ENHANCING WRITING SKILLS IN PRESCHOOLERS

Presented by,Aiswarya K.S.

Student, PSTTIDate of submission: 16/11/2013

Sr.No. Title Page No.

1 Acknowledgement

2 Aim and Objective

3 Introduction

4 Content

5 Suggestions

6 Conclusions

7 Bibliography

Index

Acknowledgement

Through this acknowledgement, I express my sincere gratitude to all those people who been associated with this assignment and helped me with it and made it a worthwhile experience.

Firstly I extend my thanks to Sadaf mam and Savitha mam who have shared their opinion and their experience through which I received the required information crucial for my report.

Finally, I express my thanks to Unaiza mam, Soumya mam and Prathima mam who gave this opportunity to learn the subject in a practical approach and specially Sadaf mam who guided me and gave me valuable suggestions regarding this project report.

Aims and objectives

Aim•How to further improve the quality of writing skills in preschoolers.•To show how important the activities which occur during preschool years lay the important foundation for their skills in writing.

Objectives•To make aware that, it is possible to enhance writing skills in preschoolers simply by guiding kinds of activities they would simply enjoy.•Fun activities at home and play house seek attention of younger ones, so they follow it.

Introduction

Good habits that begin in early years will last a life time and holding a pencil or crayon correctly is very important. A wonderful milestone is reached in a child’s life s when they first begin learning to write. The handwriting activities which occur during preschool years lay the important foundation for their skills in writing.

Timing can really affect a child’s pencil holding and handwriting skills. If you introduce pencil too early, he may not have the fine motor skills to hold it properly and may adopt the wrong pencil grip. If you wait too long, he may develop an improper grasping method from writing with crayons and markers and it can be harder to break these habits and correct his grip.

ContentWriting involves quite fine control and

coordination of muscles and structures of the hand as well as eye hand coordination. These are developing all the time as the child grows, but these are specific activities which will enhance the preschool physical ability to write. Even before the preschool stage, from about the age of two, some of the child’s drawing and painting can be guided towards writing skills. Encouraging them to draw lines from left to right is a good start, progressing to zigzags and wavy lines. Tracing of simple picture and dots to dots are also very good fun activities which will build confidence and coordination.

First attempt at actual writing are usually the child’s own name. it is particularly a difficult name in which ‘Mum’ or similar will do the same job. An adult could write the child’s name and sounding out the letters. They could hold the child’s hand and guide it to write the name. big chunky crayons or felt tips are great for younger preschoolers because they are easy for little hands to manage and create a dynamic effect. Plenty of praises is good for child to learn anything.

Another technique is to write the name in dots, so the child can join up the dots. After a time simple repetition will enable the child to recognize and reproduce their own name. Other words can be learnt in the same way.Another important skill is the ability to correctly use pencil. When preschoolers start drawing with crayons tend to wrap their whole hand around it making a fist. When they get to school, they will need to be able to hold and control the pencil correctly between thumb and finger. A very good way of developing the hand control necessary is to offer stubs of crayons, so that the child must hold it with fingers and thumbs such as threading beads also help with this. As well as the activities, it is important that the children see adults reading and writing rather than always typing on the keyboard. Writing need to be such as a normal day to day activity of adult world. Children naturally went to copy and often start “writing” spontaneously in the same way that they will play house, if they see adults writing frequently. The next stage the child had mastered holding an pencil and can write simple words, it is worth working on the alphabets. The child can be learning the sound of the letters at the same time as learning to draw them. In this way they will have all the building blocks they need. Have fun making up alliterative doggerel with them so that the learning is effortless.

Important things to notice

Patience and imaginations are keys at this age. Writing can seem daunting even for young children. Activities which are presented imaginatively and positively and creatively help children develop a positive attitude towards writing from very beginning.

Young children learning to write benefit from experiences that support the development of fine motor skills in hands and fingers. Children should have strength in their hand and fingers before being asked to manipulate a pencil or a pen.

To develop fine motor skills, there are some fun activities which can help them to hold pencil at the preschool age.

Some of the fun activities are:

1. Coins or buttons – picking up coins or buttons (if sure they will not put in their mouth) is wonderful for developing “O” space.

2. Tweezers – picking up cotton wool balls with tweezers is great for developing opposition of fingers.

3. Play Dough – Cutting with knife is a great strengthening task.

4. News paper – Encourage children to tear the paper into strips with their thumb and index finger and asked to them to crumble the paper into balls.

5. Spray bottles – these are perfect for developing strength in the palm, wrist and fingers. Try adding some drops of food colouring for magic spray.

