Key points:
- Developing motor skills is crucial for writing, especially between 36 and 48 months.
- Engage in activities like A-B-C bingo and drawing games to enhance writing skills.
- Encourage your child to notice and copy letters and shapes.
- Provide ample opportunities to interact with writing tools correctly.
To learn how to write, a child has to develop fine and gross motor skills in a consistent and predictable pattern through infancy, and all the way to elementary school. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, between 36 and 48 months of age comes a critical moment for the development of skills needed for mastering writing.
Here are some of the things you can do to boost your child’s writing skills before starting kindergarten:
- Play A-B-C bingo by either making your own or choosing from the ones available online.
- When your child draws a person, ask and notice different body parts like the hair, arms, and legs.
- Write a big and clearly traced letter on cardboard, put it inside a Ziploc bag and have your child trace over it with a dry erase marker that you can wipe afterwards.
- Notice letters in signs and texts your child sees every day.
- Play I Spy drawing games by asking them to draw something they are seeing.
- Make a game out of copying shapes and figures.
- When in the playground, invite your little one to make letter shapes in the sand using their finger.
- Have your child make strings of play-dough and then help them make the vowels. Spend some time making the sounds of each letter.
- Think of rhyming words and make funny sentences with them, noticing how they sound similar because they share some letters.
- Give them plenty of opportunities to interact with writing tools and hold them appropriately using their middle finger, index, and thumb.
