Tuesday 1 October 2013

All observations are useful

I wrote recently about J and writing - how he has no consistency and struggles.  Today I *think* I saw part of the reason why.

We were working with the cursive writing book, and started with a page of letters that have "descenders" - I used to call them tails, but it was j, g, p and so on.  As he copied them he was focusing on what he was copying.  He had no real issues, other than getting the relative sizing right - by the end of each line his letters were much better.  He was excited when he realised that g is a c with a tail, and so is p . . .

Then he wanted to move to the next page - the first with joined letters.  Normally we do one page and stop, but as he was eager we carried on.

The page began with a joined i and n. J tried, and couldn't get it right, as I moved in to help him I stood behind him rather than sat beside him as usual.  From behind I could see that his hand completely blocks his view of what he is writing.  Somehow his pencil grip just obscures the writing entirely.  So all this asking him to pay attention to how wide the letter is, how big the flick is, has been pointless as he just can't see until it is done.

Now I know what is causing at least part of the problem, but I have no idea how to fix it!  A quick google has turned up no advice at all.  I'll ask in a few places, but it's not something I have ever heard mentioned as an issue.

Still, as a wise man (OK, character in a TV program . . . same difference!) once said, having defined a problem the first step towards a solution is the acquisition of data.

No comments:

Post a Comment