[Closed] Teaching a Left Handed Pre-schooler to write... any tips / tricks?

Sit alongside him rather than opposite him.

Our eldest is a leftie, and couldn't read or write before starting reception. She finished the year being able to do both well, so I wouldn't sweat it. Her teacher did say that it can take a bit longer. Perhaps focus on getting him to hold a pen properly and do join the dots or colouring in pictures. That'll give him the fine motor control he will need.

get him a left handed pencil, or don't worry about it.

Neither Sweamrs or I are left handed.

Which side of his body does the postman wear his bag?

Biggest issue is smudging the writing/drawing as you go along. Damn left to right!

He'll either have to hold his hand at angle to not smudge or hover above the paper (difficult). I once drew a beautiful charcoal picture and when I got to finish on the right hand side I'd wiped it all out 😆

I wouldn't sweat it though, the school will teach him.

No pudding until he starts using his right hand.

Force him to use his right hand.

Speaking as a left-hander, it can be a flippin' pita.

Teach him Arabic, right-to-left will be easier for him.

Which side of his body does the postman wear his bag?

:o)

I'm supposed to be left handed but was "taught" (I use the term loosely) to use my right hand by a teacher who should have retired in the 50's and not the 70's.  It wasn't a great experience and so I am hoping things have moved on in the modern world...

I'm mostly ambidextrous but lean red to write initially right handed then broke my clavicle in what would be called reception today and leaned with my left until I tore the ligaments in my left thumb

Now I mainly write left handed except on whiteboards and blackboards where it depends what side I'm stood on.

I’m supposed to be left handed but was “taught” (I use the term loosely) to use my right hand by a teacher who should have retired in the 50’s and not the 70’s.  It wasn’t a great experience and so I am hoping things have moved on in the modern world…

Possibly as much the teacher giving the experience ???  It probably would have been a "not great" experience anyway!

Not wanting to get too 4 Yorkshiremen ... but "Forced to write with the other hand ... we had ITA"

Joking aside ... ITA was a totally stupid idea... but the lasting damage and resentment for me was being told to forget the "lies" my parents taught me... that were in books and shop signs and even the sign above the school.... and learn the NEW WAY

Currently when he does write he tends to write the letters backward.  We suspect this might be because he’s simply mirroring our hand movements using the other hand.

Purely basedon my experience but with the above in mind... don't sweat it and relax.... Can he see the letters are backwards?

Presuming he is reading plenty then I'd back off showing him and try not to let him copy you and instead just copy the letters... if you want to help develop motor skills then dot-to-dot.... etc.  but avoid building in any motorskills round letters incorrectly...

My mum is left handed and my dad was right handed... and I tend to do stuff (mainly) based on who showed me...

I sew left handed and hammer right handed (to be honest I can use either hand) but if I pick up a hammer it will be in my left hand and if I pick up a needle it will be my right hand.  I remember my Dad telling me that I had to choose for Tennis as I used to swap hands over and as he said, if I ever wanted to play properly I'd never have the time...

This might sound a bit weird but for example look at catching ... all the US kids I know get taught to catch left handed and throw right handed (so they can wear a baseball mit)... whereas in the UK it more right handed catching and throwing.

Nearly everyone not who starts playing baseball though ends up learning to catch left handed and it's nowhere near as traumatic as you expect.

Loads of stuff you have little choice anyway.... e.g using a camera or microscope etc. or a can opener for example... you can buy left handed ones but... and when i learned to use a mouse on shared PC's they were set up on the right so I always just did that...

I don't play golf as such but I can/could knock a ball round the playing field 😀  I basically learned using my Dad's clubs etc.  On one occasion a tried a left handed friends golf clubs...I could barely make contact with the ball...

He’ll either have to hold his hand at angle to not smudge or hover above the paper (difficult).

Or he'll write perfectly normally, just using his left hand, which is what I did.

Smudging?  Maybe if you've given him a fountain pen.  Biggest issue I had was pressing on too hard - you're pushing the pen into the paper rather than dragging it over.  I got told off constantly at school for that, it was years after I'd left that I realised why.

Force him to use his right hand.

Under no circumstances do this.

Quite a lot of right-handed children of that age write some letters/numbers backwards too; it's not unique to left-handers. You'll  be amazed how much he comes on over the next year. Try to talk to his teacher and use the same writing methods rather than confuse him with a different 'system' - I get told off for showing my grandchildren how to do things 'properly'!!

Our 2nd is left handed. The school got one of these for him to use. STABILO Easyoriginal Start Left Handed Pen and also some left handed scissors. They  were great and made it a lot easier for him to write and cut with. Since then, we moved and changed schools and he was 'taught' to write with his right hand.

He now changes hands depending what particular craft he is doing.

