How to help kids with writing

Helping Young Children Develop Strong Writing Skills

On this page

• Why is writing important?
• What Can You Do?
• Ideas for Parents: How to Help Your Child Become a Stronger Writer

Note: This article was adapted from two articles written by the U.S. Department of Education and was compiled by Colorín Colorado.

Writing is an important part of our daily lives. It is, however, a difficult skill to learn and master. By getting a head start with some simple activities, you can help your child begin to develop her writing skills at an early age. By doing so you will be contributing to her future success as a student and as an adult while teaching her how to express herself.

In this article, we provide some reasons that writing is an important skill for people of all ages, as well as a list of suggestions that will help your child become a stronger writer.

Why is writing important?

Writing is practical.
Every day, we need to write in order to complete our tasks, whether we are filling out a form at the doctor's office or writing an important letter. These tasks require us to write clearly, and organize information effectively.

Writing is an important element of a student's education.
Whether students are writing by hand or on the computer, many assignments and exams require students to write short answers or longer essays as a way of assessing what they have learned. As students get older, they will be expected to show more sophisticated writing skills, and to complete more sophisticated tasks through their writing. In addition, many colleges and universities require students to write essays as part of their admissions application.

Writing can be an important element of an employee's job.
Employees in many kinds of jobs are required to write on a daily basis. Perhaps they are taking phone messages and doing administrative work, or writing research reports and newspaper articles. Whatever the task, their ability to do their job well may depend on their ability to write. Many job applicants also must submit a resumé and a letter of application when applying to a new job.

Writing is an important form of communication.
Writing letters and emails is a common way of keeping in touch with our friends, relatives, and professional colleagues. Writing is frequently the final stage in communication when we want to leave no room for doubt, which is why we write and sign contracts, leases, and treaties when we make important decisions.

Writing can be an important outlet.
Many people find writing to be therapeutic, and a helpful way to express feelings that cannot be expressed so easily by speaking.

What Can You Do?

It's important to remember that writing can be as difficult a subject to teach and assess as it is to learn. Many students have trouble writing with clarity, coherence, and organization, and this can discourage them from writing if they feel frustrated.

That's where parent involvement can make a big difference. Encouraging your child to develop strong writing skills at a young age, and to become a better writer as she gets older, can have a lifelong positive impact on her writing, and may make writing an easier and more enjoyable process for her

To get you started, the Department of Education offers a number of ideas of things you can do help your child become a stronger writer. While many of these ideas apply to younger children, they can be adapted for older children as well. To learn more about ways to support your children if they continue to struggle with writing in middle and high school, read Tips for Parents of Struggling Adolescent Writers.

Ideas for Parents: How to Help Your Child Become a Stronger Writer

What You Need

• Pencils, crayons, or markers
• Yarn or ribbon
• Writing paper or notebook
• Cardboard or heavy paper
• Construction paper
• Safety scissors

Before getting started

Provide a place
It's important for your child to have a good place to write, such as a desk or table with a smooth, flat surface. It's also crucial to have good lighting.

Provide the materials
Provide plenty of paper (lined and unlined) and things to write with, including pencils, pens, and crayons.

Brainstorm
Talk with your child as much as possible about her ideas and impressions, and encourage her to describe people and events to you.

Activities for young children

Encourage the child to draw and to discuss her drawings
Ask your child questions about her drawings such as:

"What is the boy doing?"

"Does the house look like ours?"

"Can you tell a story about this picture?"

Show an interest in, and ask questions about, the things your child says, draws, and may try to write.

Ask your child to tell you simple stories as you write them down
Copy the story as your child tells it, without making changes. Ask her to clarify anything you don't understand.

Encourage your child to write her name
Practice writing her name with her, and point out the letters in her name when you see them in other places (on signs, in stores, etc.). She may start by only writing the first few letters of her name, but soon the rest will follow.

