I Need to WRITE??!!**

Does your child experience:

• Avoids or tires quickly while writing or printing, even if neat and legible

• Inconsistent printing with mix of, for example, letter case, style, angle, size or shape of letters

• Poor spacing between words and/or letters and/or omission of letters or words

• Inconsistent position on page with respect to lines and margins

• Cramped or unusual pencil grip such as close to pencil end and thumb over two fingers, writing from the wrist

• Unusual wrist, body or paper position

• Talking to self while writing

• Carefully watching the hand that is writing

• Trouble thinking of words to write

• Trouble organizing thoughts on paper

• Large gap between oral spoken language and written expression

If your child experiences many of these "symptoms" above, your child may have what is called dysgraphia. Dysgraphia is a learning difficulty that impacts handwriting and information processing writing skills. It is a visual-spatial, auditory brain-based disorder that can cause difficulty with forming letters affecting legibility, spacing words, writing left to right, staying inside the margins, spelling, punctuation, lowercase vs. uppercase lettering and organizing words to complete sentences, for example. Dysgraphia often impacts translating words into their component letters and the ability to store written words into working memory. Remembering pronunciation and meaning to words can also be affected. Planning sequential finger movements can be a challenge without visual feedback. Dysgraphia can be misattributed to lack of motivation or laziness. Students may learn much less from an assignment because they must focus on the mechanics of writing instead of the content. Not surprisingly, belief in their ability to learn suffers. When the writing task in the primary barrier to learning or demonstrating knowledge, then, that is a cue that adjustments need to be made in the strategy and programming.

Signs of dysgraphia are very individualized with children each having a unique set of symptoms, or experiences. Sometimes dysgraphic children also experience challenges in other areas such as dyslexia, ADHD and sometimes fine motor coordination.

Students with dysgraphia can experience frustration with anything written oftentimes developing anxiety and/or avoidance with written output tasks. Many students experience actual pain from cramping in the muscles of the hand and can have challenges holding a comfortable, stable grip on the pencil. For children with dysgraphia, it is not only the mechanical process of printing or cursive that is the issue but translating ideas into language. With dysgraphia, there is a glitch which can cause writers to lose their train of thought and have difficulty expressing themselves, sometimes creating a “mental block” to putting words on paper.

When students who have dysgraphia are expected to express their knowledge through only written skills, it significantly limits them from showing what they actually know or wish to express. Many students write the shortest passage possible to get by, which is below their ability level and may not express what they would actually like to say. Their written work will not match their ability to present information verbally or demonstrate their full understanding of a subject.

These students often achieve lower grades in language arts and any other subjects where they are expected to use written skills to express their knowledge. Eventually, many students experience a lower confidence and self-esteem saying they are “stupid” when they may quite smart but are not given the opportunity to show what they know.

With technology so easily accessible, children with dysgraphia can bypass frustration, anxious feelings, avoidance, and possible lower self-esteem by becoming early proficient typists and using voice recorders. While a student is learning more about spelling, spending time to learn touch typing is time well spent.

For older students, using voice to text can be useful. If the student has a speech impediment or profound spelling challenges, this can be a bit tricky.

The following are some tips that may support and/or bypass some challenges your child may be experiencing:

DYSGRAPHIA TIPS

* Note: These are general suggestions and may not relate to the needs of an individual child.

1. Warm up your hands

Get the blood flowing to improve circulation and prepare the muscles before printing and/or typing. Wiggle and move neck, shoulders, forearms, wrists and all fingers in all directions. Play with exercise putty or artist eraser and/or squeeze a “stress” ball, for example.

2. Use cursive vs. printing

Some children find cursive easier than printing. When looping connecting letters together, placement of the consecutive starting and ending points for a multiple stroke letter, for example a “k” is eliminated. There are fewer reversible letters with cursive. For children whom also have a tremor or fine motor coordination issues, cursive might be a possible more successful method.

3. Supports

• Use of an audio recording device, note-taking buddy and/or photo of notes, rather than taking written notes or copying

• Multiple choice vs. written responses

• Audio responses vs. written output

• Typewritten responses vs. written output

• Provide enlarged spacing for forms that must be used (enlarge on printer)

• Try different paper color and/or textures and/or lines

• Try different pencil/pen/grip

• Allow for alternate assignment with more of a hands-on approach

• Provide checklist of expectations such as spelling, neatness, grammar, progression of ideas…

• Adjust one or all of the following: rate, volume, complexity or format of the work

4. Recite word spelling aloud

Spelling aloud is often not impacted with dysgraphic students as much as on paper. Spelling quizzes orally can be more successful with students with dysgraphia. Reciting quietly to oneself before attempting to write it down can be helpful. Spelling while typing can also support spelling using muscle memory.

5. Idea generation

Composing information can be stopped at the idea level, word level, sentence level, paragraph level or beyond. Sometimes brainstorming can get ideas out, orally, rather than writing a rough draft. Referring to an “idea file” can support the process.

6. Learn to touch-type with home row

As early as possible, in any grade, even kindergarten, start teaching use of a keyboard. The keyboard is uppercase and books and onscreen can be upper or lowercase. The child will need to be proficient at matching upper to lower case letters.

Teaching “proper” fingering using home row from the beginning is important so that eventually, the child will not need to look at their fingers, the screen, then back to the paper, then back to the screen to see if they “got it right” for each letter stroke. This is incredibly fatiguing!

Typing bypasses letter formation, letter and word spacing, writing left to right and printing along a straight line. Typing allows ease of correction, spell and grammar checkers and other programs that can be imbedded for individualized needs. The muscle memory in the hands used in typing can enhance spelling skills.

There are online touch-typing programs that appeal to a variety of student interest. Typing games are fun too. Within occupational therapy sessions, there are “cut to the chase” fast methods to teach touch typing with an early expectation to type “without looking”. Fun games and challenges are possible!

For younger children, Keyboarding Without Tears (from Learning Without Tears) is a program that starts with touchpad lessons, matching letters, teaching consonant and vowels… It requires 10 “reps” for every lesson before the child can move on ensuring the child has thoroughly learned that lesson. It also prevents leaping forward before the student is ready. This program records the child’s progress which the adult can later go into track progress. There are teacher manuals for each level of typing to enhance the learning.

For young and older children as well, and specifically with children with dyslexia, Touch-Type Read and Spell (TTRS) is an excellent program for learning touch typing. This is an online program for users of all ages and ability levels. TTRS is recommended by the British Dyslexia Association and takes a multi-sensory Orton-Gillingham based approach. There is built-in feedback with an opportunity to repeat lessons to encourage self-directed study.

7. Organization of information

Graphic organizers that are simple, linear and numbered can be helpful, even scribed, providing a visual organization structure for a “rough draft”. Students don’t necessarily automatically embrace graphic organizers without learning the value and how to use it; that the extra step will enable the student to be more successful in producing work. Break down assignments into smaller steps and tasks.

For more information on specific dygraphia information for an individual child, including additional, individualized strategies, please do contact us at alison@aspireot.ca