6. Finger puppets – for story time, use finger puppets on the index or middle fingers, keeping the ring and little fingers studded into the hands.

Activities to help handwritings

Pre handwriting activities at this age are textural. Opportunities should be given for writing in oatmeal, rice, shaving cream and sand as well as finger painting and a verity of different surfaces. Children will write very large initially to avoid eye strain and the size will gradually reduce. When the children first start writing, a single letter may be painted to fill the page.

Children at this age must develop an open index finger thumb space. This means that they can make an “O” with their thumb and index finger. If your child is enable to do so they needs opportunities to strengthen the muscle before attempting writing with crayons or pencils as this will only cause frustration.

There are four important steps to notice.•Determine handedness – determine the skilled or preferred hand to teach grip. Notice which hand the child use more often during activities requiring hand use, for ex. Eating and stringing beads. You may want to discuss with teachers, parents. So they two are watching too and can help you decide.

• Writing tool is very important – select pencils or crayons as per the age of children.

•Through play provide – creative opportunities for children to develop fine motor skills that are necessary for correct grip, such as scissor activities, manipulating play dough, stringing beads etc.

•Stories and rhymes – narrate or sing rhymes with actions and clapping hands. Show some activities along with the games like waving ribbon and clapping hands.

Tips for grips

•Keep the little finger and ring finger in the palm. Have the child hold a small sponge or penny in the palm with the little finger and ringer. This keeps those fingers out of the way as the thumb, index and middle finger hold the pencil.

•Sing a song – Because children love songs, love music at handwriting without tears and even have a song to remind children about proper grip. Ex. Crayon song.

•Dot to dots- dot to dot activities really helps improve handwriting skills are valuable pre writing teaching tool. Children learn how to create shapes on focusing their pencils and learn how much pressure to apply to paper.

•Well children ready to write his hands are getting ready. There are series of small muscle in children hands and fingers and they need to be developed to help the handwriting. Fine motor activities such as mazes are the perfect way of help develop these muscle activities. A maze must be look like fun way to boost their problem solving skills. Solving mazes are wonderful for improving eye hand coordination.

Maize activity

Dot to dot activity

As with anything else at preschool age writing skills will be enhanced through play, through fun, exploration and through observation and copying of adults.

The best way to do this is reading books to them. Books with simple stories and good pictures, with lot of repetition of simple words can be shared with children from a very early age. They will soak up the concept of reading and writing without even anything they have learned something quite complex.

Preschoolers love to draw and paint. These activities are excellent for developing the initial concept of representation, as well as beginning to develop the motor skills and eye hand coordination necessary for writing.

To enhance them with writing skills preschools need to be offered a wide range of art materials such as paint, including finger paints, crayons, feet sketch pens etc.To guide them more specifically towards writing skills, younger children can be offered templates to draw around and older ones would be given simple picture to copy.

1. Mould and roll play dough into balls using the palms of the hands facing each other and with finger curled slightly towards the palm.

2. Roll play dough into tiny balls using fingertips.3. Use toothpicks to make design in play dough.4. Cut play dough with plastic knife or with pizza

cutter.5. Tear news paper into strips and then crumble

into balls.6. Pick up objects using large tweezers.7. Use lacing and sewing activities such as

stringing beads8. Use eye droppers to pick up colours for artistic

design on paper or blob painting9. Scissor activities (age 3 to 4) – Cut papers (use

craft scissors only), Cut play Dough, Cut straws etc.

Some of the fun activities are:

Stringing activity

Scissor activity

Picking with tweezers

Colouring activity

Play Dough activity

Some of the fun ways I experience with my child are:

• Ask the child to point child thumb and pointing finger and pick up the pencil at the end using your thumb and pointing finger, use your other hand to slip the pencil around, this is the perfect way to hold the pencil.

• Ask your child to make and “Okay” sign with your hand and open the “O” slightly. Slip the in the gap and wrap your other hand around it.

Suggestions

Using these ideas, with virtually no craft effort, it is possible to enhance writing skills in preschoolers simple by guiding and extending the kinds of activities they would naturally enjoy anyway.

By the time they get to school they will be confident and receptive to the next stage of development.

Conclusions

BibliographyOnline articles

HWT connections – www.hwtears.com. Education space 360 – Author : Briar Metler. Wikipedia.

Speech or lecture

Sadaf – Child Psychology. Soumya – Rhymes sessions. Prathima – Montessori.

Personal experience

Montessori and craft classes. Experience with my baby.