A Guide To Pre-Writing Skills!

Throughout their time in preschool children develop rapidly. They may not be holding a pencil correctly, copying letters or writing words but through play children are mastering crucial skills which are the first building blocks to being able to write. For older children who struggle with handwriting it is often the underlying areas developed in early childhood that are lacking.

The Importance of Building Gross Motor Skills

In order for children to perform the fine motor movements needed to form letters they need a solid base of support which means they need to develop strong gross motor skills and movements.

Sitting with good posture during handwriting tasks is very important. Good sitting posture and core strength can often be overlooked when it comes to teaching handwriting.

Children with poor posture/core strength may:

• Slouch back in their chair
• Lean forward too close to the paper
• Constantly move or shift positions
• Rest their head in their non-dominant hand or on the table
• Dangle their non-dominant arm/hand beside their body instead of stabilising the paper.
• Display poor balance in their chair
• Show fatigue or complain of tiredness

The correct sitting posture for handwriting involves:

• Feet flat on the floor
• Straight back, facing towards the desk, pivoting from the hips
• Thighs parallel to the floor and knees at a 90-degree angle
• Neck and shoulders relaxed
• Paper stabilised with non-dominant hand
• Body to squarely face the desk so that the non-dominant hand can support body weight.

In order for children to achieve the correct sitting posture for handwriting they need a solid core and strong neck muscles to sit upright and to keep their head upright. Strong shoulders are needed in order to facilitate arm and wrist movements and strong fingers are required to effectively grasp objects.

Postural Control and Shoulder Stability

In order to be able to sit and write letters children require adequate postural control. Postural control is our ability to keep our bodies stable when we are stationary and when we move. Effective postural control provides us with a strong foundation to be able to use our arms, hands and fingers with good control.

Shoulder stability refers to the ability to contract the muscles on either side of the shoulder joint to hold the shoulder steady. This allows the arm to be held in different positions while the forearm and hand do an activity. Our shoulders support our arms and hands, when there is reduced shoulder stability children have less control over their arms and hands.

The Importance of the Playground

Playing on outdoor playground equipment such as swings, seesaws, climbing frames, ladders and monkey bars is crucial in helping children to develop postural control and shoulder stability.

Walking or running up and down unstable surfaces, crawling through tunnels and navigating obstacle courses are all extremely beneficial activities.

Pushing and pulling vehicles such as prams, carts and trolleys and helping out with gardening tasks such as digging, raking and carrying soil and water in buckets develops shoulder stability.

How to develop Gross Motor Skills?

Gross motor skills improve through practise and repetition. Therefore, children must be exposed to a variety of movement activities. Coordinating big muscles comes before the coordination of smaller muscles in the hands therefore gross motor development is essential before writing can begin.

Stepping stones where children move through a course placing the correct foot on each stone or walking or hopping backwards and forwards through hoops on the ground can help children to develop spatial orientation and body awareness.

When completing obstacle courses children can travel with their arms in different positions. Carrying objects such as balls and beanbags and dropping them into targets whilst moving can be an effective form of body movement.

Balance beams are excellent for developing gross motor skills. Children can walk forwards (heel- to- heel), backwards or sideways with feet sliding to each other or crossing over. For a greater challenge children can turn or pick up/drop objects whilst balancing on a beam.

 The outdoor environment lends itself to large gross motor movements. Children can:

• Experiment at the water table
• Paint on large sheets or easels
• Paint the outdoor area with water and large paintbrushes or rollers
• Wash toy vehicles
• Practise stretching and popping bubbles blown in the air
• Turn a skipping rope for a group game
• Dance with a ribbon stick
• Throw and catch a large ball or hit a large ball/balloon with a bat

Crossing the Midline

The midline is an imaginary line running down the centre of the body, dividing the body into two halves (left and right). When we ‘cross the midline’ we move a body part to cross over the midline in order to complete a task.

The automatic crossing of the midline is required for mature and complex movements. Being able to cross the midline is important as it is needed for visual tracking as children learn to read by following words across a page. Many every day actions such as getting dressed and reaching for objects across a table require midline crossing.

