Handwriting Skills to Prepare Your Kids for Success

2

Mobile phones, tablets, digital assistants. These days it may seem that kids learn to type on a keyboard or ask Siri even before they can crawl. That doesn’t mean we should forget about teaching handwriting.

Why Handwriting Matters

Handwritten communication is still a part of our everyday lives. Whether it’s signing a birthday card or taking notes, your child needs to be able to share information through paper and pen. Plus, there are many benefits for learning handwriting. These skills have been found to build your child’s self-confidence, boost their memory, and help them focus. All of this sets them up for success in school.  

How to Work with Your Child on Handwriting

Building the skills needed for handwriting can start long before kids write their first letters, says Michelle Pearson, OTR/L at Blank Children’s Hospital. This means having the appropriate strength in their hands and hand-eye coordination. Both play a factor in preparing them to pick up a pencil.

The first step for building hand and arm strength is crawling. For older children, an important foundation to writing is coloring and drawing simple shapes. Pearson shares the following fun ideas for coloring activities:

Finger painting

Using sidewalk chalk

Drawing in shaving cream

Using dry erase markers on windows

When and Where to Get Support

Some kids might need a little extra help when it comes to developing their handwriting skills. Pearson says some signs your child may need extra help are difficulty with basic shape formation (not able to start shapes at the top) or very large and unreadable letters. Other clues they may be struggling are if they switch hands while coloring because they get tired or they have a different grip on their writing utensil that causes problems.

No matter what the cause, you don’t want to see your child get frustrated or overwhelmed with writing tasks. Fortunately, occupational therapy can help. Pediatric occupational therapy at Blank Children’s focuses on helping kids be independent and do what they need to do as a kid, such as playing, learning, and interacting with others.

One option to consider are the Summer Handwriting Camps at Blank Children’s Pediatric Therapy. These are designed to help your child improve their fine motor skills and writing through fun and engaging activities.

The eight-week program in West Des Moines starts the week of June 11 and offers camp for ages pre-K through 5th grade. The small groups will meet once a week for an hour to focus on handwriting tasks. All program materials will be individualized for your child. Learn more and register for the camps online.

Connect with Blank Children’s Hospital UnityPoint Health

1200 Pleasant St. Des Moines
515-241-5437
This sponsored post is brought to you by UnityPoint Health Des Moines.

2 COMMENTS

  1. I’m interested in learning more about this. When are the sessions, what is the cost, is this the first time this program has been offers?

    • Hi Jill! See the link in the post – “learn more and register for the camps online” for answers to all your questions!

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here