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Spacing / Letter Placement
This resource offers strategies in teaching spacing between words and this relates to the concept of spacing / letter placement under handwriting skills which is supported by the Nurturing Early Learners Framework (MOE,2012) under learning goals 4, the use of drawing, mark making, symbols and writing with invented and conventional spelling to communicate ideas of information.

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When it comes to legibility in handwriting, spacing between words makes all the! Addressing spatial awareness in handwriting can make a big difference in legibility fairly quickly given intervention, practice, awareness, and the tools to address spacing in written work. We've shared several handwriting spacing tools here on The OT Toolbox, like a cute DIY space martian spacing tool and this pipe cleaner spacing tool.

Read on for another quick craft that kids can make and use to teach spacing between words...using a clothes pin for better spatial awareness in written work.

This spacing tool is one that can be attached to a notebook or folder and used again and again...because any school-based OT knows that those spacing tools can get lost very easily!

Handwriting Spacing Between Words Tool

The best part of this handwriting spacing tool is that kids can make their own, while creating a unique tool that fits their personality!

Next, get all of your materials ready, because this handwriting spacing tool is a fun activity! In fact, school-based therapists can create a group activity in a classroom with random items found in a craft bin...while boosting those fine motor skills!

To make a DIY spacing tool, you'll need a clothes pin. The wooden type is perfect for painting and decorating, making a fine motor craft based on the child's interests, favorite color, etc. When the child makes their own spacing tool, they are more likely to use it again and again.

Using the clothes pin clip allows the spacing tool to be saved. (Better yet, the clip prevents another lost therapy item later found at the bottom of a backpack or in the midst of desk chaos!)

To make the Clothes Pin Spacing Tool

You'll need some basic craft items (affiliate links are included below):

Next, get the kids started on painting. Ask the child or group of kids to paint all sides of the clothes pins.

On the wet paint, glitter and sparkling gems can be added. Let the paint dry and embellish with additional items including gems, stickers, puffy paint, or other items.

How to teach spacing between words with a clothespin:

The clothes pin clip is perfect for attaching to notebooks, folders, or a pencil box on a desk. Students will always know where their spacing tool is...but how do they use it?

Use a clothespin to teach spacing between words the same way you would use other spacing tools.

Show students how to place the clothespin on the paper after the last letter of a word. They can keep the clothespin in place as they write the next word in a sentence. They physical and visual cue of moving and seeing the clothespin can make a lasting impact on spacing between words.

Think about it this way: the messiest written work is easier to read when it has space between words. As readers, we tend to fill in missing blanks using our predictive reading skills. When words are spaced out, students will be better able to read back over notes, homework assignments, and other written work.

Spacing is often times, the easiest way to make a big impact on handwriting legibility!

For younger students, using the clip portion of the clothespin spacing tool can be achieved using strips of paper to practice handwriting. Simply cut regular double ruled paper into strips and clip the clothespin between each word as the child writes.

Those strips can even be laminated and handwriting practiced with a dry erase marker.

Using the clothespin spacing tool can make a big impact on written legibility!

Looking for more ways to teach spacing between words? Try these ideas:

Looking for more ways to address spatial awareness? Grab our free handwriting printable packet and you will also receive a short email series that addresses areas like spatial awareness, letter size, letter formation, and more. This is perfect for the OT looking for handwriting handouts, or anyone who works with kids on handwriting.

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How to Teach Spacing Between Words with a Clothespin - The OT Toolbox

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When it comes to legibility in handwriting, spacing between words makes all the! Addressing spatial awareness in handwriting can make a big difference in legibility fairly quickly given intervention, practice, awareness, and the tools to address spacing in written work. We've shared several handwriting spacing tools here on The OT Toolbox, like a cute DIY ...

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Holding / Controlling the pencil
This resource offers strategies and this relates to the concept of holding and controlling the pencil which is supported by  Schwellnus,  Carnahan,  Kushki, Polatajko, Missiuna & Chau (2013), discussed about relation of pencil holding (skilful fine motor coordination and precision) to handwriting. As the production of functional handwriting is reliant on a few abilities which includes fine motor skills, precision and force regulation. With a few skills involved to gain successful handwriting acquisition, learning to write can be challenging for young learners.

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As a mom to five little ones and as a kindergarten and special needs teacher, I have helped a lot of children learn how to hold a pencil correctly. Sometimes it would be really difficult to teach a child how to hold a pencil until I figured out this fun and crazy alligator trick. It is really important to teach correct pencil grip for a number of reasons. Primarily, you want the child to feel comfortable while writing and secondly, correct pencil grip will help improve handwriting.

How to Hold a Pencil

To teach the correct way to hold a pencil, you can have the child pretend his/her dominant (writing) hand is an alligator.

Open and close the alligator's mouth - and show that the alligator is hungry and wants to eat the pencil!

Now that the alligator is holding the pencil in his mouth, place the pencil on the bottom jaw of the alligator,and close the alligator's mouth on the pencil.

As the alligator eats the pencil, he doesn't like the taste of the pencil, so he puckers his lips. (Show your children what it means to pucker your lips!)

He puckers his lips and curls his jaws in the shape of an 'o' - and clenches the pencil in his teeth.