Cheers Cougar

like the OP I also wrote and drew with my left hand pre-School then my P1 teacher made learn to write with my right hand. Which I still do to this day but I hold the pen/pencil backwards (the other end pointing forwards and sligtly to the left rather than back towards me and to the right. I've always pressed too hard. Never really thought about why until now.
As for smudging, because of my odd way of holding writing implements those rub outable erasermate pens by papermate in the 70/80s were a nightmare.With some cheap disposible pens it still sometimes happens.

and also some left handed scissors

I'm actually against left-handed scissors, simply because they're so hard to come across day-to-day.  The first time you need to use scissors outside of your own home you're screwed.

we moved and changed schools and he was ‘taught’ to write with his right hand.

Have you moved to a school in the 1940s?

Thanks all - some good advice.  We're not sure if he's noticing the letters are backwards currently but suspect not.

I’m actually against left-handed scissors, simply because they’re so hard to come across day-to-day.  The first time you need to use scissors outside of your own home you’re screwed.

It's hardly just scissors ...

We’re not sure if he’s noticing the letters are backwards currently but suspect not.

Get some of the books with the letters in that they trace.... (or download PDF's and print) .. or make your own with meaningful stuff....  it's just going to be hard for him to break the motor skills the more he develops them... indeed its always easier to learn something new than try and learn something different.... and this is 26 times.

At 4.5 it's too late. There's a few lefties in the wife's family so with our little one I put all her play mat toys on the right and left her left mit on. Not having any of that weirdness under my roof.

Inverted letters are common amongst right handers as well. Don't worry about it, the fact he's writing before school is a good sign and being a lefty isn't a problem with writing really, just don't give him a left handed guitar 🙂

Have you tried tying his left hand behind his back, forcing him to use his right, beating him with a big stick and cursing for being the left handed spawn of Satan?

Sometimes the old ways are best!

:o)

Just googled ITA - wow. Glad I missed that delight.

To be honest if he's writing any letters at all by the time he starts school then you are doing well!  My son just wasn't interested at all until half way through reception year but has come on leaps and bounds since then.  I really wouldn't overthink it-he'll find a way to write that will come naturally to him.

Writing backwards is pretty normal at that age... is it just letters or the whole word right to left? Anyway, no need to worry. I twist the page 90 degrees to avoid smudging and I also push the pen into the page, but it's not a big deal unless the school "reward" good writing with fountain pens - they're a disaster! But do not force him to write (or play sport etc) right handed. Why would you force someone to be less-able with both hands than they could otherwise be? To be fair there is a knack to scissors (you have to pull the blades together by twisting your thumb at the same time as cutting) that might be worth getting left handed ones until he's a bit older.

A reasonable summary:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04s04kn

To be fair there is a knack to scissors (you have to pull the blades together by twisting your thumb at the same time as cutting)

Yeah.  Tricky to learn though.  I just learned to use them right-handed, easier all round in the long run.

On my first day at school, the teacher sat down with a mirror to demonstrate I was writing back-to-front and got over it pretty quick.

I write 'uphill' with the paper at 90 degrees so I can see the text, minimising smudging and even taught myself to write calligraphy with pen and ink. You can get 'left handed' pens these days with fast drying ink.

In my first job, I worked in a design office with 4 other left-handers!

Babybgoode is a leftie now in Y2. He soon picked up how to write in reception and has vastly improved through Y1.

Mrs Danny is a leftie too and has impeccable hand writing so she clearly picked it up ok as well.

The Stabilo pens are nice, but hardly essential - other than fountain pens most writing implements work the same in either direction.

Though I do have one on my desk at work to confuse the righty weirdos when they borrow it to note something down 🙂

The Stabilo pens are nice, but hardly essential

They're brilliant for the dyspraxic child. Sandwich Jr progressed well with them.

I’m naturally a lefty, so do most 'instinctive' things (throwing, catching) primarily left handed. For most learned skills I’m ambidextrous (eg sawing, screwdriver use, batting, computer mouse, knife and fork use).  I can only think of one skill where I am exclusively left, and that's snooker/pool, and handwriting is the only thing I do exclusively right handed.

I suspect a lot of people who self describe as ambidextrous are natural lefties, but learned skills from right handlers. I think my writing comes from being the only lefty, and youngest of 6 in my family, so all the examples of writing were my right handed siblings. I had a lesser version of the prejudice at primary school in the 70s in that the dinner ladies couldn’t cope and continually tried to get me to swap knife and fork, but I have always been 'assertive'. I was lucky at secondary school that our woodwork/metalwork teacher was also a lefty, so he never had an issue with left handedness in others, and I often got one to one demonstrations.

i would agree with the comment above about lefty scissors etc - I think it’s better to learn to cope with the norm, and it’s not really that difficult most of the time.

