improving handwriting (year 4) - any suggestions? Handwriting Without Tears maybe?

[geekgirl]

Dd1's (8 years old, in yr 4) handwriting isn't good - huge and messy, and she is quite conscious of it. She doesn't hold her pen in a tripod grip and her teachers have pretty much given up on that and say that the grip she uses now will be functional for her. That's fine with me - as long as she can write reasonably neatly I don't really mind how she holds a pen.

I had a look at Handwriting Without Tears but some of the letters look very different to what is taught in the UK - generally the concept of it looks great though - just wondering what other people's experiences are, and if anyone has any good suggestions for improving handwriting. Thanks.

I would suggest going back to a pencil with a grip holder on it until your DD feels more confident - so much easier to control as more friction on paper.

Will school provide you with copy of the handwriting they use so you can help her to practise at home?

How is she with other fine motor skills like cutting etc?

Write from the Start if she was a bit younger, but I think they do one for junior age kids now... Teodorescu and Addy I think...

Romy7 - I was also going to suggest Teodorescu but with my small maternity leave sized brain I couldn't remember the name or spell it!

thanks, I just had a google for Teodorescu but couldn't find anything other than 'write from the start'.

I'll try her with the grip holder - although she might not want to use one at school Maybe I can find a pink one. with sparkles. And unicorns.

This sounds a bit mad but we have been buying those scratch foil pictures for DS1 as they require quite fine pen control and he doesn't think he's practising handwriting!

Just to add to your armoury...

oh, forgot to add that her fine motor skills generally seem pretty good - she can do very nice origami for instance. But OTOH she is really very rubbish with a knife and fork - her younger sister, who has Down's syndrome and as a result pretty awful fine motor skills, is much better at handling cutlerly.

Staedtler do pink pens and pencils with shaped grip bits for left and right handers - they aren't too geeky and just look like cool pens - slightly curved... maybe that's not as tragic as using grip holder at school?