Use games
There are numerous games and puzzles that help children with spelling while increasing their vocabulary. Some of these may include crossword puzzles, word games, anagrams, and cryptograms designed especially for children. Flash cards are fun to use too, and they're easy to make at home.

Turn your child's writing into books
Paste her drawings and writings on pieces of construction paper. For each book, make a cover out of heavier paper or cardboard, and add special art, a title, and her name as author. Punch holes in the pages and cover, and bind the book together with yarn or ribbon.

Day-to-Day Activities

Make sure your child sees you writing
She will learn about writing by watching you write. Talk with her about your writing so that she begins to understand why writing is important and the many ways it can be used.

Encourage your child to write, even if she's scribbling
Give your child opportunities to practice writing by helping her sign birthday cards, write stories, and make lists.

As your child gets older, write together
Have your child help you with the writing you do, including writing letters, shopping lists, and messages.

Suggest note-taking
Encourage your child to take notes on trips or outings, and to describe what she saw. This could include a description of nature walks, a boat ride, a car trip, or other events that lend themselves to note-taking.

Encourage copying
If your child likes a particular song, suggest that she learn the words by writing them down. Also encourage copying favorite poems or quotations from books and plays.

Encourage your child to read her stories out loud
As your child gets older, ask her to share her stories with you. Listen carefully without interrupting, and give her positive feedback about her ideas and her writing!

Hang a family message board in the kitchen
Offer to write notes there for your child. Be sure that she finds notes left there for her.

Help your child write letters and emails to relatives and friends
These may include thank you notes or just a special note to say hello. Be sure to send your child a letter or card once in awhile too so that she is reminded of how special it is to get a letter in the mail. Consider finding a pen pal for your child.

Encourage keeping a journal
This is excellent writing practice as well as a good outlet for venting feelings. Encourage your child to write about things that happen at home and school, about people she likes or dislikes and why, and about things she wants to remember and do. If she wants to share the journal with you, read the entries and discuss them together.

Things to remember

Allow time
Help your child spend time thinking about a writing project or exercise. Good writers often spend a lot of time thinking, preparing, and researching before starting to write. Your child may dawdle, sharpen a pencil, get papers ready, or look up the spelling of a word. Be patient — this may all be part of her preparation.

Respond to your child's writing
Respond to the ideas your child expresses verbally or in writing. Make it clear that you are interested in what the writing conveys, which means focusing on "what" the child has written rather than "how" it was written. It's usually wise to ignore minor errors, particularly at the stage when your child is just getting ideas together.

Praise your child's writing
Take a positive approach and find good things to say about your child's writing. Is it accurate? Descriptive? Original? Creative? Thoughtful? Interesting?

Avoid writing for your child
Don't write a paper for your child that will be turned in as her work, and don't rewrite your child's work. Meeting a writing deadline, taking responsibility for the finished product, and feeling ownership of it are also important parts of the writing process.

Help your child with her writing as she gets older
Ask your child questions that will help her clarify the details of her stories and assignments as they get longer, and help her organize her thoughts. Talk about the objective of what she is writing.

Provide your child with spelling help when she's ready for it
When your child is just learning how to read and write, she may try different ways to write and spell. Our job is to encourage our children's writing so they will enjoy putting their thoughts and ideas on paper. At first, your child may begin to write words the way that she hears them. For example, she might write "haf" instead of "have", "frn" instead of "friend", and "Frd" instead of "Fred." This actually is a positive step in developing her phonemic awareness. Keep practicing with her, and model the correct spelling of words when you write. As your child gets older and begins to ask more questions about letters and spelling, provide her with the help she needs.

Practice, practice, practice
Writing well takes lots of practice, so make sure your child doesn't get discouraged too easily. It's not easy! Give her plenty of opportunities to practice so that she has the opportunity to improve.

Read together
Reading and writing support each other. The more your child does of each, the better she will be at both. Reading can also stimulate your child to write about her own family or school life. If your child has a particular favorite story or author, ask her why she thinks that story or that person's writing is special.

