Dysgraphia or Bad Hand Writing (Fine Motor Skill Issue)

Last year in kindergarten, our son had the worst handwriting in the class. We (and the teacher) struggled to read almost anything he wrote. At the beginning of the year, his teacher told us to give things some time. By the end of the year, she was also concerned.

His teacher gave us some ideas to use over the summer. She said if we didn't see improvement in first grade, then testing may be an option. First, he had to continue writing and journaling. We didn't want this to be too much "work". We didn't want to make it a fight or make him hate writing. So we worked out a system. For every page he wrote he would get a poker chip. The poker chips could be cashed in for screen time. It motivated him to do it. We never had to ask him, it was always his idea. And since we let him write about anything he wanted, he enjoyed making up stories when he was bored. We would use his stories to casually talk about sentence structure or punctuation. We tred lightly. We wanted to teach without putting him off.

Then she said we needed to help him with fine motor skills and hand strength. So we played with a lot of playdough. We made games where he had to move and transport small object using tweezers or clothes pins (he really loved these games). We did lots of cutting and hole punch activities. And we left stress balls lying around to play with. We also made paper airplanes and encouraged playing with legos. And we taught him to do some simple embroidery. I really think this helped him immensely and he really loves to sew now.

We NEVER called it handwriting work. We never forced it. They were just fun silly things we planned for him to do. We did see improvement over the summer, but we knew he had a long way to go.

When first grade started, we talked with his teacher about our concerns immediately. She assured us that we would see improvement, because kids gain so much in the area of confidence and fine motor coordination in first grade. And sure enough, slowly we saw the handwriting get better. He is not the best writer in the class, but you can read everything he writes this year and he is definitely no longer the worst writer in the class!! It has been quite amazing to see his work transform.

It's too soon to worry.
Some kids are not writing at all when they start kindergarten and it can take till 2nd or 3rd grade before they settle into the writing that will be their style pretty much for life.
Practice can help (have him keep a journal) but don't just focus just on writing to improve his writing.
He needs to work those hand/wrist/arm muscles in many different ways.
Cutting with scissors
playing with play dough
finger painting
drawing
coloring
lacing cards
sorting beans/buttons/pasta shapes
etc

I'm glad that you put in your post that your son is 6, since he is still in kinder. That helps.

As far as tying shoes is concerned, it's normal for a kindergartner to not tie shoes. Some children don't learn until they want to. My older son didn't learn until a girl he was "sweet on" tied her shoes in front of him, and it embarrassed him that he couldn't. He learned in one afternoon, and that was when he was in 1st grade. So please don't worry about that.

About the handwriting - here's what I did because I knew my son had an issue (I just didn't know what the issue was...) Ask for a referral to a pediatric neurologist and tell the doctor what you observe. Take a sample of his handwriting with you so that he sees what you are talking about. My son's neurologist told me that my son had a weakness in his writing hand, and we addressed it with an OT who was actually a handwriting specialist. I got REALLY lucky and found one who had group classes, and made it fun for the kids. I found her ad in one of those free parenting magazines, and her classes were WONDERFUL. She dealt with sensory integration problems in her classes in the "guise" of play as well. She used Jan Olsen's "Handwriting Without Tears" program. I have to tell you that this is the best way of dealing with this.

I would NORMALLY tell you not to worry about the ball issue. However, since you know that there is an issue with his handwriting, the way he throws a ball could be associated with it. This is why you should have him checked by the neurologist to make sure that he doesn't have an issue that he needs help with.

Yes, there are plenty of people out there who have awful handwriting and throw a ball poorly. Does that mean that there's something wrong with them? No. Does it mean that it should be ignored? No. You would do right by your child to have him assessed and get him some help with this so that his life is easier. I PROMISE you that learning good handwriting habits and addressing any problem will help him in his many years of schooling. He doesn't have to have dysgraphia to have an issue, either.

Knowledge is power. Go get him assessed.