I’m naturally a lefty, so do most ‘instinctive’ things (throwing, catching) primarily left handed.

I'm left-handed, left-eyed and left-footed.  I do very few things instinctively righty, amusingly after what you've just said playing pool is about the only thing I can think of.  Also,

the dinner ladies couldn’t cope and continually tried to get me to swap knife and fork

I still hold that knife and fork is arse-backwards.  I use them the conventional way round, it bakes my noodle that a right-hander would use a spoon or fork right-handed but *swap hands* if a knife is introduced.  That's just bloody odd, why would you eat with your off-hand?  If I tried that I'd end up sticking food up my nose or something.

Oh,

computer mouse

I use a mouse in my right hand.  Reason being, the first time I ever used one was on an Atari ST, the cord plugged into the right hand side of the computer and wasn't long enough to have the mouse on the left.  But for me the mouse is a secondary input (like the knife above), it makes sense for me to have my favoured hand on the key primary input device (keyboard).  Plus there's the scissors argument, I use so many different computers day-to-day that it'd be a PITA to have to keep swapping over.

Back to the Computer Mouse - I first used one right handed, until I found the setting to change it, which I did for mischief. Then realised I preferred that.  However, other people use our home PC so that’s right and I do a fair amount of support around our team, so have always been happy swapping. It’s only people using my work desktop who have a problem and, after 15 years, IT are used to it (I’ve put the settings icon on my desktop just for them).

I didn’t even realise the righties swap the fork from left to right until someone at secondary pointed out that I don’t. Do lefties?  As a child, my handedness appeared to be set for the day by which hand I used at breakfast; I’m not so sure now.

Anyway, to the OP's question - don’t worry, these days I would expect there to be more understanding of left handedness and the teachers should be able to help him write without smudging everything.  Do many kids start school able to write?

Most folk who think of themselves as Ambidextrous are probably cross dominant. (ie doing some things left handed and other things right handed) truly ambidextrous folk are vanishingly rare.

I lead with left foot, was taught right handed writing, hold cutlery "backwards" and so on. but I know my dominate side is right.

Learn to write left handed with him? Sitting and practicing at his side and comparing work sounds like fun.

Rachel

Little J is a leftie. I'd advise patience.

The smudging thing was an issue for him on chalk or dry boards etc. He'd get really frustrated which distracted him from the writing. I did what Rachel suggests and wrote left handed next to him to show it could be done.

He still gets b's and d's the wrong way round ,just turned 6.

:o)

Just googled ITA – wow. Glad I missed that delight.

Yep.... It was a crazy idea just on the face of it to start with but when you think a little deeper it was beyond that.

Imagine your kid now reading some books and signs ... then they get to school and get told "Forgot that it's wrong" ... then on the way home they see the sign saying "Supermarket" or whatever...

Don't worry too much.... just try and prevent them getting motor skills embedded that then need to be unlearned.

I write left handedly, mostly with a fountain pen and was taught to read and write using the ITA. I still can't spell...

I asked my son how he gets on with scissors -he's a full lefty, whereas I'm only left-handed for writing and a few other things (could never understand when I fanned playing cards that the symbols were hidden!) he said why? I said cos you're left handed, do you use scissors with your right? He picked up some scissors and paper and chop chop chop, no issue at all. Guess he's taught himself a way of pulling the blades together without thinking about it.

Mouse use is the only thing I'm ambidextrous at!

Guess he’s taught himself a way of pulling the blades together without thinking about it.

Yeah, it's doable, it's just counter-intuitive.  The natural turn of your thumb pushes the blades together, so if you use right-handed scissors in your left hand (or of course, left-handed scissors in your right) it pulls them apart instead.  You need to consciously pull your thumb back towards your hand as you cut.

That's what I thought, I seem to recall him struggling with it when he was a little'un. S'why I asked, but he chopped that paper quick as any normal person 😉

I never had any problems with right-handed scissors in my left hand... my cutting is a whole load better than my handwriting !

for writing without smudging I just have my fingers straighter than a righty would and the pen points up all the time

Gosh, I'd forgotten about playing cards - I shuffle, fan and deal left handed  My parents liked Canasta, so we would end up with huge hands of cards and I had trouble fanning them out.  the joy when we got some cards with numbers/letters in all four corners!

I remember ITA. Or at least I remember various funny looking symbols and then having to learn 'normal' spelling, and this being intertwined by getting spanked..... I guess education has changed a bit! I'm almost surprised kids even write any more.

Dont worry about writing so much, just get child drawing straight lines, squiggles etc.  Make it fun.

Or at least I remember various funny looking symbols... and this being intertwined by getting spanked…

You have to pay good money for that these days.