As you read and write more with your child, you will be building an important foundation, and taking steps that will help your child to become a better reader, writer, and student. Your efforts now will make a difference — and it may be just the difference that your child needs to succeed!

References

U.S. Department of Education. Office of Educational Research and Improvement, Archived Information. "Help Your Child Learn to Write Well." http://www.ed.gov/pubs/parents/Writing/index.html.

U.S. Department of Education. Parent Section: Helping Your Child Become a Reader. "Write On!" http://www.ed.gov/parents/academic/help/reader/part5.html#write.

Reprints

You are welcome to print copies or republish materials for non-commercial use as long as credit is given to Colorín Colorado and the author(s). For commercial use, please contact [email protected].

Major support provided by our founding partner, the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO.

With generous support provided by the National Education Association.

ADVERTISEMENT

Most Popular

Language Objectives: The Key to Effective Content Area Instruction for English Learners

8 Strategies for Building Relationships with ELLs

Supporting ELLs in the Mainstream Classroom: 12 Strategies for Language Instruction

Using Cognates to Develop Comprehension in English

Tweets by @ColorinColorado

How To Improve Writing Skills For Kids: 14 Easy Tips

Writing — it’s an important form of communication and a key part of education. But in today’s technology-driven world, kids aren’t given many opportunities to practise and improve their ability to write. This leaves many parents wondering how to improve their child’s writing skills.

It takes time to develop strong writing skills, and it can be a tough task to accomplish. Thankfully, there are many things that parents can do at home to help improve children’s writing skills.

From fun activities to daily reading and writing sessions, these tips on how to improve kids’ writing skills will help your child build his or her skills in no time.

Improve your child’s communication skills with these simple and fun kids’ writing activities.

14 Activities To Improve Kids’ Writing Skills

1. Read Up

   Regular reading is a stepping stone to better writing and helps kids’ strengthen their writing skills. It helps expand children’s vocabulary and shows them different ways of using words. This also makes it easier for them to use these words in their own writing.

   With younger children, make sure you’re reading together every day and encouraging their love of reading as they grow. Start reading early—many children who devour books grow up to become strong writers themselves. Tweet This

2. Make it Fun!

   Play games and activities that encourage writing. Crossword puzzles and word games are great for everyone. Little ones will especially like the “write the word” game: where they search for items and write down the word when they find each item.

3. Create Writing Worksheets

   For young children just learning to write, try creating a worksheet where they can trace letters and words. Write out letters and words, place another piece of paper on top, and have your child trace onto the blank piece of paper. You can also create a connect-the-dots game by having your child trace along dotted lines and then tell you which letter or word she or he finds.

4. Try Different Materials

   Switch it up by writing with something other than a pen or pencil. Sidewalk chalk on the driveway, finger painting, or a salt writing tray are all fun writing activities that will also help build kids’ writing skills.

5. Write Letters

   Today, writing letters is a bit of a lost art. Encourage your child to write letters to friends or family members. Distant family members will especially love receiving handwritten letters and it’s a great way to work on improving writing skills for kids.

   Pen-pals are also a fun idea, or you can even write letters to each other and leave them around the house to find!

6. Encourage Journalling

   Keeping a journal is a great way to express thoughts and ideas while also working on improving children’s writing skills. Plan an outing to pick a fun journal with your child and encourage them to write in it as much as possible. Make it a part of his or her daily routine.

7. Create a Writing Space

   Set aside a little corner in your house that is completely devoted to writing. Having an area dedicated solely to writing will help free your child from distractions so he or she can focus on practicing writing skills.

8. Invest Time

   Make sure your child knows you’re available to help with spelling or proofreading whenever he or she needs it. When you make writing time a priority for you, it will make it easier for your child to improve his or her writing skills.

9. Connect Their Interests

   Think about your son or daughter’s favourite book series. Or maybe he or she is obsessed with dinosaurs. Whatever his or her interests, connect them to writing. Have your child write a new short story about his or her favourite characters, or let him or her create a story all about dinosaurs.