If your child continues to struggle, there are some neat tools out there that really help children to grip a pencil correctly. Click thepicture below to see the tool we recommend for teaching someone how to hold a pencil correctly . We do not recommend the small grips that slip onto a pencil - in my experience, they still confuse the child where and how to hold the pencil. These sort of pencil grips may help your child feel more comfortable holding a pencil (ergonomically correcting an already correct grip).
Baumgartens 00071 Twist and Write Pencil, Assorted Color Cimostar Ergonomic Pencil Grip ,Writing CLAW for Pencils and Utensils ,Set of 3
Here is a picture of how the pencil on the left above works: I have had 2 children use the pencil on the left to help them learn pencil grip. More recently, I have a 4 year old who was having trouble and I bought him the pencil grip on the right. Amazing! He was having a lot of fine motor difficulty -holding the pencil correctly and also when he was writing he could not press hard enough. The pencil grip on the right really helped him! I highly recommend both of the tools above... if one does not work, try the other. If your child has small hands, the one on the right might be better...(at least this seemed the case with my 4 year old)

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After your child has mastered holding a pencil correctly, we have some free handwriting worksheets for you to help them master handwriting. Enter your information into the form below and you will be automatically emailed a copy of our free pre-handwriting practice worksheets. You will be added to our mailing list where you will find out about lots of fun free activities for kids. If you have any trouble with your download, email me at [email protected] -I am happy to help!

How to Grow a Confident Writer

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How to teach a child to hold a pencil correctly

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https://www.sightandsoundreading.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/alligator-trick.jpg As a mom to five little ones and as a kindergarten and special needs teacher, I have helped a lot of children learn how to hold...

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Print Awareness - Left to Right
This resource is an activity to introduce to children that writing progression from left to right and this relates to the concept of handwriting skills which is supported by Noella Mackenzie (2011) where she explains about teacher's beliefs in teaching handwriting to children. Starting out with fundamentals like print awareness and not introducing and jarring children with priority of letter or word recognition can make the writing process difficult.

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This is one of the many ways I teach print concepts in my Pre-K classroom. I use these charts to teach left-to-right progression of print, as well as top-to-bottom progression to children who are pre-readers.

Emergent reader books and other shared reading activities work well for this also.

I make each chart by writing simple, repetitive sentences. The sentences are rebus sentences, made by drawing very simple pictures in place of some words. Below the first word of each sentence, I draw a green dot, and below the period at the end of the sentence, I draw a red dot. The green dot shows children where we start when we read the sentence, and the red dot shows them where to stop. The black dotted line between the two dots is the "road" children follow as they "read".

To make it extra fun, we use a small toy of some kind to move across the sentence. For our Bug chart, I have a small plastic ladybug. I show the children how the ladybug starts at the green dot and moves along the road as I read the sentence.

It's important that the sentences are short, simple, and repetitive, so children can quickly memorize what they are supposed to say. Memorization is not actual reading, of course, but the purpose of this activity is to practice left-to-right, top-to-bottom progression with children who don't yet have the skills to read sentences.

With our fish chart, I use a small toy fish which moves across the sentence as we read. I also point out to the children how I start with the sentence at the top and move down. After I have demonstrated each sentence to the children, I have the class read along with me as I move the fish. Then I give each child an opportunity to move the fish as they "read" the sentences.

We read until we stop at the red dot.

I use these simple charts throughout the year with different themes. The mini toy used for our chart stories coordinates with the theme we are doing that month. In the Winter, we had a bear; during our Bug theme, we had the ladybug; during our Transportation theme, we had a car; and for our Water Animals theme, we are using the fish.

Each time we used these charts, I followed this same procedure:

I read the sentences to the class (while moving the toy across).

We read the sentences together (while I moved the toy across).

Each child had a turn to come up and read a sentence while they moved the toy across.

Every child I've had in my class so far has been successful because the sentences are easy to read. We clap for each child when they finish. I think it's a great way to encourage reading and to help them feel like they are capable of learning to read.

Here are more examples of the charts I've made:

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This is one of the many ways I teach print concepts in my Pre-K classroom. I use these charts to teach left-to-right progression of print, as well as top-to-bottom progression to children who are pre-readers. Emergent reader books and other shared reading activities work well for this also.

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Having good fine motor skills practices for pre writing can affect handwriting. This resource offers strategies in improving on fine motor skills and this relates to the concept of pre handwriting stage which is supported by Seo (2017), where he explained the importance of ability in fine-motor skills before starting to write as the ability to control a handwriting tool like a pencil or pen with speed and accuracy can produce good handwriting.

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Like what you see? Tap the "Pin" button above to save this with a pinnable image on Pinterest.
Inside: Pre writing skills have never been so fun using this handwriting practice hack and free printable template. This shaving cream sensory bag is perfect for early childhood children to get ready to write their letters, name, and sight words.
I began teaching my toddler how to write her letters the more traditional route with pencil and letter tracing paper. She quickly became bored and frustrated with her developing skills. I realized I needed to re-evaluate to find a different way for her to practice letter formation or pre-writing skills. That is how I came up with these pre-writing activities for preschoolers.

As a former teacher and reading specialist, I want learning to be fun. This shaving cream sensory bag is sure to be just that.
This post contains affiliate links.
Pre Writing Skills Activity

For this activity, I isolated the lines that make up the letters of the alphabet in this free pre-writing practice printable. This makes it easy to build a foundation for the shapes needed to write the letters in the alphabet.

Here are the steps:

1. Print the free pre-writing practice printable and cut out the templates.

2. Next, fill a large Ziploc bag with a dollop of two paint colors and 1/4 full of shaving cream. Try to gently press out any remaining air before sealing the bag.

3. After that, seal the bag with tape. This is a must. Little hands are really good at breaking the seal otherwise.

4. Let your little one have some sensory fun by mixing the paint together with the shaving cream. By creating colored shaving cream, you will be able to see the letters better, through the bag.

5. Place a white piece of paper behind the bag and set on a flat surface.

6. Model how to trace each card from the pre-writing practice printable with a Q-tip and then mimic the line on the shaving cream bag.

To view the video tutorial, visit Play Learn Connect on Facebook where I share tons of fun kids activities.

Materials:

As your little one improves his or her pre-writing skills, you could also use this bag to practice the letters in the alphabet, numbers and even sight words, which are the words that are most common in reading.

Pre-writing practice printable

Scissors

Large Ziploc bag

Paint

Shaving cream

Q-tips

Clear tape

White paper (for behind the bag)

PS - If you enjoyed this, you may also like Over 100 Easy Kids Activities That are Surprisingly Fun.
How will you use this handwriting practice for kids hack?

