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We're going to talk about grasp for a minute. Next, we'll discuss pencil grasp specifically. One thing you can do is lay the pencil flat on a surface and have the student pinch it, then push it up into their web space.

To have a proper pencil grasp, use a quadrupod grasp with four points of contact, or a tripod grasp with three. I hold my pencil with three fingers since my last two are not touching it. The first three fingers are your precision side, and the other side is the power side of your hand.

When looking at different grasps, the thumb wrap probably means the student needs more precision. Tucking the thumb is inefficient and indicates they are using more of the power side of their hand. You can see other samples here.

Pupils are using more shoulder muscle when they hold the pencil in this manner. To help with that, you might want to practice your fine motor skills. In a moment, I will discuss a few of those. I have to go back to presenting mode after that.

The following slide illustrates how handwriting grasps typically develop. The pincer grasp appears at 10 months. The pincer grasp is demonstrated when a student can grasp an object with two fingers, such as picking up Cheerios. They then begin to hold a pencil with their entire palm using the palmar supinator grasp.

The digital pronate grasp, in which they point their hands down, is visible when they are two or three years old. At three or four years old, the quadrupod grasp should begin to emerge. In a static tripod grasp, the entire hand moves while the pencil is held in place.

Prehensile skills are used in the dynamic tripod grasp. The thumb, index, and middle finger on the skilled side of the hand are used for precise tasks, while the ring and pinky on the power side are used for stability. When writing, placing their hand on the paper gives them stability.

The child is prepared to hold a pencil once the sides of their hands have clearly separated. Finding out if the student can separate picking up and gripping is crucial. To separate the grasp from the pinch, have them hold something and try to pick up a snack or Cheerios.

We can grasp objects of various shapes thanks to the palmar arch, which also shapes the hand. I have an arch in my hand when I hold this object. I have an arch when I roll the dice and hear them click.

If I hold the dice tight and there is no clicking, there is no arch. The arch allows us to grasp both small and large objects. This is important for development and for writing with precision.

We're going to talk about six skills needed for written comprehension. First of all, I want to mention that to have written comprehension, we need to have reading comprehension. This involves the ability to read and understand text, sound out words, have vocabulary, and recognize those words on paper.

Secondly, in order to have good written comprehension, we need to have good transcription. Transcription is the act of physically putting words onto paper or typing. Often, we can transcribe information by dictating; this process involves taking our thoughts, turning them into ideas, and writing them down on paper.

Third, you have sentence construction. The student must have the ability to make a complete sentence that makes sense with correct grammar and tense. This is crucial for written comprehension.

Fourth is genre and content knowledge. This category includes the different types of writing, such as persuasive, informative, or narrative writing. Content knowledge refers to what they know and what they are writing about, whether it is something they have experienced, read, or seen in a video.

Planning, editing, and revising come in fifth. Students must be able to organize, edit, and revise their writing to have strong written comprehension abilities. Executive function abilities are needed for these tasks. A lot of executive function information has been covered in some of the previous trainings I've participated in.

You can email me if you're interested in any of those. Some of those are free on my website if you are a member of our VIP program. We can also talk about learning more or receiving coaching.

We occasionally employ a graphic organizer to assist students in structuring their ideas during planning, editing, and revising. Making sure they have an opening sentence, a closing sentence, and a middle sentence is part of that. Certain graphic organizers are made to look like hamburgers.

The bun represents your opening and closing, the meat is your main topic, and the toppings are your details. This approach is fun. There's also an Oreo graphic organizer, which represents opinion, reason, and example.

There are many different graphic organizers, even a plain spider organizer with a circle in the middle and details branching off. Graphic organizers help students get their content out. Finally, the sixth skill needed for written comprehension is the ability to self-regulate.

Students might have trouble regulating their anxiety about writing. For instance, consider spelling. As an occupational therapist, I am not necessarily teaching the student how to spell, but I am helping them write legibly.

When it comes to spelling, I like to write it out for the student or spell it verbally and let them copy it. What's important is that they aren't using their cognitive brain function to figure out how to spell the word but rather how to write it legibly. Giving a student time to come up with ideas first and then copy them is a good way to work on legibility.