My eldest is right handed and now writes well, but in earlier years (nursery/reception) would often write letters or words backwards - it's not uncommon. He still struggles a bit with 'b' and 'd'. I wouldn't worry about it.

I'm left handed for writing and haven't ever had an issue with it even though I do a lot of writing in my job. I do remember that I found writing in pencil a bit easier at primary school - not sure why, poss. because of the rolling resistance on the paper.

I think it's interesting how mixed up things are - I write left handed, bat (cricket) right handed, kick with both feet (better with left), hit a tennis ball with both hands (better with left), use a knife/fork the traditional way round, but use my left hand for spoons. My eldest is almost the opposite (apart from kicking a ball better with his left).

I still hold that knife and fork is arse-backwards.  I use them the conventional way round, it bakes my noodle that a right-hander would use a spoon or fork right-handed but *swap hands* if a knife is introduced.  That’s just bloody odd, why would you eat with your off-hand?

Because “back in the day” knives were proper knives and bloody sharp. You really want to to wielding one with your dominant hand to make sure it’s only your food you’re eating.

Uh. Back in the day were you sticking it near your face?

Generally yes. A knife would be used for cutting the food, then spearing it to lift to the mouth.

The same knife would probably also be used for shaving, cutting anything needed, in fact generally everything in life. So left or right, you’d hold it in your dominant hand. As most people are righties, this then became convention to hold a knife with the right hand.

Trying to help a leftie learn to spread butter when you're right handed is fun!

Sit opposite them so they can mirror you.

Mrs_oab is early years teacher.

I work a bit with early years.

Writing letters backwards is a developmental thing, and not to be too worried about just now.

Big issue now is not copying but developing fine motor skills and transferring ideas in head into lines etc - creativity.

Get mini_s to do lots of observational drawings (not colouring in...), pattern making and repeat patterns. Use different things such as chalk, crayons, pens, pencils, sticks on sand etc etc. Get them to do anything that develops fine motor skills etc

There is some research that trying to write letters and fixed shapes too early is a hindrance - but creating and developing fine motor is great.

Thanks all again.

I’m right handed, but with a dominant left eye, so I use a camera with my left eye, and on the rare occasions I use a gun, like an air rifle, I also use my left eye; that caused problems when my dad used to take me to the TA rifle range, because of the bolt action being on the left.

Yeah, guns are... problematic.  A hot cartridge to the face is no fun.

I still hold that knife and fork is arse-backwards. I use them the conventional way round, it bakes my noodle that a right-hander would use a spoon or fork right-handed but *swap hands* if a knife is introduced. That’s just bloody odd, why would you eat with your off-hand? If I tried that I’d end up sticking food up my nose or something.

Yeah, I stuggle with desserts when they give you a spoon and a fork - use knife and fork in normal manner (think I was taught that way at home) but spoon in left hand so struggle with posh puddings.

I could mirror write as quickly and a fluently as normal writing when I was younger, not sure if thats a leftie trait or not.

I've found all the delicate/small movement stuff I do left handed but right hand generally for brute force stuff like throwing, cricket, golf etc. but still left footered for footie.

Lefty here.

I can't use left-handed scissors - spent so long using righty ones in my left hand that my instinctive movements stop lefty ones cutting.

Can't use a mouse with my left hand at all. Feels so wrong.

I still hold that knife and fork is arse-backwards.  I use them the conventional way round, it bakes my noodle that a right-hander would use a spoon or fork right-handed but *swap hands* if a knife is introduced.  That’s just bloody odd, why would you eat with your off-hand?  If I tried that I’d end up sticking food up my nose or something.

This. So much this.

I can’t use left-handed scissors – spent so long using righty ones in my left hand that my instinctive movements stop lefty ones cutting.

Try them in your right hand? (-:

This. So much this.

Oh, thank gods it's not just me.

What has being left handed got to do with anything

I'm lefty, made the adjustments to stop smudging ink as you do

reading a vast amount when I was young helped me form words easily as I just knew what they were supposed to look like

I’m sorry but I still don’t get why it’s such a big deal to be left handed!

I’m a proper lefty, write with my left hand, I’m left footed, use a mouse with my left hand, eat from a fork with my left hand, chop with a knife in my left hand, I can use normal scissors but prefer the comfort of left handed shaped scissors, I can use a conventional can opener and cork screw..........

I’ve survived for the last 48 years with no problem. A lot off things I just naturally learnt how to do as a mirror image of right handers. Doesn’t mean I do them wrong, just my own way!

Admittedly a couple of hundred years ago I’d probably have been burnt at the stake as a witch, but I’m not sure that’s because I’m left handed? (Sinister is the Latin for left!)

Dont panic over it, kids find their own way, and left handers tend to be the most artistic people, as we use the right side of our brains more apparently!