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Amazing Pre Writing Hack to Try With Your Kid Right Now

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Like what you see? Tap the "Pin" button above to save this with a pinnable image on Pinterest. Inside: Pre writing skills have never been so fun using this handwriting practice hack and free printable template. This shaving cream sensory bag is perfect for early childhood children to get ready to write their letters, name, and sight words.

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Seo, Sang-Min (2017). The Journal of Physical Therapy Science. The Effect of Fine Motor Skills on Handwriting Legibility in Preschool Age Children. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5851374/pdf/jpts-30-324.pdf.

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Fine Motor Skills
This resource offers strategies in improving fine motor skills and this relates to the concept of strengthening pre handwriting and is supported by Huffman & Fortenberry (2011) as the journal shares about how pre handwriting progress depends largely on the development of fine motor skills involving small muscle movements of the hand. With this fine motor activity, the strengthening of fine motor skills will be supported by the continuous practice of this.

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This resource offers an activity that can be incorporated in class for emergent writers and this relates to emergent writing which is supported by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC, 2017) shared how children need to have the conceptual knowledge in learning the function of writing and learning that writing has a purpose. In this activity, the labels they will be writing out will have a purpose to understand the pictures.

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Kindergartners begin school with a wide range of literacy backgrounds. This can make it difficult to know where to start with writing. Some children are just learning what a letter is; others are already recognizing and writing simple words. Labeling is a great writing activity that reaches all students and provides valuable experience with language and letter/sound relationships. (This post contains an Amazon affiliate link for TYH Supplies Dry Erase Pockets.)

Labeling their pictures is a natural way for emerging writers to begin using print. Labeling allows students to integrate many literacy skills (print concepts, phonics, letter formation) while cementing their understanding of print as a representation of spoken words. In addition, students at varied stages of spelling development can feel successful when labeling their drawings.

Labeling Activities

Here are some classroom activities to help you teach and reinforce the practice of labeling.

Self-Portrait
Have students draw pictures of themselves and label with their names. Show them how to draw an arrow (or just a line) to indicate that the name is a label for the person in the picture. If you want to make the idea of labeling more concrete, try giving each student one blank address label to stick onto their self-portrait paper. Have them write their name on the label and draw a line or arrow to their picture. Extend this name-labeling activity to include pictures of families, pets, and friends.

Label the Classroom
Pre-make labels for the items in your classroom that the students see and interact with daily (computer, flag, window, whiteboard, door, etc.). Be sure to make the print large enough to be seen from around the rom as the students will reference these labels throughout the year. As a group, work on reading and placing the labels.

Procedures Anchor Charts
Make anchor charts using shared writing and drawing. When discussing playground rules, have students brainstorm pieces of playground equipment to draw on the chart. Model drawing these pieces. (If you don't think you're good at drawing, do it anyway. What a great way to model perseverance to your students!) Have the students help label the drawing. Then work together to compose a list of playground rules or procedures. This activity can be repeated for the cafeteria, media center, and other parts of the school.

Labeling with Technology
If you have a Smart Board or some other type of interactive board (or even just a projector for your computer), try displaying pictures for your children to label. You can find pictures on the internet that reflect your current theme or students' interests. Have students identify the items in the picture and call on volunteers to come up and label them. You can also do this with photographs of your students that you've taken while they play or work. This can be a great springboard to narrative writing.

Labeling Center
Use pictures from old magazines or calendars for a labeling center. Stick blank address labels onto the pictures in places where a label would be appropriate and draw arrows. Then put these pictures (along with lined paper if desired) into write and wipe pockets to use with dry erase markers. You can also use pictures printed from the internet (sites like Unsplash.com and Pixabay.com have a lot of options). If you don't have dry erase pockets, you can use simple sheet protectors or can laminate the pictures.

Tips for Working with Emergent Writers

Accept your students where they are.

Many children will be very reluctant to take risks in writing if they think their teacher expects correct spelling. Encourage children to use the knowledge of letters and sounds that they already have and acknowledge even small efforts. Children who are overly concerned about spelling will be prone to copying words and/or using the simplest words they can in order to achieve perfection. Create a safe writing environment where children know their best efforts are enough.

Don't give in to the "How do you spell?" questions!
For children who are afraid to make mistakes, telling them how to spell a word sends the message that you want them to spell conventionally. Instead, encourage them to use the tools they have (sound knowledge, environmental print, word walls) and praise their effort.

Ask for support from parents and family members.

Explain to parents that learning to write is much like learning to talk. Just as we don't expect perfection from our babies when they babble and manage their first few words, we should greet attempts at writing with excitement and encouragement.

Use student work as a model.

If you have a document camera and a projector, it is easy and motivating to show the class a quick example of the skill you're working on. "Look! Veronica has labeled the picture of her sister with a T because her sister's name is Teresa and that begins with the /t/ sound!" If you don't have a document camera, you can highlight student work during carpet time. Be sure to focus on effort and growth when using students as a model, rather than on perfection and mastery. This builds confidence and pride!

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Working with Emergent Writers: Labeling Ideas and Tips

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Kindergartners begin school with a wide range of literacy backgrounds. This can make it difficult to know where to start with writing. Some children are just learning what a letter is; others are already recognizing and writing simple words. Labeling is a great writing activity that reaches all students and provides valuable experience with language and letter/sound relationships.

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Fine motor threading activity
This resource offers an activity for strengthening one's fine motor skills and hand eye coordination and this relates to the concept of building up pre writing acquisition which is supported by Rymanowicz (2015) where she focuses about explaining about pincer coordination which is having advance fine motor muscles and coordination and being able to use that to grasp writing instruments like pencils, crayons or markers and begin writing. With this activity, it helps to support the progress to the acquisition of pincer coordination.