For instance, have the student dictate the sentence into a phone, then look at the phone to copy it. They can edit or delete something if it picked up the wrong word. They can get their sentence correct first and then write it legibly.

This is a fun way to work on legibility and spelling by letting students copy the text. We're trying to reduce the cognitive load of deciding what to write, how to spell words, and how to form letters while ensuring spacing and sizing are correct.

All those thinking skills can interfere with their content and legibility. Remember, we are focusing on the legibility of the content, not its spelling or content.

For additional information, please watch the following video: https://youtu.be/KSeRagJgYso 

Developing foundational skills. We're going to talk about activities for strength, coordination, and dexterity. This exercise is the posture slide I was talking about. You can see these screenshots of the court. In one, he's leaning on his hands. He's like this. You might remember he yawned.

It's critical to have posture as a foundational skill. Your student should be sitting upright with their desk at their elbow level. We call it 90/90/90. You're looking at about a 90° angle of the arm, a 90° angle of the hips, and the legs. Their feet need to be supported.

This is the best handwriting posture, but it's almost 90/90. It doesn't have to be exactly 90, but you don't want your student to be dangling their feet. You don't want them bent over. You want them sitting upright and able to write on the desk in front of them. Many times if you have posture weakness, you can have your students sitting on a ball to work on trunk strength when they're not writing.

If your student enjoys watching television, position them in front of the television while seated on a large therapy ball. That student can work on strengthening their trunk and their posture while watching TV. They won't notice it as much. When they slouch, make sure they're sitting up. We're going to take breaks.

It's just like any other exercise. Let's see how long you can sit upright on the ball with your feet on the floor. When they need to slouch, we'll take a minute break, then sit up again. You're strengthening that posture for their handwriting. You're working on handwriting skills without even really handwriting.

These are some of the posture checklist items you can look at. You can look at the table height. The table could be too high. A lot of times when I was working in a school, kindergarten tables were up to their chins. We want to make sure that the table height is around chest height.

Feet on the floor. Paper tilt. When you have a piece of paper, it's going to be tilted. If I'm right-handed, I'm going to tilt the paper to the left and write uphill. If you're a lefty, you're going to tilt the paper to the right and write downhill.

Those are some of the posture things you want to look at. Your student may need a pencil grip if they're not holding their pencil correctly. We're going to cover that in a minute. We're going to have a tripod grasp.

You can raise the papers slightly by using a slant board, such as a three-ring notebook. It may or may not be necessary, but it alters the field of view and occasionally reduces lighting glare. Lastly, special seating.

To help them sit upright, your student might need to sit on a wiggle chair or something else that allows them to move. They might have to sit on their feet, in a hard chair, or on a three-legged stool. I am aware that my son used to frequently do that. We refer to it as perching. Because it lessens distractions, perching is acceptable.

The walls can be quite busy in a classroom. To help him concentrate, my son would get on his knees and look down at his paper. That's alright. When considering posture, we should keep that in mind.

For additional information, please watch the following video: https://youtu.be/hhzKCbhQ_H0 

I want to start with some research. An article in the Journal of Eye Science, cited on sciencedirect.com and published in May 2020, discusses the prevalence of incorrect posture among children and adolescents. Nearly 600 students were screened, and the overall prevalence of incorrect posture in children and adolescents was 65%. Girls had a higher prevalence of incorrect posture than boys, and students over the age of 10 had a higher rate than those under 10.

Thus, what that tells me is that posture isn't addressed as a foundational skill for handwriting and schoolwork. Why not proceed to enter in the comment section any factors that may contribute to poor posture? What are some of the major causes you might think are leading to poor posture? There was also a study in 2007 and 2016 that showed 34 to 50% of children and adolescents have different degrees of incorrect posture, so there could be a student who just leans.

Have you ever seen a student who lies all the way down? They'll lie on their arm, and then they write like kids who slouch. What are some reasons you think might be causing that poor posture? Do you have any guesses? I'll give you a minute here. Some of them are low levels of physical activity; obesity contributes to that, and electronic entertainment, of course. Many kids display poor posture and nutrition due to their rounded-back posture while looking at small screens, heavy bags, and incorrect sitting positions.

Watch the video below to learn more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HhO5JzcDio