Issues in Handwriting Instruction

Abstract

My 6-year-old daughter, Leah, just finished her first year of school in a whole language classroom. Because of my personal interest in my daughter's education and my professional preoccupation with children's writing and writing instruction, I kept a log of the practices Leah's teachers used throughout the year to help her and her kindergarten classmates grow as writers. The most prominent practices included:-providing children with frequent opportunities to compose on topics of their own choosing, primarily by dictating stories to an adult or by writing out their compositions using pictures, known w9rds, and invented spellings. -encouraging students to work on the same composition over a series of days.-creating a classroom environment where children's ideas and efforts were valued and supported. -using reading and other language skills to support the development of writing, and vice versa. -encouraging students to share their work with classmates, other adults in the school, and parents.

Preliminary Rasch Construct and Reliability Validation of TeleWrite: A Telehealth-Based Handwriting Assessment

“…Handwriting is an important tool for communication. According to Graham (1992), legible handwriting in school-aged children is a key factor in achieving academic success in the education system. Evaluating handwriting is an important area for pediatric therapists to address, as poor handwriting is the most frequent referral for OT services in the school system (Cermak & Bissell, 2014).…”