Difficulties Crossing the Midline

Children who have difficulty with midline crossing will lean over to the right or left when writing on that side rather than rotating their upper body or they may rotate their paper 180⁰ to write or perhaps swap hands half way through writing a line.

If a child has difficulties with midline crossing this can delay the emergence of hand dominance which can impact performance in fine motor tasks. Activities such as writing, colouring, buttoning, dressing and using scissors may be difficult and children may constantly swap between hands.

Activities which reinforce crossing the midline can include:

• Ask children to wipe their whiteboard or a table (make a rainbow without lifting the hand)
• Draw rainbows with chalk on the floor and walls outdoors
• Play clapping games such as Patty Cake
• When playing with toy cars on a racetrack invite children to move the car without changing hands (set out track in a figure of eight)
• Pass beanbags from one hand to the other across the body
• Place finger puppets on one hand and remove with the opposite hand by reaching over

Bilateral Coordination Skills

Bilateral coordination (also known as bilateral integration) means using both sides of the body together to do an activity effectively. The brain communicates effectively and automatically integrates movements of both legs and/or arms.

Children who have difficulty with bilateral coordination may find it difficult to use their other hand to support or assist their dominant hand to complete tasks such as holding/adjusting paper when writing, drawing or cutting.

Writing involves asymmetrical coordination where both sides of the body are working together but doing different movements. This involves one side supporting or assisting the other – one hand is required to stabilise or adjust the paper.

Activities which target bilateral coordination include:

• Commando crawling – with tummies on the floor
• Animal Walks – dog, bear or crab walking
• Marching games and songs
• Playing games such as Hopscotch, Twister
• Using balance bikes, scooters, trikes and bikes
• Tasks which require threading such as beads or pasta onto string
• Use stencils, a ruler or Spirograph to develop the use of two hands working together

Visual Perceptual Skills

Handwriting is a complex skill! In order to produce legible handwriting effective motor skills as well as visual perceptual skills are required. Visual perception is the process where the brain extracts and organises information, giving meaning to what we see.

Visual motor integration relates to our ability to take visual information and to respond to it with our movements. This helps us to be able to copy shapes and letters accurately by translating what we see into a physical movement when using our arm to move a pen. Poor visual perceptual skills can result in letters, shapes and numbers being incorrectly formed, distorted or reversed.

Strategies and activities to help develop visual perceptual skills include:

• The use of concrete objects such as dominoes, card games such as matching pairs and bingo games.
• Peg patterns – children can copy set patterns
• Use play dough to physically make letters and numbers
• Spot the difference/find the odd one out activities
• Match and sort games/puzzles
• Search and find tasks such as find all the letter ‘b’s’ in the paragraph, all the rhyming words on the page.
• Complete partially drawn pictures
• Dot to Dot/mazes

Pre-Handwriting Shapes

The ability to copy pre-writing shapes (a vertical line, circle, horizontal line, right oblique line, square, left oblique line and an oblique cross) are an indication of a child’s readiness to integrate visual motor skills to begin handwriting instruction.

Children are typically encouraged to control their pencils and practise hand-eye coordination by tracing various lines, then shapes and then letters. Lines may be dotted or faded and children may also be provided with paths, roads or outlines to draw between.

Children will need to be aware of subtle differences which distinguish letters for example an ‘n’ can easily look like a ‘h’ if the initial line is too long. Children can also demonstrate difficulty with writing on a line, leaving adequate spacing between letters and words, or maintaining writing on the left-hand side of the page with the beginning of each line. These important skills all require time and practise.

Mark Making

Young children’s first experience of writing involves mark making and simple drawings. Mark making is the creation of different patterns, lines, textures and shapes. This could be done on a piece of paper, on the floor, in the outside area or using different sensory materials.

At first, mark making may be a blend of writing and drawing. Children may incorporate writing into games and role play situations where they have noticed people writing.

Consider Opportunities for Spontaneous Mark Making

Opportunities for spontaneous mark making can happen in both the indoor and outdoor learning environments. Mark making resources should be carefully chosen, well organised and attractively presented so that children can independently decide how to represent their ideas and which medium to use.