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You know me, I thought I'd share with you a fun and educational activity that is also great for recycling some of the everyday things you might already have in your home. This is a simple, fine motor threading activity using straws and cardboard tubes.

Fine motor threading activity using straws and cardboard tubes

Ever since learning about the dangers of plastics to our Earth, I've had this terrible guilt over a packet of straws sitting in my pantry cupboard. Ugh, it's horrible.

I actually don't even remember buying them, so I have changed my thinking and have decided to repurpose them as loose parts suitable for educational activities. They will not have one use, but many.

Brilliant. Check this out...
To do this activity you will need -
Cut each of the cardboard tubes in half or abut 10 - 15cm long.

Depending on the capability of your child, ask them to punch holes into the cardboard tubes using the hole puncher.

Using a hole puncher is really great for fine motor development. It strengthens the smaller muscles in the fingers and palm of the hand. Important for when they are learning to write with a pencil or draw.

The activity and it's purpose is simple, much like my previous post.

Present them with the straws and ask them to thread them through the holes in the cardboard tube. In one side and out the other.

They begin to look a little like crazy and colourful spiders after awhile.

Boo (aged 3 years) discovered that she needed to bend the end of the straw to stop them from slipping out. The was a great discovery and only learnt through her own experience of doing this activity.

This activity does open itself up to challenging your child and their problem solving skills.

I've got my eye on this similar idea from Babble Dabble Do.
Is this an activity your child would enjoy?
This is a super simple activity that you might like to set up for your child. It reuses some of the things you already have in your home and turns them into wonderful, handmade teaching tools (or toys).

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Fine motor threading activity using straws and cardboard tubes - Laughing Kids Learn

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If you want an activity that is simple to set up and engaging for your toddler, try this fine motor threading activity using straws and cardboard tubes. Children develop their fine motor skills, concentration and problem solving skills with this handmade teaching tool or handmade toy. Fun for toddler to make too.

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This resource offers opportunities for children to expand their thoughts and produce detailed sentences, and this relates to the concept of conventional spelling and sentence writing under emergent writing, which is supported by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC, 2017) where children increasingly write with conventional spellings and structures.

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STRETCH: Adding Details to Simple Sentences | Lesson Plan | Education.com | Lesson plan | Education.com

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Inspire creativity in all of your students by giving them the tools they need to transform their simple sentences into longer, detailed descriptions.

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Byington A. Teresa, Kim Yaebin (2017). Young children. Vol. 72, No. 5. Retrieved from
https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/yc/nov2017/emergent-writing

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Writing prompts
This resource offers prompts for children to write proper and full sentences to describe a picture, and this relates to the concept of writing under Emergent writing which is supported by the Nurturing Early Learners Framework (MOE, 2012) as it prepares children for the instruction and learning experiences they will encounter later as young readers.

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These are FREE samples from my Writing Prompts Growing Bundle.

Get the Writing Prompts Growing Bundle HERE

Free Writing Prompts contains 20 free pages of writing prompts worksheets. This product is suitable for kindergarten and first grade students.

Students are encouraged to use thinking skills while improving their writing skills. These pages can be used for morning work, literacy centers, and writing center.

Included in this resource:

2 pages of Informational writing.

2 pages of the same Informational writing without sentence starter.

5 pages of opinion writing.

5 pages of the same opinion writing without sentence starter.

3 page of narrative writing.

3 page of narrative writing without sentence starter.

If you like this product, you may like:
August Writing Prompts September Writing Prompts October Writing Prompts November Writing Prompts December Writing Prompts January Writing Prompts February Writing Prompts March Writing Prompts April Writing Prompts May Writing Prompts Writing Picture Prompts Bundle Reading and Writing Growing Bundle Sentence Writing Bundle
For more information about my products and freebies, please check out:
Miss Faleena Pinterest Miss Faleena Instagram Miss Faleena Facebook Miss Faleena Website
Thank you for stopping by! You can contact me at Faleena@yahoo.com with any question.

Kindergarten | Kindergarten Worksheets | First Grade | First Grade Worksheets | Free Informational Writing Prompts | Free Opinion Writing Prompts | Free Narrative Writing Prompts | Writing Prompts Literacy Centers | Free Writing Prompts

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These are FREE samples from my Writing Prompts Growing Bundle.Get the Writing Prompts Growing Bundle HEREFree Writing Prompts contains 20 free pages of writing prompts worksheets. This product is suitable for kindergarten and first grade students.Students are encouraged to use thinking skills while ...

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Reading Booklet
This resource offers children with opportunities to express their thoughts and ideas into writing, and this relates to the concept of comprehension under Emergent Writing which is supported by the Nurturing Early Learners Framework (MOE, 2012) as it develops the ability to listen to or read and understand text. This involves thinking about and making meaning from print.

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This is the perfect activity for early readers to demonstrate their comprehension. It is designed for kindergarten and first grade stude… | Kinder L.A. | Kindergarten reading, Grade 1 reading, Reading response

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This is the perfect activity for early readers to demonstrate their comprehension. It is designed for kindergarten and first grade students. Students answer questions about the plot, characters, setting etc.

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Dot painting Activity
This resource offers opportunities in improving the pincer grip and this relates to the concept of strengthening the fine motor muscles, which is supported by Bunce (2014), where she emphasizes that a child is able to complete important tasks such as writing, feeding oneself and more, with the development of these skills.

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by -
This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy.

Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand
Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

While the activities below are listed in order from beginning to more precise prewriting skills, we're currently using all of these prewriting activities with my son who has special needs. It's worth it to revisit and strengthen previous skills for more practice.

1. Peg or Straw Prewriting Activity

Any basic fine motor activity where your child is holding an object similar to how they would hold a pencil helps build grip strength.

We love using Lauri peg materials to practice fine motor control.

You can also poke holes in the top of a plastic container and have your child place straws inside for another fun prewriting activity.

