This study examined the effectiveness of two approaches used in elementary schools to improve children's handwriting. Participants were 72 New York City public school students from the first and second grades. A nonequivalent pretest-posttest group design was used in which students engaged in handwriting activities using two approaches: intensive handwriting practice and visual-perceptual-motor activities. Handwriting speed, legibility, and visual-motor skills were examined after a 12-wk Handwriting Club using multivariate analysis of variance. The results showed that students in the intensive handwriting practice group demonstrated significant improvements in handwriting legibility compared with students in the visualperceptual-motor activity group. No significant effects in handwriting speed and visual-motor skills were found between the students in intensive handwriting practice group and the students in visual-perceptualmotor activities group. The Handwriting Club model is a natural intervention that fits easily into existing school curriculums and can be an effective short-term intervention (response to intervention Tier II).
The purpose of this study was to determine appropriate screening tools for schoolbased therapists to use in assessing handwriting difficulties in children. Using the Minnesota Handwriting Assessment (MHA), this study examines the ranges of legibility of handwriting in typically-developing first and second grade students. Also, it evaluated whether the Handwriting Checklist that documents students' posture, tool use, grasp, and other components during the writing task accurately predicts legibility. Regression analyses found that the four Handwriting Checklist variables accounted for 23% of the variance in the legibility variable on the MHA test.
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