Although there are different reasons behind dysgraphia (fine motor vs visual etc), the thing that I understand to be common is that it is essentially a challenge with developing automaticity of tasks. From my perspective, the thing to do at this point is to take a deep breath and.... let it go. Focus on typing and accommodating and give your ds time and opportunities to focus on his academic strengths (science or puzzles or math or whatever they may be!).
Our neuropsych's advice when our ds was first diagnosed (2nd grade) was to *try* HWOT, *try* OT, and then to move on to typing. We tried HWOT and it was *horrible* for ds - partially due to pain (we tried prior to his handwriting OT, while waiting for an opening to get him into OT), and part of it was the emotional frustration of doing something over and over and over again when he wasn't developing automaticity like a neurotypical child would be - so we let it go. OT was helpful for him, but only in a limited way - he learned how to hold his pencil, and he learned good posture while writing, and these two things helped lessen his wrist pain while writing - but he was done with the improvements he was going to make after 9 months.
I've mentioned it here before, but will mention it again - our ds learned cursive along with his class in 4th and 5th grade. He had very nice-looking cursive writing (for a 4th grader lol), but by 6th grade, when his class was no longer practicing cursive every day, he completely (and I mean *completely*) forgot how to form his letters in cursive, and the only cursive he was able to remember was how to write his name - because he was routinely signing his name in cursive.
So I'd take a deep breath, and move on at least for awhile. Here are a few tips we've heard along the way, fwiw:
* Cursive is easier than printing for some dysgraphics (not all) - so you might consider having your ds learn cursive. The key is that the pencil doesn't leave the paper as often as in print, and since letters are connected there is less confusion about where to start a letter and about direction. Note: it isn't the case for all dysgraphics.
* Some dysgraphic children have a noticable improvement in handwriting during puberty
My DS says that he can know what he wants to write, but what shows up on the paper is something different.
My ds says the same thing. He also has told me that he "likes" writing numbers better than writing letters because "it's easier, since there are only 10 numbers to memorize instead of 26 letters". Keep in mind, this is a teen with an incredibly high IQ stating that - put that into perspective - it's *not* typical - so from my perspective, as parents we have to let go of expectations that we have developed from our own, usually more typical, life experiences. It may sound like giving up in one sense, but I honestly feel that it was more helpful in the long term for us to let go of hopes of improving handwriting and focus on helping our ds learn and get used to accommodations. Realistically, handwriting wasn't ever going to be something he could rely on to show his knowledge, just as my dd who is nearsighted most likely isn't ever going to suddenly wake up one morning not needing her glasses. And it's all ok - the world we live in is increasingly less and less reliant on handwriting
And just to be clear - I have a dyslexic dd, and I would not just "give up" on reading instruction for her - she needs to learn how to read. I see that as very different from handwriting, both the need for the skill *and* the reasons the skill is a challenge (hence the ability to remediate is different).
Best wishes,
polarbear
ps - please note, I hope this sounds kind and not disrespectful because that's not my intent at all - but as the parent of a dysgraphic child seeking advice for dysgraphia, it would be helpful to me if the posters who are replying would state whether or not their child is dysgraphic. I don't have time to refer back to previous posts to see if each child is dysgraphic, and it is information that makes a difference in reading about people's experience with HWOT etc - because the children who are going through the instruction are coming at it with a very different set of abilities if they are or aren't dysgraphic. My non-dysgraphic kids were all taught HWOT at school and it worked very well for them - but they don't have a challenge with developing automaticity.