10. Create Story Prompts

    A fun way to improve kids’ creative writing skills is to have them write short stories.

    Cut out pictures from a magazine with different characters or locations, or write down different words. Place these in a container or glue them to cards to use as writing prompts for creating a unique story. This also makes a fun activity for the whole family to join in.

11. Model It

    There’s no better way to learn something than to see someone else doing it. Let your children see you writing, often. When writing is a normal part of your daily life, it will come more naturally to them. Anything goes: a simple grocery list or letter to the teacher, holiday or thank you cards, or even a sweet note to your child.

12. Use Technology to Your Advantage

    There’s no getting around the fact that technology plays a huge part in our lives. Use it to your advantage by having your child create a blog. This can help your child work on improving his or her writing skills by encouraging frequent writing habits.

13. Make it Part of Your Daily Routine

    Make sure there’s time each day to do some writing in one way or another. Whether it’s writing a grocery list, writing in a journal or composing a letter, practicing writing every day will go a long way to improving kids’ writing skills.

14. Praise Their Work

    Show lots of interest in your child’s writing and stories. Ask questions, celebrate when he or she brings home a good piece from school, and encourage his or her writing as much as possible.

Improving Writing Skills Can Be Fun

Writing is an important practical life skill. While developing great writing skills requires lots of time and patience, you can help your child with these simple writing exercises for kids.

Lots of reading, frequent writing time in a special writing area, and incorporating fun writing activities and games will all go a long way to giving writing skills a boost.

Need Extra Help?

If your child needs extra help improving his or her writing skills, Oxford Learning can help. Our English tutoring program helps develop kids’ writing and comprehension skills, from word recognition to paragraph writing. Contact us today!

Related Resources

5 Reasons Writing By Hand Is Good For The Brain
Understanding Literacy & Your Child
5 Ways To Help Kids Learn At Home

Practicum for parents "How to help a first grader to master the skill of writing"

Keywords: bad handwriting, exercises for the formation of graphic skills

Your child is a first grader and you are faced with the fact that your child cannot write beautifully. What should a loving parent do? Many parents come to me asking how they can help their child.

The problem of poor handwriting is one of the most common problems at school.

The first reason is poorly developed fine motor skills of the hand.

Physiologists under this expression mean the movement of the small muscles of the hands. At the same time, it is important to remember about hand-eye coordination, because. the development of small hand movements occurs under visual control. Why is it so important to develop fine motor skills in a child's hands? The fact is that in the human brain, the centers that are responsible for speech and finger movements are located very close. By stimulating fine motor skills, we activate the areas responsible for speech. And besides, in the future, the child will need these skills to use movements to draw, write, dress, etc.

The second reason for is the incorrect position of the handle.

Parents and teachers face difficulties in teaching children to hold a pen correctly when writing. A child comes to school already with a certain skill to hold a writing instrument! Unfortunately, retraining is much more difficult than teaching correctly. How much effort and time is spent to teach children these seemingly simple rules! Children hold the writing instrument incorrectly: they squeeze too much, place their fingers incorrectly, bend them, twist the brush. As a result, excessive tension occurs in the fingers and hand, which causes numbness and pain, the child quickly gets tired, the speed of writing decreases and handwriting deteriorates. Wrong writing style can even contribute to such a serious disease as writing spasm.

The handle must rest on the left side of the middle finger. The index finger on top holds the handle, the thumb supports the handle on the left side. All three fingers are slightly rounded and do not grip the handle too much. The index finger can be lifted easily without the handle falling off. The ring and little fingers can be inside the palm or lie freely at the base of the thumb. While writing, the hand rests on the upper joint of the little finger bent inward. So, the handle must be held freely, without clamping it too tightly and without bending the index finger. Bending the first joint of the index finger increases muscle tension, the child quickly gets tired, and the pace of writing slows down.

