Pre writing skills

So much of what we do in the classroom is subtly helping to develop the child’s hand strength and coordination in preparation for writing. I found it quite fascinating when I first began my teaching degree how much you could prepare your child for writing, without ever actually doing any writing. When a child has been exposed to all these activities and given the opportunity to develop their hand strength at a young age, they start writing and just excel! That gives them a lot of confidence, they take great pride in their new skills and have a really positive attitude towards writing. In contrast, the child who is lacking in strength and coordination trudges along, not really being able to progress very fast when they begin to write and that is a lot harder, a lot less motivating. At the end of the day, what we are looking to foster in our students more than anything else, is a love of learning, and everyone loves what they are good at, what comes naturally, without pain or struggle. We probably all remember the children in school who would waste the majority of their time procrastinating, saying ‘I hate writing’ or ‘I can’t do it’. With the right preparation, that will never be your child, they won’t need to be hampered down with insecurities and can get on with perfecting their skills with the knowledge that they can do it and they are good at it.

I am told by parents of kindy children that some of the children in their child’s class still cannot hold a pencil correctly! This is also quite common with young children when they start preschool, where the child has gotten into a firm habit of holding their pencil with a fist, with their hand upside down or a number of other strange ways. The way to overcome this is through constant moving the child's hand back into the correct position and reminding them of how to hold it, until the habit is broken. However, it is much easier for them to learn the right way to begin with, rather than unlearn old ways.

Essentially, any activity where the child is forced to hold objects in the ideal pencil grip, is a great to way to prepare them for writing.

• Chalk or crayons, broken into little pieces, so that they are too small to be able to be held in any way other than than with the tips of their fore fingers and thumb are ideal. If you don’t have a chalk board you just need a paved/ concrete outdoor area that can be hosed down once they have finished. The older children love to have such a big area to get creative as well, and seeing them working can be great inspiration for little ones. Once a good pencil hold has been established, any drawing or coloring in is a fantastic way to get their hand strength and coordination going. 

 

•          Puzzles with little knobs

•          Any small fiddly activities such as Lego, where the item is so small it must be held by the tips of fingers.

 

 

•  Pegs! Great for developing concentration as well. When my mum introduced my little one to a bowl of pegs he spent a solid hour putting them all around the bowl and taking them off, again and again, totally absorbed in his work. It is even better if you can organize it so that they can help you hang real clothes on a low line and put pegs on it. I can halve the time spent hanging and taking down laundry by giving Jake a little basket to hang out, while I hang out larger things on the big line and he feels like he is really involved and I guess gets that satisfaction from being a productive member of the family! I have seen lovely little hills hoist play washing lines online that would be so cute and perfect for this if you want something a bit more pretty. This is just the cheap and quick option, about $10 from Kmart for the drying rack and a peg basket with pegs.

 

• ​     Beading, starting with big chunky beads and as concentration and skill increases, working towards smaller beads. You can talk about colors or make patterns as they get more skilled.                                                                                                                                                  
  

-          Spooning, whether it is feeding themselves or as an activity

 

-         Using Tongs to serve food. At the Montessori playgroup we attend the children serve themselves a snack using tongs, they love it! There is a lot of heaping up plates unnecessarily so that they get to use the tongs a bit more...

-  When they are really good at using things like tongs and pegs, move it up to tweezers for a good challenge. If you can get your hands on a sunflower the dried up middle part of the flower is really interesting for the children, they can really get up close and examine it all, pull out the little seeds and peel back their shell. It is fascinating to them to think each of those little seeds can grow a whole new enormous sunflower with so many new seeds! 

  

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If your child is using an iPad or tablet be aware that while it might be developing other things, it isn't developing their pencil hold. I have had students that have had great little games on these devices and spent a lot of time on them. Some of them have been fantastic at reading and spelling, but didn’t have the hand coordination to be able to write more than the most basic letters. I think that if your child is really keen on using a tablet, than a stylus pen would be a great investment, so that they are practicing holding their pen all the time that they are using the device.