Handwriting help is one of the most common reasons for referral to an OT and with good reason – Handwriting is HARD!
Just think about how many steps are involved just to write something seemingly simple like ‘cat’. You need to:
- Decide you’re going to write cat
- Work out that the first sound is ‘c’
- Know which letter makes the sound ‘c’ and what it looks like
- Write the letter which makes the sound ‘c’ and make sure you do it the right way
- Check that its legible
- Then, remember which word you are writing so you can work out the next sound is ‘a’
- … and so on and so forth for each letter of the word and then each word after that! Phew.
It’s no wonder young children get referred so often for ‘difficulty with handwriting.’ Given how many component skills are involved in handwriting, an OTs first job is to work out where the child is having difficulty. Do they know what the letters look like? Do they know their left and right? Can they hold and control the pencil well enough to write? Can they tell if they’ve written a letter backwards? Do they know what they want to write? Do they know what sound each letter makes?
An OT will assess pencil grip, visual perceptual skills and visual motor integration skills to determine whether your child has the underlying skills needed for writing. From here, they can focus on remediating the skills that actually need to be addressed.
Sometimes, it’s as simple as teaching them the correct way to write letters, in a way that actually makes sense.
Other times, the underlying skills needs to be assessed in order to make progress but either way, an OT can help!
If you want to know more about how an OT can help your child with handwriting, contact Blossom Rural.
