Magic link online handwriting programme

[Biscuitlady1]

My son is 10 and handwriting remains a headache. We have spoken to school and OT about this many times but not made much progress. He was diagnosed with dyspraxia when younger and he has very bendy fingers. His coordination has improved a lot and it doesn't interfere with other aspects of his life. We have tried pencil grips, writing slopes, putty etc. etc. I think we have now tried everything available.

When I have tried going through this with him, it ends up very stressful and that just makes it all worse. So I am looking at Magic Link handwriting programme. I've seen good reviews. We don't live near a teacher though so I'm wondering if anyone has experience of their online programme and how your kids found doing it. I'd also be interested to hear if anyone did one of their intensive programmes as perhaps we could travel and just try to get all 30 steps done in a shorter timeframe.

Thank you
Yours exhaustedly!

Both our children have done the in person programme. For them I’m not sure it would have worked online. They found it helpful to have the teacher be able to stand and see and correct their work in the moment and demonstrate by writing the letters. But if you can’t get to a teacher you could give online a go.

In truth I am not sure whether magic link is actually ‘magic’ or if it’s mainly having the intensive lessons and practice.

It worked very well for our eldest child. I’m less sure for our youngest.

To be clear we did weekly in person 45 min lessons with practice in between. Not the intensive programme.

Thank you. How many lessons did you do? I thought maybe with intensive it might also help because otherwise he'll be learning that outside of school while also writing the school-taught way at school which would confuse him.

His school taught him lead-in strokes.... and now they are telling him not to do it but it's a habit now. It's been frustrating! His school Ofsted inspection came back recently and the inspector was incredibly critical of the school's handling of handwriting.

I’m not sure how many lessons sorry from memory. There are 30 steps in the programme but it’s less than that in weeks. Eldest and youngest did the course together in year 9 and year 4 respectively. Youngest has just done it again in year 6 with a different teacher because it hadn’t ‘stuck’. I think he would benefit from an occupational therapy assessment to see what might be ‘going on’ but we’ve not found a private OT so thought it was worth trying the course again now he’s older.

I’m dyspraxic and - somewhat unusually - actually have very good handwriting. But that wasn’t always the case. When I first learned to write as a tiny kid, it was awful and my teachers despaired. And even now I grip my pen in a fairly odd way. I just had a look at the Magic Link method and interestingly, that is precisely how I was taught joined-up writing at primary school in 1983! Same practice exercises and same kind of style with no lead-in strokes. Which is probably how I ended up getting the hang of it.

Does you son find printing easier than joined-up? If so, I would take him back to that and start from scratch to be honest, not least because he’s only got a year before he starts secondary school, and at secondary school they won’t care whether he joins his letters up or not anyway. And some people can print as quickly as they can write.

I’d also add that if he has a diagnosis of dyspraxia, the school probably should have just focused on legibility and comfort for him, rather than trying to force him into a very specific joined-up hand and fretting over the precise style of his letters. It would be a reasonable adjustment.

Allowing him to type might be an option at secondary school, including for exams.

My ds has hypotonia & his handwriting is terrible even at 22. He had an assessment with a physiotherapist who concluded that his writing would never improve, she recommended that he did all his work on a laptop which he did from Y5 to leaving school, he still does now for university, right down to taking notes in lectures, he now has speech to text software as well as part of his disabled students programme but has learned to touch type, he can type faster than I can with a level 3 typing qualification. Try to get your ds an assessment & school can provide a laptop for him if needed.

The introduction of cursive script in schools from EYFS can be a nightmare for those with fine manipulative difficulties, DCD and autism etc.

As an advisory teacher I had many discussions with school staff around the children I supported using print not cursive script.

Both of our daughters had an “ incorrect grip” which no teacher managed to correct ( one diagnosed with autism, SPD and one DCD)

As PP has said typing is used moving forward. Our youngest taught herself to touch type and was SO fast. At University a laptop and software can be provided if DSA is awarded.

There’s also other software that can be used such as Clicker and Dragon in school. They should be reducing the need to write especially in foundation subjects.
Look at multisensory methods and the Writing Wizard app.
Sorry no experience of this method you asked about but have read about it.