This week the boys have been practicing writing numbers and letters on their own!
Rondel has always struggled a bit with fine motor skills, but recently he has been developing a lot more control and finesse, so he’s been starting to show more interest in actually writing things himself; he has a tendency to flip letters and numbers around when writing and reading, and left-to-right directionality doesn’t come naturally, but his writing is getting noticeably better the more he does it.
Limerick, on the other hand, was obsessed with letters at 18 months and could write rough approximations of all of them in sidewalk chalk at that age. His handwriting now is quite clear with chalk, and a bit more wobbly but still legible with pen or pencil (I think the thicker chalk is easier for him to control than the narrower options). The only number he consistently reverses is the 6, and he only occasionally needs to verify which side the “1” should be on when writing the number “10.” He can also write much more quickly than Rondel.
Despite these differences of background and innate ability, I’ve never heard the boys compare themselves or their writing (and I try not to either, when they are around to hear it!). They are both just doing their best, continually learning and improving, excited about each other’s accomplishments and encouraging each other to try new things.
Anyway, we got together and over a couple days drew a human-sized numbered game board on the driveway, taking turns writing the numbers until Limerick completely took over around 78 and continued all the way to 196. (Since then we’ve washed the driveway off and completely covered it with different variations on number lines and letters multiple times… it’s all he wants to do whenever the ground is cool enough to tolerate).
We also discovered a free app this week called ABC Kids that offers alphabet tracing games; I didn’t think the kids would be interested, but Rondel has spent hours carefully tracing the letters, both upper and lower case, in the correct directions and with the recommended motions, which I can only imagine is good for his fine motor development as well as his familiarity with the letters and handwriting skills. (The app supposedly offers phonics as well, but since we can’t get the sound to work it doesn’t, functionally at least. But it is great for tracing, for matching lower and upper case letters, and for identifying words beginning with each letter.)
So that has been our focus this week! Writing, writing, and more writing, in all different media! Maybe we’ll try finger-painting some letters and numbers next 🙂
little thoughts 