The distance from the tip of the rod to the index finger should be about 2 cm. The color of the paste should be dark blue, dark purple. Adults rarely pay attention to the quality of the pen: its shape, length, thickness, hardness of the rod, and these are all important conditions for the success and ease of skill formation. The optimal length of the handle is 15 cm, it is better not to use very short and very long handles. Different types of gift and promotional pens are not suitable for writing by children, especially flat tetrahedral ones, with a diameter of more than 7 mm, etc. The core is too hard, the thickness is “not handy”, the ribbed edges are not only inconvenient, but require additional efforts, complicate the process developing writing skills.

The third reason is incorrect seating.

Correct posture: straight back, straight shoulders down, head slightly tilted at the right distance from the notebook. The chest should not be in contact with the table - this position makes it difficult to breathe.

The fourth reason is the position of the notebook.

No less important is how the paper or notebook lies. Not only the clarity of handwriting depends on its position, but also the ability to sit correctly. Try it yourself and with your child to put the notebook straight in front of you, then move it slightly to the right so that the lower left edge of the notebook (sheet of paper) is in the middle of the chest, and you can easily see that in the first position (the notebook lies straight) it is very difficult to write. The second option (the inclined position of the notebook) allows you not only to sit correctly, but more easily and freely move your hand along the line from the beginning to the end. As the sheet is filled, the notebook moves up. At first, the left hand supports the notebook from below, and when the page is filled from below, from above.

A lot depends on the psychological attitude. You should not scold the baby for ugly lines, in no case should you compare his results with the results of other children. So you can completely discourage the desire to learn. Praise your child more for what he does!

First of all, tune in to a condescending attitude towards your child, because a novice student requires patience and accuracy. Do not forget, however, that fatigue can come to the baby after a five-minute lesson in calligraphy. At the same time, a child complaining of hand fatigue shows not only crumpled and stiff fingers, but also the muscles of the forearm. In this case, the hand must be stretched. Massage is the best.

Written work at first should be done together with the child, without fuss and haste.

The principle “Less is more” is particularly relevant in calligraphy. Believe me, the effectiveness of such a technique is much higher than inaccurate repeated repetition “for show”.

There is another little trick to teach a child to write beautifully. As a rule, a piece of tracing paper is inserted into modern prescriptions for the first class. This leaflet is very useful for practicing writing beautiful letters. How do first-graders usually write in copybook? First, they train on the "draft", and only then they write in the "clean draft". By the time you need to write in a “clean copy”, the child is already pretty tired, and not everything always goes smoothly. In a word, pain! What is good about calca? It saves you from exhausting work in the "draft". We put the tracing paper on top of the page on which the child is working. On a tracing paper on a printed basis, we write the necessary letter or element two or three times, then the next one once in the recipe. We put tracing paper again: we write twice on tracing paper, the third time in copybook. In the next line, you can write one letter each on tracing paper and in copybook. Thus, the hand gets used to writing beautiful correct letters, and the child does not get tired. If there is no tracing paper in the copybook, then it is worth buying it, you don’t need a lot of it.

It is very important that your child name the letter that each element of that letter spells out. Such pronunciation has a beneficial effect on the development of speech. Pronunciation of the letter as it is written allows the child to control the correctness of each element.

Writing is a complex type of learning activity. It consists of a number of structural components, many rules and skills, the mastery of which is a complex, lengthy, difficult process for elementary school students. A student, learning to write, must master three main groups of skills, namely:

a) technical - to use writing instruments correctly, coordinate hand movements, adhere to hygiene rules;

b) graphic - correctly depict letters, syllables, words, write letters with the desired slope, a certain height and width, evenly positioned on the working side, correctly connect them;

c) spelling - correctly determine the sound and letter composition of words, comment on their description.

Mastery of these groups of skills is the basis of good writing and good handwriting. Psychologists warn: illegible words are not remembered.

The student learns two alphabets - printed and handwritten, and in alphabets - lowercase and uppercase letters. Teaching reading and writing proceeds simultaneously (in parallel) and is closely related to the development of speech, the enrichment of vocabulary, the streamlining of the syntactic structure of speech, and pronunciation skills.

