The hand that writes
By R.L. Garcia
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:31:00 10/11/2008
MANILA, Philippines—Handwriting ability is a reasonable output that many parents will expect from their children, whom they have sent for schooling early on during their preschool years (around 3 to 6 years of age). After all, handwriting, is indeed a very critical developmental milestone and a necessary skill that is almost as basic as learning to eat or talk. An extra bonus for many parents is when their children turn up with beautiful, evenly spaced and pristine writing outputs. At its very least, handwriting is essential.
Many parents set out to achieve this by purchasing voluminous workbooks of tracing exercises, super big coloring books and dot to dot, instructing caregivers or spending time themselves sitting down with the preschoolchild for about 30 minutes or so in a day, supervising the completion of these worksheets. Younger preschoolchildren will usually need or even require an adult to place a hand over theirs, practically executing the task for the child, whose soft and feeble fingers are not yet quite accustomed to the tight and steady grip required to make a definite mark.
This well-meant practice and exercise may reap benefits in a proper time and framework. Yet, for preschoolchildren, pre-maturely setting the pace for structured writing exercises at a time when physical and cognitive readiness are not yet in place may preempt a child’s natural desire to explore this supposedly basic and essential skill. Since a child will need to develop this skill and use it for most of his/her adult life, should he/she develop love for it, rather than disdain and drudgery? Isn’t a skill more readily acquired and appreciated when it can be meaningfully applied rather than acquired simply by imposition (literally by the adult hand over the child’s hand)?
It is important, therefore to prepare the hand that writes before handwriting can be reasonably executed. Of course, the other side of the coin, that is the mind that writes is equally important, too, in that what the child “writes” is something that strikes a meaning to his/her young mind, a meaning as simple as for instance the sound of a letter which he/she hears in a word. This is another matter all together and deserves a separate article. Nevertheless, to develop the hand that writes and to understand it in the context of the “developing and emerging” potentialities of a preschoolchild, is important if we wish to increase the chances of promoting handwriting as an essential yet pleasurable beginning experience for young children. We, occasionally, should allow our children to show us the way . For instance….
• Very young children like to touch things. They have moved on from a passive “waiting for mom to give me my toy” to reaching out and holding it for themselves. This comes with the freeing of the hand from crawling, as they now walk and so the hand is more active. Adjust your home environment to allow as much opportunities for this as possible with as little need for restraint as possible.
• Young children usually enjoy touching and picking up small objects. While still very young, they grasp with their entire palm but after a while, they begin to take note of tiny things and attempt to pick them up. This time, they would need to exercise the fingers and in their attempts, they are actually helping themselves improve their finger motor skills, in effect their emerging pencil grip.
Provide real but safe opportunities for your child to do a lot of handling of small items, with supervision of course. Use these as teachable moments for helping your child slowly learn what is safe and not. If circumstances allow, tell your child that something is unsafe and have him/her hand the object to you instead of grabbing it from her/him.
• Generally, muscles develop when they are used and fail to do so when they are idle ... so, allow your child to use their muscles in doing tasks that they need to learn doing anyway. Allow them to hold their own glasses or mugs, even glassware. Young children surprise many by showing that they can handle breakables if told that they are breakables and if they are shown how to handle them.
Allow them to zip their pants, button their shirts, fold their clothes, carry their bags, stir their drink, all these tasks prepare the hands and fingers for writing. The children will love the “freedom.” While we must not set up our children for failure, we must, from time to time allow them to fail. The former dampens the spirit, the latter strengthens it.
• When a child picks up a writing implement like a pen, pencil, crayola or pentel pen and start making marks wherever and whenever, he/she is actually engaging in beginning writing. Scribbling, first in random dots and lines and then in circles are expressive outlets for creativity alongside developing fine motor skills. Provide space for such explorations, like a wide space covered with Manila Paper.
Notebooks and structured writing materials are not necessary yet as the child simply desires to express himself/herself through scribbles. There are also teachable moments. (It is okay to scribble on the table with the brown paper or the white board but not on the wall or on the sofa.)
• Finally, when children display improved ability in handling the pencil, it may be better to try out copying rather than tracing exercises. In the beginning, it may be good to utilize the “copy me” stage… “Can you write something like this?” rather than giving them dots to trace. Structured tracing can be done later on to refine handwriting, after the child has already derived a “pleasure and love” for expressing himself/herself in handwriting.
(For questions and clarifications on this article, you may e-mail the writer at magnificence2008@gmail.com. Parents who want to learn more about their preschoolchild may visit www.fmployola.com.)
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