“It’s vital that little hands are given big opportunities to have FUN with pre-writing skills. At preschool age, it’s not about correction of letter formation, it’s about providing loads of joyous moments to use a variety of writing tools, from chunky crayons to shave foam. We strive to have our little ones to WANT to experiment with pre-writing and LOVE what they create.” - Miss Mary-Ellen
Handwriting is a complex task involving fine motor and cognitive processes. Difficulties in either or both of these processes can impact your child’s participation and performance in the occupation of handwriting. Implications could hinder classroom participation, cause frustration, or avoidance.
In order to best maintain these implications, Tightrope Learning aims to bridge the gap for preschool aged children as they transition into their primary school years to gain necessary fine motor skills, attentiveness, and enjoyment around pre-writing skills.
At Tightrope Learning, our curriculum utilises different activities that target building hand strength, use of different grips and grasps, in-hand manipulation, precision and tracing skills.
Tightrope Learning also strives for each child to work towards achieving a correct pencil grasp as evidence tells us that a poor relationship between types of grasp can impact handwriting (Schwellnus et al., 2012).
The Tightrope Learning team take pride in grading tasks by using different tools which encourage the development of those little hand muscles. Our main aim is to facilitate the children’s successfulness in completing the task of pre-writing skills with a huge smile on their beautiful faces!
About OT Tuesday and the author, Elly Rooney.
Our very own Elly Rooney is currently studying Occupational Therapy at The Australian Catholic University.
Elly has been a part of the Tightrope Learning Team now for 4 years and has built such beautiful relationships with the children and their families. Her passion for what she does, coupled with her genuine love of children, has directed her focus towards Paediatric OT.
Elly is an absolute gift to Tightrope Learning. She brings along a wealth of fresh knowledge and resources and works closely with all the children in her care.
Elly has now decided to write a blog for us each week, to be known as “OT Tuesday”. Be sure to read this each week to learn more about how to help your own special little one.
The content of this post is for general purposes only. Always seek individual guidance from your healthcare professional regarding any medical condition you may have.
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