Learning to write is an integral part of the general Russian language program. It cannot be viewed in isolation. It is closely interconnected with learning to read, with the development of oral and written speech, spelling, fine arts, labor, and physical education.

A special requirement is to teach children from the first days to the correct fit at the desk (put their feet on the floor or the crossbar of the desk if they do not reach the floor, the back is straight, the spine is not curved; eyes from the notebook are at a distance of 30-35 cm; head slightly tilted forward; the shoulders of the students are horizontal, one shoulder cannot be lower than the other; the arms are pulled up to the waist to the width of the palm, lie on the desk, the elbows hang slightly (by 2-3 cm) so that the right hand moves freely when writing). The notebook should lie obliquely (to the left), the angle of inclination of the lower end of the page in relation to the line of the table or desk is approximately 25 °; the lower left corner of the page on which the student writes is located opposite the middle of the chest; gradually filling the page, the child moves the notebook to the left with his left hand.

The position of the pen in the hand when writing. The handle is held by three fingers: thumb, index and middle. It is located between the thumb and middle fingers, and the index finger holds it from above.

Children must not grip the handle tightly. The index finger should not bend. The fingers are slightly extended. The distance from the tip of the index finger to the ball is approximately 1.5-2 cm (as convenient).

The teacher checks how freely the children hold the pen in their hand, as they may develop the wrong habit of holding the pen with four fingers, in a fist. Children put their hands on the desk on the elbow and show how to hold the pen. The index finger is lifted up several times. The teacher reminds that the pen does not need to be squeezed, it is only necessary to hold it between the thumb and middle fingers. When writing, you need to lightly press the index finger on the pen. When in contact with paper, it leaves a noticeable mark.

The first letter, the first word… How much effort a first-grader sometimes spends, and only scribbles appear in a notebook. “What is the matter? - parents are worried - After all, the child is trying. The child is nervous, the parents are worried, the teacher is not happy. And the reason is insufficiently developed manual dexterity. This makes it much more difficult to master the skill of writing, and subsequently improve it.

A child with poor coordination of hand movements draws worse, experiences difficulties in physical education and technology lessons. Therefore, it is very important to start developing this quality in a timely manner, even before entering school, and continue to improve it throughout the entire period of study in the first two grades.

The degree of development of manual dexterity in children of 5-7 years of age can be determined by the number of throws of a ball with a diameter of 10 centimeters against a wall from a distance of 1 meter. If in 30 seconds the child threw and caught the ball more than 24 times - the coordination of his hand movements is good, from 24 to 19 times - satisfactory, less than 19 times - poor.

Special physical exercises that need to be done daily help to improve hand coordination. At the same time, one should not forget about other physical education activities, since children with a low level of manual dexterity, as a rule, have poorly developed general coordination and speed of movements. Such children are very useful games and exercises with the ball. Parents should in every way encourage them to such games, and at the first opportunity to play ball with their children.

Teach your child to shift and then throw the ball to different heights and catch it with both and one hand; catch the ball after additional movements (clapping in front of you, behind your back, turning 360 degrees, squats). From time to time check how effective these exercises are. This can be done using very simple control exercises:

• Hit the ball on the floor and catch it after the bounce, first with a grip from below, then from above.
• Hit the ball on the floor while standing still and then moving in different directions. Catch alternately with each hand separately, then with both hands.
• Throw the ball against the wall from a distance of one and a half to two meters and catch it with two, and then with one hand. Gradually accelerate the pace of throws.
• Throw at a target located at a height of 1 meter, 1.5 meters, 2 meters, balls of different diameters alternately with the right and left hands.

As hand dexterity improves, the child will be able to master these tests more easily. The pace of their implementation will increase, as well as the number of repetitions of each exercise.

1.

