How to Improve 4th Grader's Handwriting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’d move to cursive, teach him slowly and correctly and consistently.

+1

[Anonymous]

Cursive and they have to care. When i went to school i got downgraded for illegibility. Solved that problem real quick.

[Anonymous]

Send him to Catholic school.

[Anonymous]

OT was a huge waste of time and money for us. My kid CAN write legibly - he just won’t. He uses graph paper for math to keep things lined up and the rest is a free for all.

And it’s true that handwriting matters less and less as you get older.

[Anonymous]

Zaner-Bloser workbooks. Daily practice. Focus on quality over quantity.

[Anonymous]

Zaner-Bloser seconded. The HWWT is dreadful for cursive.

[Anonymous]

Are there any cursive handwriting camps in the area that are not HWWT?

[Anonymous]

My dd has developmental coordination disorder and low muscle tone. She had a lot of trouble holding the pencil the correct way. These pencil grips helped:

https://www.amazon.com/Pencil-Grip-Universal-Ergonomic-TPG-11106/dp/B001SN8HOY/ref=sr_1_7?crid=PDKBVHOUOVA0&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.GyMyx7RgwAlxe3oSC7VNPjCYI8nKlw-I1l8nOB9U6tNNhZnEoupilZUQOmq7ZvHUDPFA2n-Op-Tcl55o_alZgSzv-vkpAnabpMDYgS55IVsqukpLzcLoDwfeQhqkQ0gCMyaD0iAB_EBT4GFkqwTyB2khnRYJ6u-dyMWyOXLKSiRSazaYuir2niXuiN3C1dnTJaMDnVC0ZvS6tKjckt--oTdmGp7ZrYkU77SNgBmfPEyHgl7fvf22zJEJwm223aWgIzHURAV5BKKGxTb1cxy6LS8l0fwQOC7lznfzG1tWq-k.JVudkgKAoqpKHGYQd1lkRR1XH8sOoUABHpuTcJ_uBt0&dib_tag=se&keywords=Rubber+pencil+grips&qid=1713746984&sprefix=rubber+pencil+grips%2Caps%2C79&sr=8-7

[Anonymous]

Thank you for all of these suggestions.

-OP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are there any cursive handwriting camps in the area that are not HWWT?

I went on Tutors.com and found a local retired teacher to help my son. He's in 6th grade and is just starting to learn and use cursive. His printing is still atrocious, but he's at the point where he is using cursive to complete his school work. It isn't the cursive I learned as a kid, so it's not as flowy or pretty, but his handwriting is much, much more legible and much faster.

If the schools spent time on handwriting and writing in general, the kids would all be able to pick it up, just as they did when I was in ES. Even the least bright among us learned how to write legibly in print, cursive, and calligraphy. And no doubt, the actual process of learning to write helped to improve and develop fine motor skills. Tracking words on a page from a book and recording them on paper helped to build visual motor skills. Now we don't teach it and the kids who don't organically pick it up get a label slapped on them and the parents spend money on expensive OT to teach skills they might have learned if the school had just focused on recording words on paper.

I don't understand how/why the schools decided it wasn't necessary anymore. If they aren't teaching keyboarding in class to 2nd/3rd graders, they should spend the time needed to teach them to write. This means you teach the letters and then give them practice by having them write words, sentences, paragraphs, poems, and eventually stories and essays. And yes, all of this occurs over the years and not in one month, but by the 3rd grade, most kids will have mastered legible cursive handwriting and basic grammar, spelling and writing.

So many basic skills are more accessible to teach when you first teach a kid to write. Reading, spelling, grammar, punctuation, simple and complex sentence construction, paragraph structure, and story and essay structure. The process is so much more difficult without the ability to write quickly or legibly. Education should be a structured activity, not a loosey goosie through a bunch of stuff at a wall; give them a laptop, teach them how to answer multiple choice questions, and call it an education.

[Anonymous]

I wish I had an answer. My 4th grader’s writing is legible, but the way he holds a pencil is bonkers. He was in virtual school for all of 1st grade. No one fixed it in 2nd because they just wanted to get kids academically back on track.