2. Dot Painting Prewriting Activity

Your child can begin painting a picture of dots using his or her finger, then progress to using a Q-tip in paint to letters, create pointillism art, or complete dot painting printables like these at 1+1+1=1. Dot painting helps familiarize your children with letter and number shapes while practicing precision in placing their finger or the Q-tip.

3. Tracing Letters Activity

Before learning to hold a pencil, it helps to practise tracing the alphabet with a finger. Doing so helps your child develop stronger familiarity with their letters, begin memorizing how to write letters, and adds a sensory aspect to forming letters. You can employ multiple types of sensory materials for tracing letters.

Examples of Tracing Letters:

Trace over your writing or tactile letters, like sandpaper letters or glitter glue letters. (Create these by drawing a letter in glitter glue on an index card.)

Draw letters in a sand or salt writing tray.

Trace inside letter stencils on a light table.

4. Dot-to-Dot Prewriting Activities

Remember doing numerous dot-to-dot activities as "bonus work" in early elementary school or in activity books on car rides? Well, those dot-to-dot worksheets actually help build pre-writing skills! Create your own dot-to-dot to cater to your child's needs. When beginning to work with dot-to-dot activities, create simple ones, especially if working with a younger preschooler or a child with fine motor delays. "Down" and "across" are the first writing motions to master. When starting this with my son, I made dot-to-dots with just three dots forming a "L" shape.

Increase the number of dots, add multiple changes in direction, add diagonal lines, and progress to curved lines to increase difficulty. Then, begin creating dot-to-dots to form a favorite object, like a ball.

5. Bubble Letters

Before we can even begin a formal handwriting curriculum, my son needs to be able to control his writing strokes within a defined space. "Bubble letters" offer parameters for letter formation.

We first did this activity with the "t" shape. I drew four "t" bubble letters on one sheet of paper. I modeled the first one for my son, then asked him to draw "down and across" in each of the others. He was so proud when he did it!

Progress with different types of lines as your child gains more control. (I suggest beginning with "t," "L," "E," and "H.")

This post was first published 2013. Updated 2018.

What prewriting activities have helped your kids strengthen their skills?

Breaking writing skills down into smaller steps builds confidence and solid skills. Just as it does when you are teaching your child to read!

Caroline is a wife, homeschooling momma to two undeserved blessings, writer, former public school teacher, and picture book fanatic. She blogs at Under God's Mighty Hand with book reviews, homeschooling activities and printables, modifications for kids with special needs, and faith and family posts. She also contributes monthly to three other team blogs and loves to chat on Twitter and spend "homeschool planning time" on Pinterest. :)

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5 Pre-Writing Activities for Preschoolers - I Can Teach My Child!

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by - This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy. Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

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Dot painting activity
Bunce, P. (2014). The importance of fine motor skill development. Retrieved from Kohl's building blocks program: http://penfieldbuildingblocks.org/2014/11/importance-fine-motor-skill-development/

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Tracing tactile letters activity
This resource offers children with practise to trace the alphabets with their finger, and this relates to the concept of Multi-sensory learning, which is supported by Minnesota Literacy Council (2015), where it states that tracing tactile letters is a form of multi-sensory learning which incorporates all senses into the learning process
to activate different parts of the brain simultaneously,
enhances memory and the learning of written language.

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by -
This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy.

Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand
Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

While the activities below are listed in order from beginning to more precise prewriting skills, we're currently using all of these prewriting activities with my son who has special needs. It's worth it to revisit and strengthen previous skills for more practice.

1. Peg or Straw Prewriting Activity

Any basic fine motor activity where your child is holding an object similar to how they would hold a pencil helps build grip strength.

We love using Lauri peg materials to practice fine motor control.

You can also poke holes in the top of a plastic container and have your child place straws inside for another fun prewriting activity.

2. Dot Painting Prewriting Activity

Your child can begin painting a picture of dots using his or her finger, then progress to using a Q-tip in paint to letters, create pointillism art, or complete dot painting printables like these at 1+1+1=1. Dot painting helps familiarize your children with letter and number shapes while practicing precision in placing their finger or the Q-tip.

3. Tracing Letters Activity

Before learning to hold a pencil, it helps to practise tracing the alphabet with a finger. Doing so helps your child develop stronger familiarity with their letters, begin memorizing how to write letters, and adds a sensory aspect to forming letters. You can employ multiple types of sensory materials for tracing letters.

Examples of Tracing Letters:

Trace over your writing or tactile letters, like sandpaper letters or glitter glue letters. (Create these by drawing a letter in glitter glue on an index card.)

Draw letters in a sand or salt writing tray.

Trace inside letter stencils on a light table.

4. Dot-to-Dot Prewriting Activities

Remember doing numerous dot-to-dot activities as "bonus work" in early elementary school or in activity books on car rides? Well, those dot-to-dot worksheets actually help build pre-writing skills! Create your own dot-to-dot to cater to your child's needs. When beginning to work with dot-to-dot activities, create simple ones, especially if working with a younger preschooler or a child with fine motor delays. "Down" and "across" are the first writing motions to master. When starting this with my son, I made dot-to-dots with just three dots forming a "L" shape.

Increase the number of dots, add multiple changes in direction, add diagonal lines, and progress to curved lines to increase difficulty. Then, begin creating dot-to-dots to form a favorite object, like a ball.

5. Bubble Letters

Before we can even begin a formal handwriting curriculum, my son needs to be able to control his writing strokes within a defined space. "Bubble letters" offer parameters for letter formation.

We first did this activity with the "t" shape. I drew four "t" bubble letters on one sheet of paper. I modeled the first one for my son, then asked him to draw "down and across" in each of the others. He was so proud when he did it!

Progress with different types of lines as your child gains more control. (I suggest beginning with "t," "L," "E," and "H.")

This post was first published 2013. Updated 2018.

What prewriting activities have helped your kids strengthen their skills?