I.p. - standing or sitting,
arms extended in front of the chest,
fingers apart.
Strongly clench your fingers into fists,
stay in this position for 2-3 seconds,
then unclench and relax your hands and
shake them.
Repeat 4-6 times

2.

I.p. - standing or sitting,
arms extended in front of the chest,
fingers of the right hand clenched into a fist.
Unclench the fingers of the right hand and
simultaneously clench the fingers of the left hand into a fist,
return to I.p.
Repeat 20 or more times,
gradually speeding up the pace.

3.

I.p. - standing or sitting,
palms together,
fingers intertwined.
Alternately bend and unbend the fingers.
Repeat 20-30 times.

4.

I.p. – sitting, hands with spread fingers
lie on a flat horizontal surface.
For 30 - 60 seconds, alternately tap
on the support with the fingers of one, then the other, then both hands.

5.

I.p. - sitting or standing,
arms bent in front of you.
Touch the thumb
alternately with the index,
middle, ring,
little fingers.
The pace of execution and the pressure
gradually increase.
Repeat 15-20 times.

6.

I.p. - sitting or standing,
palms together,
fingers intertwined.
Flex them and unbend the hands
in the wrist joints.
Repeat 10-20 times.

7.

I.p. - standing or sitting,
arms extended in front of the chest,
fingers apart.
Turn palms outward,
return to I.p.
Repeat 15-20 times.

8.

I.p. – standing or sitting,
arms bent at the elbows
in front of the chest, palms up.
Shaking hands,
bend and unbend relaxed hands.
Repeat 15-20 times.

"Musicians" - children imitate playing various musical instruments with hand movements.

“The hen is drinking water” - elbows rest on the table, fingers are folded in the form of a beak, rhythmic inclinations of the hands forward.

“Fingers say hello” - the tip of the thumb touches the rest in succession. Alternately performed with the right / left hand.

A variation of this exercise: the palms of both hands are raised with the fingers up and facing each other, the fingers are spread apart. Alternately, the fingers touch, tapping each other. This exercise can be combined with saying nursery rhymes:

Once upon a time there were three penguins: Peak, Pak, Pok.
Peak, Pak, Pok is washing his ice floe together.

/you can play with poems, draw funny facial expressions, animal figures with a felt-tip pen on your fingertips/.

"Fingers play football" - alternately bend and unbend the fingers

Fingers play football,
Everyone overtakes each other
Everyone scores a goal
It's good to play football!

In order for a child to acquire a graphic skill, he must consciously assimilate the visual image of a letter, imagine what elements it consists of and in what spatial and quantitative relations these elements are combined in each individual letter. For example, in order for a child to learn to distinguish between the top and bottom of a sheet on paper, he is offered tasks, “snowflakes are falling”, “butterflies in a meadow”.

“ Snowflakes are falling” - the children put snowflakes made of paper on top of the sheet, then take each snowflake and show where it falls. The child accompanies his actions with the words: “ Top - Down ”.

“ Butterflies in the meadow” - focusing on the adult’s display and his verbal instructions /instructions/, and then only the verbal instruction, the children move the butterfly across the sheet of paper, commenting on their actions: “ from below - up, from above - down “ .

Game: “Kittens ran away” - Memorizing the words: “right - right, left - left, up - top, bottom - bottom” - on a flannelgraph / sheet of colored paper / there are figures of kittens of different colors. At the start of the game, they are all in the same place. The child names the location of the kittens: “in the middle of ...” The adult says: “ The kittens ran away ...” and moves the figures in different directions. The child must show, say, where each kitten is, for example, “ The gray kitten is sitting in the upper right corner, and the red one is at the bottom left .... ”. The game can be played in several versions:

Formation of writing skills is directly related to the cultivation of perseverance, the desire to achieve the best results, the cultivation of accuracy, respect for the notebook. Teaching writing is impossible without the development of attention and observation, as well as such complex forms of mental activity of students as analysis and synthesis.