If you haven't had his eyes tested by an opthamologist.. make an ap[ointment.. make sure he can see up close.. (to write) and far away (to throw the ball)

I would think an occupational therapist would test the for the hand function. see if your dr can give you a referral. my kid did 6 weeks of speech therapy and it helped so much. maybe a few weeks of Occupational therapy over the summer..(when you have more time0 wwould do wonders for him.

Ya know it's funny, years ago most five year olds could tie their shoes, but not write nor were expected to write or read. Now they're expected to write and read but not tie their shoes. The system has it backwards.

Anyway, I won't go into the many reasons children should not learn academics too soon, although there are warehouse loads of reasons and the facts behind them. But I wanted to tell you that you may want to check into brain gym, just google it. You may also want to check into books by Raymond Moody. I think one is called Later is Better.

There are many things you can do to help your son with handwriting but you might be surprised at some of the answers. One thing is to have him draw in the air with his finger then the other hand -- different straight and curved lines, figure 8 and such, then have him do it with his feet then his nose. Pick up marbles with his toes (both feet) and put them in a basket. Draw with his toes on a chalkboard or a taped down large paper. Be sure he gets plenty of climbing, running, etc. Say verses with him while you and he walks to the beat, then do it backward, then do it with your eyes closed. Do the same with a song. Play catch with a small soft ball or bean bag while you sing or recite a verse, example: "round and round the earth is turning always turning round to morning and from morning round to night." Jumping rope or chinese jump rope. These are just a few ideas that will do amazing things for balance, dexterity and connecting the brain waves, so to speak. Of course you'd have to make a plan, practice yourself and do it every day or at least five times a week. You only need to practice for about thirty minutes each day. Do not underrate the affects of these activities for healing and closing the gaps in early childhood development.

Along with brain gym you may want to look up waldorf activities for the balanced child.

The best to you and your little boy

Boys notoriously have terrible handwriting. I would work with him over the summer if you are concerned. Boys gross motor skills are much better. He is in
Kindergarten. Cut him some slack before you start labeling him and run ing him to doctors. My sonsage 35 and 36 still have crappy handwriting. It comes together in first grade. Words look like words and not just letters.

Tying shoes. Does he wear tie shoes everyday or Velcro, Some kids don't master that for a long time especially since the invention of Velcro. So he does not throw a all well. I don't see any of these as issues.

I think it may be early days to decide anything yet, but you can always start working with him now if you suspect fine motor delay or dysgraphia.
Even if he doesn't have any of those things, he can learn to do things with his hands and have fun at the same time.

First of all, for writing, take a look at the Handwriting Without Tears program. It was developed by a pair of OT's, and some schools are now using their program to teach writing to all their kids, not just those with issues. They have materials for both print and cursive. I am currently using their cursive program with my 3rd grade son, and it has indeed been painless.

Now, a few things that have helped my daughter, who had fine motor delays, "catch up" her fine motor skills:

1. Working with clay can be great. It exercises the hands, and your child won't realize that he's practicing - he'll be rolling snakes or balls, or pounding clay to get the air bubbles out, of using a rolling pin to flatten slabs of clay. Teach him how to make pinch pots and coil pots (you can learn how to do these on line). Let him build sculptures or figurines. Or just play around and make shapes.

2. It's not too early to play around with basic keyboarding, even if at his age he probably won't get good at it. There is a really fun free program you can access online called Dance Mat Typing. The BBC folks created it.

3. Building with blocks is very good for hand/eye coordination.

4. Legos!

5. If he has the patience for it, origami is great training for both using your hands precisely and following directions. You can find all sorts of patterns ranging from simple to complex online.

6. Teach him to use basic tools. Build something together.

7. Get him to help you cook. What kid wouldn't like to help mix the dough for chocolate chip cookies, or measure and drop the cookie dough onto the sheet pan? After all, there's a payoff at the end of the project.