Breaking writing skills down into smaller steps builds confidence and solid skills. Just as it does when you are teaching your child to read!

Caroline is a wife, homeschooling momma to two undeserved blessings, writer, former public school teacher, and picture book fanatic. She blogs at Under God's Mighty Hand with book reviews, homeschooling activities and printables, modifications for kids with special needs, and faith and family posts. She also contributes monthly to three other team blogs and loves to chat on Twitter and spend "homeschool planning time" on Pinterest. :)

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5 Pre-Writing Activities for Preschoolers - I Can Teach My Child!

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by - This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy. Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

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Tracing tactile letters
Multisensory Activities to Teach Reading Skills. (2015). In Summer Reads 2015 (p. 5). Minneapolis: Minnesota Literacy Council.

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Dot-to-dot activity
This resource offers strategies in building pre-writing skills, and this relates to the concept of gaining good control of the hands as supported by O'Mealia S. (2011) who states that elements of literacy need to be acquired.

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by -
This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy.

Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand
Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

While the activities below are listed in order from beginning to more precise prewriting skills, we're currently using all of these prewriting activities with my son who has special needs. It's worth it to revisit and strengthen previous skills for more practice.

1. Peg or Straw Prewriting Activity

Any basic fine motor activity where your child is holding an object similar to how they would hold a pencil helps build grip strength.

We love using Lauri peg materials to practice fine motor control.

You can also poke holes in the top of a plastic container and have your child place straws inside for another fun prewriting activity.

2. Dot Painting Prewriting Activity

Your child can begin painting a picture of dots using his or her finger, then progress to using a Q-tip in paint to letters, create pointillism art, or complete dot painting printables like these at 1+1+1=1. Dot painting helps familiarize your children with letter and number shapes while practicing precision in placing their finger or the Q-tip.

3. Tracing Letters Activity

Before learning to hold a pencil, it helps to practise tracing the alphabet with a finger. Doing so helps your child develop stronger familiarity with their letters, begin memorizing how to write letters, and adds a sensory aspect to forming letters. You can employ multiple types of sensory materials for tracing letters.

Examples of Tracing Letters:

Trace over your writing or tactile letters, like sandpaper letters or glitter glue letters. (Create these by drawing a letter in glitter glue on an index card.)

Draw letters in a sand or salt writing tray.

Trace inside letter stencils on a light table.

4. Dot-to-Dot Prewriting Activities

Remember doing numerous dot-to-dot activities as "bonus work" in early elementary school or in activity books on car rides? Well, those dot-to-dot worksheets actually help build pre-writing skills! Create your own dot-to-dot to cater to your child's needs. When beginning to work with dot-to-dot activities, create simple ones, especially if working with a younger preschooler or a child with fine motor delays. "Down" and "across" are the first writing motions to master. When starting this with my son, I made dot-to-dots with just three dots forming a "L" shape.

Increase the number of dots, add multiple changes in direction, add diagonal lines, and progress to curved lines to increase difficulty. Then, begin creating dot-to-dots to form a favorite object, like a ball.

5. Bubble Letters

Before we can even begin a formal handwriting curriculum, my son needs to be able to control his writing strokes within a defined space. "Bubble letters" offer parameters for letter formation.

We first did this activity with the "t" shape. I drew four "t" bubble letters on one sheet of paper. I modeled the first one for my son, then asked him to draw "down and across" in each of the others. He was so proud when he did it!

Progress with different types of lines as your child gains more control. (I suggest beginning with "t," "L," "E," and "H.")

This post was first published 2013. Updated 2018.

What prewriting activities have helped your kids strengthen their skills?

Breaking writing skills down into smaller steps builds confidence and solid skills. Just as it does when you are teaching your child to read!

Caroline is a wife, homeschooling momma to two undeserved blessings, writer, former public school teacher, and picture book fanatic. She blogs at Under God's Mighty Hand with book reviews, homeschooling activities and printables, modifications for kids with special needs, and faith and family posts. She also contributes monthly to three other team blogs and loves to chat on Twitter and spend "homeschool planning time" on Pinterest. :)

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5 Pre-Writing Activities for Preschoolers - I Can Teach My Child!

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by - This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy. Guest Post by Caroline of Under God's Mighty Hand Most children go through stages of development in pre-writing skills, and we can utilize a variety of tactics to help progress their skills.

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Dot-to-dot activity
O'Mealia, Shannon, "How Can Prewriting Strategies Benefit Students?" (2011). Education Masters. Paper 14.

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Playdough writing tray
This resource offers strategies and a variety of ways to practice writing, and this relates to the concept of developing children's competencies by allowing children to read and write effectively by exposing them to gradually challenging reading materials and writing tasks as supported by Sadiku L. M. (2015).

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By · This content may contain affiliate links. During the preschool years it's helpful to provide kids with a variety of ways to practice writing. And it can be fun to think past pencil and paper and use different materials.

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Playdough writing tray
Sadiku, o. M. (2015). The importance of four skills: Reading, Speaking, Writing, Listening in a lesson hour . European Journal of Language and Literature Studies , Vol. 1, Nr. 1, 29-31.

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Word placement
This resource offers an exercise for writing lower-case alphabets and this relates to word placement in handwriting which is supported by Noella Mackenzie (2014), she explains that learning to write is fundamental to literacy learning and grasping the language. A child's interest in writing is contributed by teacher's responds to his or her attempts in writing and it helps to willingness in a child's learning. Hence, with this resource, the child can be guided with 3 categories of letters (tall, small and fall) to help them in lowercase writing.

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I have been watching our OT the past few years when she's come into our classroom to do a few lessons here and there and I've picked up on a few of her tricks. The good thing about this is.... she's on maternity leave this year, but I was still able to replicate a few of her lessons, which my firsties needed, believe me! :)

The lessons I love are on Tall, Small and Fall letters. We started looking at letters and the lines they sit on. Here's the chart I made for our firsties.

