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There is also a big difference between "acceptably legible" and "beautiful" penmanship.


The former is really the best that many people can hope to accomplish and maintain over a lifetime. Personally, I draw the line at functional handwriting when looking at whether or not there's something that needs addressing.

My DD's handwriting never really improved much even with a lot of practice and reinforcement, and she tires VERY quickly-- though she definitely has good automaticity while her hand strength lasts.

She will probably need to take notes even in college via a laptop or other mobile device. Longhand for an hour isn't going to happen, legibly or otherwise.

On the other hand, she CAN push herself to write legibly for a standardized test (state testing, ACT/SAT, etc.) when timed and when it counts.

At six years old, though-- she had the handwriting of a fourth year med student... or Sasquatch. Which is what my DH (lovingly) called her handwriting, frankly.

Because she didn't write (it was painful) she was quite slow to develop automaticity. She has it now, but it's been a long slow road.

Thank you all so much. I would say 90% of the time her writing is fast and very sloppy. Letters are not formed the same way each time, many letters look similar, and she still has "b" "d" reversal issues. If I remind her to write neatly, she can slow to about half the pace, the tongue comes out (somehow the tongue always comes out when she is trying to write neatly) and I would say the handwriting looks more typical first grade. If I offer a big incentive for writing neatly - a bowl of ice cream or something, her writing slows to a snails pace - and like zen scanner said - it is more like drawing or drafting than writing, and she can do a good job - but she can only do a few words like that and then she can't take it any more.

polar bear - 1) yes in most other areas she is really far ahead, but the handwriting really stands out as being an area that is a disaster. 2) She is a very active kid who would rather be running than sitting to write anything. 3)In the classroom she is both much faster and much more sloppy than her peers. Her teacher additionally commented on the volume of work she produces, because she will write pages and pages (of sloppily written work) in the time it takes most kids to turn out a single page. 4)bigger fine motor (buttons and zippers) are OK, but truly micro fine motor (tiny beads and rainbow loom) are not- I have no idea what is considered developmentally normally that way. Shoes are not ever on the correct feet. Never. 5) letters are always randomly made - lower case r is often formed like trying to write a checkmark backwards (starting at the right side of the letter). She starts each letter at a different place each time - we have done handwriting without tears, which tends to emphasize where to start from, but it did not seem to sink in.

I guess I am just wondering if this is something that can be fixed with more practice, and if so, what kind of practice...
I had a friend recommend that I try having her play with a squirt gun over the summer, practicing the pulling the trigger with just that one finger... I thought it was a good thought - this motion was really hard for her, and she always wanted to pull the trigger with two hands. Now that it is snowy, the squirt gun has been put away.

It seems like she may have some fine motor issues and some visual processing issues... but if that is the case... what should I do?

Can't remember if you said her pencil grip is Ok/normal? (tripod grasp). If she is holding a pencil incorrectly it could be she has weak hands/low muscle tone.
I would probably take her in for a private OT eval, specifiy that you are concerned with both fine motor and writing (but esp. writing) and they can do assessments to at least see if there is a fine motor issue. Some OT's can diagnose disorders like dysgraphia and others don't. But all of them can diagnose motor issues.

She is in a public school...can they/ would they do some of these assessments?... I would guess not for the visual processing, but I believe they have OT.

Is there still a preferred pencil grip? My kids both have a wierd grip, four finger grip for the one with bad handwriting. I pulled up the diagrams. My husband and I both have the tripod grasp. I think they were really particular about that back when we were in school. The other, dd, has some wierd one too which rests on her ring finger. Her writing is beautiful though, better than all of the rest of us. I never noticed until they were older, which may be too late to change.

I find varying info online. Anyone have any knowledge of that?

My son had an OT evaluation this week at school. We will see what she recommends in a week or so.