Once children have developed their fine motor skills, worked on learning letters and practiced writing on blank paper and with other mediums to develop their letter formation, they are usually introduced to handwriting paper with dotted-thirds to assist them in writing letters of consistent size and format.
A little trick I used in my classroom to help children learning to write in dotted-thirds was, "Clever Cat."
Clever Cat's bottom sits on the solid base line and his body takes up the first gap. His head sits on top, occupying the second gap up between the dotted lines and his tail dangles below the solid line, extending to the first dotted line below.
Clever Cat for handwriting works as a fun visual aid to assist children in remembering where letters should sit between the lines and their sizing.
When we write out all the lower-case letters, we can see that they all sit in Clever Cat's body space.
Some also sit in his head space and some in his tail space. In the script we use in Victoria, our lower-case "f"'s sit in all 3 spaces.
We end up referring to the letters as "body letters," "head letters" and "tail letters" once we are familiar with the concept.
All of our upper case letters sit in the body and head space. They are usually easier for children to write than the lower-case letters.
We would draw and discuss Clever Cat when we did handwriting together as a class on the board, and then when children were writing in their hand-writing books, they or I would draw a Clever Cat at the start of their writing for them to use as a visual aid.
I love that not only is this Clever Cat version a good visual aid for the children, it is something that they can hold and manipulate as well.
Clever Cat on a stick can move along the page with children as they write, to assist in keeping their writing between the right parts of the lines.
Clever Cat can also be used as a spacer between words.
After seeing a craft stick version of Clever Cat many years ago, I made one at home and gave it to my daughter the next time she did some writing. "It's Clever Cat!!!" she exclaimed, gave him a hug (however it is that one hugs a popsicle stick) and took to her writing with new enthusiasm and confidence. :)
How to use Clever Cat
- Start by introducing the concept of "Clever Cat" to your children and discussing what each body part represents and how Clever Cat can help us.
- Draw Clever Cat on lined paper between the correct lines and let your children also practice drawing Clever Cat. Can they get his body sitting right on the solid line and up to the first dotted line?
- Brainstorm the different letters that sit in the same spaces as different parts of Clever Cat together. Have the children identify and write all the lower-case letters that:
- Only sit in Clever Cat's body space (ie. a, c, e, etc.)
- Take up Clever Cat's body and head spaces (ie. b, d, h, etc.)
- Take up Clever Cat's body and tail space (ie. g, j, p etc.)
- Take up the space between Clever Cat's head to tail ( f )
- Are a little bit different (ie. t. They may also include i and j with the added dots)
(Please note that handwriting and the style of lettering differs from state to state and country to country. Here in Victoria we use the Victorian Cursive script)
- Depending on their control and fine motor skills, you may want to draw Clever Cat on the craft stick for your children.
- Use a wider craft/popsicle stick for younger children or for larger gaps if using as a word spacer
- Before each writing session, have a little discussion about Clever Cat as a reminder of how they can use this tool to both motivate them and to assist them in forming letters correctly between the lines. You don't need to tell the children, first see if they can tell you.
- To first begin handwriting between the lines with children, find the widest dotted-thirds that you can. As they get older and their control gets better, children start using lined paper with the dotted-thirds closer together, forcing them to write smaller. Maddie (aged 5) uses a "24mm Thirds Ruled" writing book at home. Buy them where you would buy school stationery (eg. Officeworks).
More fun ways for children to practice letter formation and writing:
Happy handwriting,
Debs :)
Look where else we are. Are you following along? :)