We looked at the letters and decided where we should put them. Each person was given a letter and came up to place it on the chart. A few were put in the wrong places, but we were able to look at the other letters to help us find the right home.

After a few days of practice, we moved to cutting (we need it desperately) sorting and gluing.

We also did some whole group sorting.

After that we looked at letters and found either tall, small or fall. Then, we practiced writing them.

Some of needed some highlighting to make sure our letters were being formed correctly. It's a work in progress. :)

I made a little packet to help our little firsties with recognizing and writing. There are also a couple of sorts that can be used for an assessment. Interested????? I'll give this packet to the first five people that comment. :)

Happy Handwriting!

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I have been watching our OT the past few years when she's come into our classroom to do a few lessons here and there and I've picked up on a few of her tricks. The good thing about this is....

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The handwriting house
This resources offers children with strategies to improve their handwriting as well as to learn to write alphabets properly, and this relates to the concept of letter placement under handwriting skills which is supported by Sadiku L. M. (2015) where it states that handwriting stimulates parts of the brain linked to learning to
read.

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Understand the letters and where they live in the house. Adults, babies, teenagers, and pets!

Does your child need help with correct letter placement? Maybe his handwriting is all over the place? You'll love this simple tip for better handwriting!

Introduce The Handwriting House

Start by explaining the handwriting house and who can live there.

This house has an upstairs, a downstairs, a basement and an attic. No one likes to go in the attic because it's all filled with cobwebs. The basement is unfinished and really only the pets like to go down there because they have tails.

Make your house look like this:

Brainstorm that the adults in the house go upstairs and downstairs (all capital letters: A,B,C,D)

Brainstorm the babies that might live on the first floor. (lowercase letters: a,c,e,m,n,o,r,s,u,w,x,z)

Brainstorm the teenagers that can go upstairs and downstairs, but they are not fully grown like the adults. (b,d,f,h,k,l,t)

Brainstorm that the pets that have tails and like to go in the basement (g,j,p,q,y)

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Once you have it all figured out - it's time for a fun story. Tell them it will be very scary! Hee! Hee!

Story telling tip: You'll need a blank house to begin, scroll to bottom to see the finished product. In our county we use D'Nealian handwriting, that is why the K looks the way it does!)

Now For A Spooky Handwriting House Story

There was once an abandoned house and everyone was scared of it! The trees were huge, the bushes were overgrown, the shutters were falling off, the windows were broken. It was a mess! No one ever wanted to go near the house.

One day a family came to look at it and they said, "This house has promise. This house could be great!"

So the man moved in to start work on the house. His name was Steve. Write a capital letter S.

He didn't want to be alone, so he also brought a pet dog with him. Write a lowercase p.

Steve worked hard on his house, he fixed the roof, mended the fence, painted, put in new light bulbs, threw out the trash, and cut down the huge bushes. He told his family that it was time to move in!

The family had two twin babies. Write two lower case o's - o o .

The house became so busy with the twin babies, that they decided to hire a teenager to come in and help them sometimes. Write a k.

Finally, life was back to normal in the house and everyone was happy. So, the parents decided to add one more pet to their house... a black cat named.... Write the letter y. SPOOKY!

I love this story for so many reasons, but the best part about it is that it speaks to kids! They relate to the pets and babies. You can easily say, "Keep the adults upstairs and downstairs." or "Only the pets want to go in the basement." when you're writing. It's a fun way to keep your kids on track without nagging!

-------
There is a great printable of a house here on What the Teacher Wants.

Note from Busy Kids Happy Mom - I'm not sure where this story or portions of it originated. I have used it or some variation of it for a long time. If you come across the original one, let me know!

Post First Published: Oct 24, 2011

Click here for more fun learning for kids:
5 Simple Tips To Get Your Child Reading How To Make An Environmental Print Book For Preschoolers Reading Quotes for Kids (Free Printable)
(Visited 5,141 times, 1 visits today)

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Handwriting House for Correct Letter Placement

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Understand the letters and where they live in the house. Adults, babies, teenagers, and pets! Does your child need help with correct letter placement? Maybe his handwriting is all over the place? You'll love this simple tip for better handwriting! Start by explaining the handwriting house and who can live there.

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Handwriting reusable tracing cards
This resource offers an activity for beginning writers that can be used in learning corner or take-home kits and this relates to the concept of handwriting which is supported by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC, n.d) discussed the importance of supporting children with materials during the early stage of writing as they will need easy access to materials so they can build up their skills acquisition.

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Colors and numbers and letters, oh my! While it's still hard for me to admit, I now have a preschooler on my hands (WHERE did my baby go?!) and she's so excited to learn all. the. things. So to make the most of this excitement, I put together this fun bundle of preschool tracing cards for us to practice lots of common preschool skills!

Why We Love Tracing Cards

First off, is my kid the only kid who thinks that writing with dry erase markers is the coolest thing in the world?! I can't say that I blame her and her love of writing on shiny paper, though. There's just something so fun about it! This is the first reason why we love these preschool tracing cards - LG thinks they are so fun!

Secondly, they are SO easy to reuse over and over again! Once you've done the work of putting them together, you have a resource that can be used for years to come. This always makes the work worth it for me!

As LG is getting older, she's working more on her pencil grip. These tracing cards combine fine motors practice with common preschool skills like upper and lowercase letters, beginning sounds, numbers, counting, shapes, and colors. That's SO much practice in one easy activity!

How to Prep Tracing Cards

Prepping these cards is so super simple!

First, I print off my cards on card stock to make sure they're nice and sturdy. Next, I laminate them. This is what gives them the ability to be used with dry erase markers! (Stay tuned for my upcoming blog post covering all the resources I use to print and prep my materials!) Finally, I cut the cards out and hole punch the corners so that I can put each set on its own binder ring. And there you have it! Easy, reusable preschool tracing cards!