8. Get him a simple knitting loom (usually available at fabric stores or craft stores) and a few colorful skeins of yarn and teach him to use it. His hands get practice doing close work without him needing to hold needles or figure out stitches, and the entire family gets homemade scarves for Christmas. :-)

9. Keep art materials easily accessible. Let him draw and paint to his heart's content.

10. Get a bucket of water and a large paint brush (like one you'd use to paint the wall) and have him write "secret messages" on the driveway. As the water dries, the message disappears, so he can do it again.

11. Sidewalk chalk.

12. Have you ever seen on of those dinosaur excavation kits? You get a plastic dinosaur skeleton encased in plaster of paris. (And yes, you can make your own - embed plastic dinos, or marbles for "gem mining.") Then let him chip away at it with a little hammer and chisel, and brush away the dusty bits with a paint brush or tooth brush.

Talk to your pediatrician and ask for a referral to an ophthalmologist who will test for not just acuity, but eye function. He may have vision issues.

My son has ocular motor dysfunction and convergence dysfunction; the latter was treated through eye therapy and the former, his therapist gives him eye exercises to provide good bio-feedback. He will be dealing with this all his life and so now is the time to promote good visual habits and 'visual hygiene'. Because we have a diagnosis, we also have a 504 plan for him which helps his teacher to help him and addresses what sorts of interventions can be helpful for his learning; i.e.--placement in the classroom near the teacher; use of certain materials such as primary ruled paper; facing him when one speaks to him; signs of visual strain/tiredness-- so that it isn't interpreted as 'laziness' or lack of effort, etc.

Start with that. For more information, you can check out PAVE (Parents Active for Vision Education)

http://pavevision.org/

Undiagnosed vision problems can have a profound impact on learning, so it's better to address this while your child is young. Good luck! I may be off on suggesting that the dysgraphia has to do with vision, but from my understanding, sometimes it can be caused by how the eye is perceiving the images presented. There is also another website here:

http://www.ncld.org/types-learning-disabilities/dysgraphi...

I cannot tell you a specific person to get testing done, but if you go online there are support groups specifically for dysgraphia and I am confident they can direct you to a testing facility/professional.

I am sure you are aware that dysgraphia is more than just messy handwriting. Often it is accompanied by very specific indicators--certain traits, not just messiness. Capital letters in the middle of words, poor spacing between letters within a word and words in a sentence, extreme erasure (often to the point that they make holes in the page), awkward/poor grip on the pencil, and pain. Not just the "I am getting used to writing" cramps, but pain every time they write more than a few minutes.

I believe it is considered a language processing disorder.

http://www.ncld.org/types-learning-disabilities/dysgraphi...

http://www.handwriting-solutions.com/dysgraphia.asp

http://www.ldonline.org/article/12770/

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One of the more noticeable things (my understanding anyway) between just motor skills vs. dysgraphia, is the child's attitude. Kids with dysgraphia will shut down and refuse to write. It is almost like torture for them, not just a "challenge" or something that more work will make better. He is very young to be looking for major issues, when it could be just poor handwriting. But better to stay open to the idea that it could be more, especially if he openly rebels against the "fun" ways of working on his fine motor skills.

My son went into kindergarten just before he turned five. His pre-K teacher was concerned about his handwriting - it was not very good because he is ambidextrous and because his fine motor skills were still developing. However academically I had to send him to Kindergarten. He's very smart but the last thing to develop for him was his fine motor skills. He is 10 now and really got coordinated with baseball catching and throwing when he was around 8. We asked the pediatrician for a recommendation and we sent him to Occupational Therapy for a few weeks. It made his handwriting good enough to start Kindergarten. We made him choose one hand so his handwriting was consistent. But we said he could use either hand for anything else he wanted to do. Check with your pediatrician for recommendations or go on line to see if there are games and activities you can do to help develop fine motor. Most likely it's just his age and next year he will be even better. If he is learning and reading well then it is most likely just an age thing!

Good luck.