The success of learning to write largely depends on how active the student is, which is determined by raising the right attitude of children to writing assignments / it is important to sit correctly while writing, correctly position the notebook, hold the pen /.

Drawing/tracing a snail, balls of thread, try to trace without lifting the pencil from the paper - “waves”, “algae”, “grasshopper jumps”, “fish scales”, hatching ...

Each the child's skills are formed at a different pace.Parents should conduct classes in a calm, friendly environment, celebrate any achievements of the child.First graders are happy and proud of their successes, reflect confidence in the effectiveness of their activities.Success awakens a further desire to learn.

The most important task of primary school is to teach children to read and write. The better the child learns this skill, the more effective further training will be. Unfortunately, not all children quickly master writing and reading. Difficulties in mastering writing and reading are commonly referred to as dyslexia. What is the essence of this diagnosis and how to deal with it - this question worries many parents.

Written speech is perhaps the most basic and one of the most complex mental processes that interacts with such psychological processes as attention, speech, emotions and memory. If one of the processes lags behind in its development, then the whole chain suffers. Initially, the child masters oral speech. He learns to speak and pronounce words correctly. Learns pronunciation and builds sentences, then the child begins to gradually master reading.

If parents notice incorrect pronunciation of certain sounds, a speech defect, then it is necessary to contact a speech therapist so that more serious problems do not begin to appear in the future. If speech defects are not resolved in time, then defects will appear in the study of literacy and writing. Even if the child pronounces everything correctly and no defects are heard in his speech, this does not mean that in the future a violation of sound analysis and synthesis cannot occur.

It will be possible to identify this violation only when studying grammar. This manifests itself in the form of skipping letters in words, rearranging sounds, replacing them with inappropriate letters or sounds. Such a violation of phonemic hearing can only be detected by a speech therapist.

To find out if a child's sound-letter analysis is impaired, home testing can be done before going to a specialist. To do this, you need to ask the baby to pronounce a series of syllables: KA-PA-TA, AT-ACH-AT, BA-BA-PA, SA-SHA-SA. If a child finds it difficult to repeat these words, gets confused and makes obvious mistakes, then there is a phonemic hearing impairment.

Very often one can observe such errors in the letter as the replacement of letters that are similar in spelling, non-observance of the line, slovenliness in handwriting. With this type of violation, you can fight with the help of finger gymnastics and the development of fine motor skills.

Let the child sculpt more with plasticine, collect small beads in a box or string them on a thread. All this contributes to the improvement of writing and the development of finger motor skills. It is very useful to assemble a LEGO constructor.

What should I do if my child has obvious difficulties in writing?

• Do not scold the child and help in every possible way.
• Show more care and attention.
• Watch less TV and create a calm environment at home.
• Work with your child at home more often and inspire confidence in yourself and your abilities.

Corrective work should be started as soon as difficulties in mastering writing become apparent. It is important for parents to know that the problem will not go away by itself. It is necessary to constantly train memory and develop attention, it is worth remembering that all these psychological processes are interconnected. It is necessary to start with the simplest exercises and tasks, even if they do not quite correspond to the age norm.

To master the correct writing, you must always pronounce the words. Highlight the meaning of the word, roots, find words with the same root. By giving various kinds of tasks, the thought process also develops, and soon the child will begin to independently notice his mistakes and correct them.

The main thing is willpower and the desire to help your child cope with this defect. Constant replenishment of vocabulary, memorization of tongue twisters and poems will also help speed up the process. Everything must be approached in a complex. Developing one psychological process, there is an influence on other not unimportant processes. It is important for parents to know that it is necessary to constantly expand the horizons of the child. More often go to various exhibitions, museums, theaters. Read more to the baby, show visual material and tell educational stories.

Constant work with the child will help him cope with all the problems and not face them again in the future.

step-by-step instructions with expert advice

And now the first letter, the first word, appears on a piece of paper. Uneven and uncertain. But long-awaited. How to teach a child to write? How can I help him develop writing skills at home? The answers are in our material

Alena Gerashchenko