure if this is because she likes to see their reaction or what!

What they're comfortable with is the best, and if you start commenting, or wanting the teacher to encourage it, you're likely just to make them self-conscious about writing and not wanting to do it.
If someone said to me as a child "is that hand comfortable?" or similar, I'd immediately not know which to use and both would feel wrong.

Unless you live in Victorian times I expect your child’s teacher will let them write with whichever hand they prefer.

ds is one of those people who uses different hands for different things with no rhyme and reason to it ( bats right handed at cricket but plays tennis left handed for example, eats left handed but brushes teeth right handed). When he started school I was sure he was left handed but like your dd he writes right handed and even though it looks awkward and he has terrible writing, there’s been no persuading him otherwise. Teacher was very pro encouraging lefties to be lefties so definitely no trying to make him right handed. Brains are funny things.

More recently than that, my brother was prevented from writing with his left hand at primary school in Essex in the 80s.

I suppose swept along might be a better way of explaining it?

I agree, I’m certain they are not being forced to use their right, but if all demonstrations etc are with their right hand, it wouldn’t be surprising for a child to think that was the only option?

When I mentioned it before I perhaps thought the teacher might have said something along the lines of there are others in the class and they’ve got left handed scissors etc available. The conversation was very brief and essentially that they didn’t teach writing until the January and to leave it to them.

my child can obviously get by with their right but I just wondered if they would find writing easier with their left and if so how best to approach it. They are summer born so had less time to develop skills before starting school.

No teacher nowadays (or any time since the 1960s) would insist on a left handed child writing with their right hand. Also 'Expected' level at the end of Reception is absolutely fine and nothing to worry about.

Left handed granddaughter often uses her right hand.
Right handed dd jumps left, right handed ds shoots left.
Definitely not set in stone, although it may take her longer to refine her skills.

As a Reception teacher I would never put a pencil into a child's hand, I would put it on the table or offer it and see which hand they picked it up with. I think you are worrying about nothing and your child is using their preferred hand.

Too true!!! I’ve got about 20 pairs now as they never go missing and the right handed ones do! The left handers get to look smug as they never have to share scissors!!

What has brought matters to a head is that possibly because of mirror writing they are currently adamant that their name is spelt with letters reversed.

From experience this is likely to treated as defiance/bad behaviour, which is why I’m wondering if I should mention something before it becomes an issue.

Yes this is the sort of thing that I thought might be suggested, thank you good to know.

Children often write mirror writing if they start writing from the right hand side of the page. It means nothing, writing left to right is just a convention in our writing system that they have to learn. Try putting a coloured dot on the left hand side so they know where to start.

I agree, I’m certain they are not being forced to use their right, but if all demonstrations etc are with their right hand, it wouldn’t be surprising for a child to think that was the only option?

The only thing is that if the teacher is demonstrating at the front of the class then at that age they often would mirror. So they use left hand when the teacher is using right hand. I learnt quite quickly when coaching tennis with that age to make sure that either I was facing the same way as the children, or to do it left handed.

You don't need an ot for this !! The child will write with the hand they are more comfortable with. Let them write at home if you're worried that her is encouraging the right and see which they favour. It will be unclear writing in year one they havnt learnt to write properly yet. That does not mean they arnt writing with the correct hand for them they just need to practise

You're waaaay overthinking this.

Spend time with your child developing fine motor skills without any pressure, their dominant hand should emerge.

Card games, collages, colouring, plasticine, baking, sorting activities, board games, planting seeds, leading to tie laces.

This is all you need to do for now. Maybe at year 1 parents evening discuss with the teacher how they were getting on as at the beginning of year 1 they didn't seem to have a dominant hand preference.

If your child is writing perfectly well for their age (Expected level) and you go in and tell the teacher you think she's really left handed and needs help with that hand the teacher will think you're nuts 😉. Honestly.

Thank you that’s a good tip. I think I will send a quick email saying that they don’t seem to have settled on which hand to use and might benefit from some strategies.

I know I seem to be overreacting but unfortunately this school is incredibly pushy and fast paced. We moved shortly before applications were due in and didn’t find out about their reputation until it’s too late.

You’d surely know aaaaages before reception which hand your kid uses. My eldest is a leftie and has always had lovely fine motor skills, nice neat writing. 🤷🏻‍♀️ He was blatantly a leftie from babyhood.

Did you read my post OP?

What about doing things yourself with your child to observe and develop their fine motor skills?

It sounds like you're trying to delegate the matter of your child being relatively late in developing a dominant hand to the teacher to deal with?

Don't you think that year 1 teachers will be skilled in observing and dealing with this?