During the Covid19 crisis, I have been continuing to support parents and carers in teaching their children handwriting whilst they are learning at home, providing a variety of resources and advice to help improve handwriting from afar.
From launching my new downloadable and printable workbooks to make it much easier for parents to access these helpful resources, to sharing homeschooling videos on my social media, with short and easy exercises that can be used at home with your child.
As always, I have also been on hand to reply to any messages from parents to provide more tailored support and I was delighted when I was recently contacted by a mother asking for support and advice to help improve her child’s pencil grip.
She has since contacted me to share the excellent results and transformation.
A great handwriting success story
During the lockdown and homeschooling, the mum noticed that her child wasn’t holding the pencil correctly, but she didn’t know how to help her.
She contacted me for my advice and help to correct the grip, to help make it easier for her child to write without experiencing a painful hand or wrist.
Here is a before picture of the child’s grip:
From this image, I noticed straight away that the child could not hold the pencil between the thumb and index finger – the correct grip.
Instead, the middle finger was steering the pencil and this grip would not only be making it painful to write, but also impacting the legibility and flow of their writing.
The biggest thing I advised was to start correcting the grip by increasing the child’s finger muscle strength, using the homeschooling activity videos I had been sharing on my social media platforms.
These videos will have helped to begin improving the dexterity of the pincer grip and improve the child’s overall strength and grip.
Here is what the mother has since sent me after they have spent time following along with my videos and building muscle strength and dexterity :
“I never knew so much of our body impacted on our handwriting. I can’t tell you how proud of herself she is! Thank you for helping, I’m really grateful.”
I am delighted to see the amazing transformation in this child’s grip, which will make writing much easier and less painful for her. It just shows with the correct support, how quickly a child’s handwriting can be improved.
If you are experiencing a similar issue with your child, from a poor pen/pencil grip, incorrect letter formation or illegible writing, I am always on hand to provide the support and advice you may need.
If a poor grip is the main issue, it would be a great starting point to take a read of a previous guest blog, written by Kim Griffin from Griffin Occupational Therapy.
In this blog, she shares her knowledge and advice on how you can support your child’s fine motor skill development.
Happy homeschooling and I hope you are staying safe!