Easels and Art Trolleys

When resources are attractively displayed children will be curious and willing to try new materials and have new experiences. A Millhouse Art Trolley allows available resources to be used in both the indoor and outdoor classroom environments.

Easels are especially useful for vertical drawing and painting as they help children to develop wrist strength and flexibility which will be needed when they come to holding a pencil correctly.

Young children tend to draw using large movements (from the shoulder rather than the wrist) which creates larger shapes and lines. Therefore, plain paper rather than lines is less restrictive. Uncontrolled movements become more controlled and smaller as motor skills develop and children begin to write at a small scale, moving more from the elbow and wrist.

In the early stages of mark making children will need to be provided with a wide range of opportunities. Sensory resources can help children to develop hand-eye coordination as well as gross motor skills. The sensory feedback from drawing in sand or making marks with sticks in the mud can associate writing with pleasure.

If a designated space in the classroom is organised as a mark-making zone, this can be a place of inspiration. Basic resources should be always available and interesting, new resources can be offered as required. Resources can be combined with tools for painting, collage and junk modelling.

Indoor Mark Making Experiences

Experiences can include:

• Use paintbrushes to make marks in sand or flour
• Shaving foam painting on windows/mirrors
• Cards – practise writing own name
• Mini-books
• Marker pens on cloth – make t-shirts
• Write recipes/lists/invitations/letters in the home corner
• Draw maps/roads/homes in the small world area
• Aqua Draw mats
• Use torches in a dark den

Outdoor Mark Making Experiences

Experiences can include:

• Finger painting
• Chalk painting – on floors and walls
• Make marks to music with ribbon sticks
• Paint rocks/pebbles with water
• Leave secret messages for story characters/fairies to find
• Use watering cans to mark make
• Swirl sticks into coloured water
• Use paint and toy cars to make marks on paper on the floor

Developing Effective Pencil Grip

Children need to be developmentally ready to hold a writing tool using the correct grip. As young children’s gross motor skills, hand strength and fine motor skills develop they will need to try a range of pencil, crayon and paintbrush thicknesses. Thicker drawing tools can be easier for young children to develop effective pencil grasp.

Children should be encouraged to hold their pencil in a way that allows their hand and fingers to move freely and easily when writing and drawing therefore developing a functional pencil grasp .

Occupational Therapy Guidance recommends: 

• The pencil is held in a stable position between the thumb, index and middle fingers.
• The ring and little finger are bent and rest comfortably on the table.
• The index finger and thumb form an open space.
• The wrist is bent back slightly and the forearm is resting on the table.
• The pencil is held 1-2 cm from the tip.

A pencil grip only tends to become a problem if a child is experiencing joint pain, fatigue when writing, is not able to adequately control their pencil or writes at a much slower pace than their peers. Pencil grip can be difficult to change once a grasp pattern has been established.

By working on fine motor skills children develop the skills they need to hold their pencil functionally and write more easily.

Fun ways to build fine motor strength include:

• Paper crumpling – Challenge children to crumple up sheets of newspaper or scrap paper using only one hand.
• Tape Races – Ask children to tear off lots of pieces of masking/washi tape and stick them to a flat surface (table/floor). Have a race to see how many pieces they can pull off in a set time.
• Playing with play dough - Make a rainbow by asking children to roll out long 'noodle' shapes. Play 'Guess the Object' games.
• Pegs - Ask children to sort a collection of pompoms into different bowls, using pegs to attach and move them.
• Tongs - Use tongs to sort and separate coloured blocks/buttons.
• To practise forming curved and straight lines children can trace a drawn image using a highlighter pen. 

Start Helping Your Children Write Today!

Learning to write is closely linked with children’s physical and cognitive developments. Children need plenty of daily opportunities for challenging and vigorous movement play in order to develop postural control, core strength, hand-eye co-ordination and upper body strength.

Young children also need opportunities and encouragement to experiment with sensory and tactile materials in order to become confident mark makers. Outdoor provision, time and freedom to explore resources will help children to develop coordination, motor skills and positive attitudes toward writing.