5 yr old son stuggling with wrtitting and fine motor skills

[MrsC24]

My 5 year old son who is in year 1, but whose birthday is 31s August, seems to be struggling at school and says he hates school and wakes up on a school day and the first thing he says is " I don't want to go to school" At parents evening th other week his teacher said he wont even be at the required level for a year 1 child mainly because of his writting. He is getting extra help with phonics and literacy but that is with 6 of them in the class for 20 minutes a day with the TA. He says it hurts him to write and in school they learn the cursive script which I think is quite difficult for achild like mine who struggles with pen control. He has always hated drawing, not great using scissors and I noticed recently he doesn't hold a knife and fork correctly and will now only use a fork in his right hand. He also strugles with buttons and now he is yr 1 they wear shirts with buttons and although they do help the undo the shirts for PE they do expect them to try and do them and he didn't like doing PE because he didn't want to get changed even though he is very sporty. I am sure he is playing up in class because he is struggling to cope and is always in trouble and missing out on play time as the school are quite strict. I am not sure if there is an underlying cause or if he is just a 5 year old boy who is takng time to develop and not helped by being the youngest! Any sugestions?

What did the teacher say about his motor skills in general? Is he getting any help in writing as well as phonics and literacy? Did she suggest how you could help him at home?
It always surprises me that schools try to make such little ones write in cursive- I can't do it yet and I'm 36!
I should go back to the teacher and talk it over in more detail, if it's affecting his willingness to go to school you need to look into it a bit further

How is he with things like Lego and plasticine?

you could ask for an ot assessment - but he's still quite little so they really wouldn't be expecting him to write in cursive at 5.5... he's really just the same age as lots of the yr r tots, who are still trying to work out which way round their t-shirt goes on in lots of cases.

lots of playing with play doh, pegs, (as in clothespegs) positng little things in slots, finger puppets etc will all help. tip out a packet of raisins and get him to eat them with thumb and fingertip. or those tweezer thingys like giant chopsticks.

i don't think he's too far behind from what you say, but if school are suggesting there is a wider developmental issue then an ot assessment would be a good idea. (and then they will tell you to play with playdoh etc )

or you could buy the teodorescu 'write from the start' workbooks and do a page or two a day as homework. they gradually introduce the skills required for handwriting. if you are concerned though, ask the school which handwriting scheme they are using, and you can usually find similar exercises on the web.

My posts a few months ago would have read exactly the same as yours except I have a June 2005 boy in year 1. I am not saying that your son has this but yesterday we got a diagnosis of dyspraxia.

Have a look at the link and you might want to get the GP to refer him to the Child Development Centre where as Madwomanintheattic says an Occupational Therapist will assess him for physical difficulties which might be causing some of the problems that he has in school.

It has been a revelation finding out about dyspraxia as a condition as before I (and the teacher) thought that he that he was just being irritiating/naughty/immature.

Thanks for all you replies and advice. I did look up Dyspraxia but he is very coordianted and is already playing in an U7 football team. He is so switched on sprots wise and knows all the different rules for football, hockey an rugby by watching it because he is interested in it. He did say he cried yesterday at school as he couldn't do his writing as he finds it really difficult and gets really frustrated. Doing anything extra at home is I don't think is an option at the moment as he will have a tantrum and whilst I will encourage him I don't want to force the issue as I want him to be a happy 5 year old and spends enough time at school which is where most of the work should be done and after school he just wants to switch off. He isn't really into crafty things and will do lego for about 10 minutes but again if the pieces ar too small he wont do it. If I get the playdoh out he will just walk off and leave me to it leaving me frustrated! Like the idea of the raisins so I'll give that a go. As far as I'm aware the only help he is getting with his writting is using a pen grip.

It would still be worth getting an OT to assess his fine motor skills. Look for pencils which have grips on them which you can get from most shops, early learning, whsmiths, staples. Ask his class teacher if they will let your son go back to printing instead of cursive writing as he is struggling. If he likes sport then try squelchy balls like the odd ones you can get from Hawkins bizarre to play with to strengthen his hands instead of the play doh? Try using a sports theme when using pencils perhaps draw a football pitch and take turns to draw a player on it or something?