**Click any of the images to purchase these resources.**
Try this resource for FREE by clicking the image below!
Read more about some of our other favorite resources for practicing preschool skills by clicking HERE!
CLICK HERE to purchase these resources in their bundle!

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Preschool Tracing Cards | The Stay-at-Home Teacher

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Colors and numbers and letters, oh my! While it's still hard for me to admit, I now have a preschooler on my hands (WHERE did my baby go?!) and she's so excited to learn all. the. things.

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Rainbow pencil control exercises
This resource offers ways to work on handwriting and pencil control, and this relates to the concept of pencil control to write on the lines at an age-appropriate speed, which is supported by the National Council of Teachers of English, where studies show that handwriting improves memory and children retain learning better.

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Rainbow Pencil Control Exercises - The OT Toolbox

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These pencil control exercises use colored pencils to help children establish pencil control in handwriting and fluid pencil motions.

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Rainbow pencil control exercises
English, N. c. (2009). Writing between the lines - and everywhere else . Illinois.

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Letter writing basket
This resource offers children with strategies and encouragement to explore writing alphabets independently , and this relates to the concept of letter-like forms and symbols, which is supported the Nurturing Early Learners Framework (MOE, 2012) where children begin to recognise letters of the alphabet and become aware of the different shapes that make up letters. Their writing starts to resemble letter and symbols which are scattered among their drawings and scribbles.

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Ethan has been really into drawing lately, he's drawing us new pictures every day and it's fantastic! I wanted to extend this love to include a bit of writing, so I made a little invitation to play for him and Ivy with a very simple letter writing basket, inspired by both of their loves of envelopes! (What kid doesn't love envelopes?)

This post contains affiliate links.

What you'll need:

This is so simple to set up, but I can't even begin to tell you how much of a success it has been in our house. It is now permanently on the kids table for them to go and play with whenever they like (and that's at least a few times a day!) I put everything in the basket and before I could even get it set up they were both right in there ready to start.

I have already seen a different in Ethan's writing because of it, and I have now put up a letter chart above the table for him to refer to. His is writing more confidently and more consistently writing in a line and fitting his letters on a page. He is asking to write a larger variety of words and interested in learning how to write addresses as well.

The envelopes and postcards are the most popular items with Ethan, he loves that these are things that people really use to send post, and after writing me a letter he insists on going outside and posting it through the letterbox. Even Ivy gets in on the fun mark making on sheets of paper and stuffing them into envelopes, then covering the envelope in stickers and stamps.

This letter writing basket has been a real saviour in our house, it keeps the kids busy and exploring independently and it's even encouraged them to write more letters. Thank you letters and birthday cards will be much easier to make the next time around! For more fun, follow us on
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest!
Follow Play & Learn Everyday's board Play & Learn Everyday - Crafts and Activities from the Blog on Pinterest.

Niki is a stay at home Mom of two young children; Ethan and Ivy. As a former teacher she tries to bring fun and learning into the activities that they do each day.

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Play and Learn Every Day: Letter Writing Basket

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Ethan has been really into drawing lately, he's drawing us new pictures every day and it's fantastic! I wanted to extend this love to include a bit of writing, so I made a little invitation to play for him and Ivy with a very simple letter writing basket, inspired by both of their loves of envelopes!

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Huffman, J., & Fortenberry, C. (2011). Helping Preschoolers Prepare for Writing: Developing Fine Motor Skills.(Author abstract)(Report). Young Children, 66(5), 100.

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NAEYC (2017). Promoting Preschoolers’ Emergent Writing. Retrieved from https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/yc/nov2017/emergent-writing

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This resource offers an activity for children in the pre writing stage and this relates to the concept of fine motor skills and letter recognition which is supported by the Nurturing Early Learners Framework Motor Skills Development (MOE, 2013) as having good fine motor skills, children will be able to use writing instruments like pencils, markers, crayons, pens efficiently.

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Boy, am I excited to share these Fine Motor Alphabet Mats with you today!

These are a FANTASTIC way to help kids build those fine motor skills needed for gripping a pencil. Not only that, there's a phonics component hidden on each mat.

*This post contains affiliate links.
**The free download can be found towards the END of this post. Just click on the teal download button.

Fine Motor Alphabet Mats

In this free pack, you'll find 27 uppercase mats and 27 lowercase mats. {There are two included for the letter x; one for the initial position and one for the final position.}

Each mat shows the letter and then shows a place to START the letter {a great introduction to letter formation!!}. In this circle is an image of something that begins with the featured letter, which is a integrates some phonics, too!

Ideas for Using the Fine Motor Alphabet Mats

There are SO many ideas for using these mats. I thought I'd share images of just a few of them with you.

Be sure and encourage your learners to grip small objects with their pointer finger and thumb when adding them to the mats.
Learners can:

Use tweezers and pom-poms to cover the mats.

Use playdough - Roll playdough into balls and cover, learners could also flatten down the balls afterwards.

Cover with buttons.

Cover with math manipulatives, like dice.

Use mini erasers to cover each circle.

Cover with bottle caps.

Cover with coins.

Use Power Magnets to cover each circle.

Use manipulatives that relate to each letter. See all our suggestions with our Alphabet Grid Games.

Now, you may have some learners who just LOVE dot markers. And that's fine. Just have your learners use dot paint to dot the circles. Once it's dried, learners could cover their colorful mats in the hands-on ways mentioned above.

You Might Also Like:

Enjoy teaching!
~Becky

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Fine Motor Alphabet Mats {uppercase & lowercase} - This Reading Mama

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Boy, am I excited to share these Fine Motor Alphabet Mats with you today! These are a FANTASTIC way to help kids build those fine motor skills needed for gripping a pencil. Not only that, there's a phonics component hidden on each mat. *This post contains affiliate links.

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Powtoon.com | See What I Created with Powtoon - Writing

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