Hi. I teach elementary Resource. I need to compose a list of strategies to help students who reverse their letters and/or numbers. The target audience is primarily parents, but I would like for it to be helpful for teachers, as well. It is important to mention that I specifically need tips for letter/number reversals. These students have NOT been diagnosed with any type of learning disability/dyslexia. I would appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.
Re: Letter and number reversals
I agree with Victoria completely. The only thing I’ll add is that you don’t need to buy a letter formation guide. You can find a free one on the internet at http://www.spellangtree.org/TeachingTheChildToPrint.htm
The letter forms you’ll find there are very similar to what Victoria is talking about.
I have managed to turn this around completely for several students by actually *teaching* handwriting — traditional formal lessons in sitting up, holding the pen forward, moving the hand and arm freely, and forming letters according to strict rules of directionality: left to right and top to bottom, and enter circle letters (c, d, e, g, o, q) counterclockwise down the left and up the right, consistently. I watch students and correct them and make them re-do any backwards letters. This is not a route to winning a popularity contest, but it helps the kids immensely.
Not only does this remove the reversals from the handwriting, but it slowly but surely gets rid of them in the reading; knowing the letters kinesthetically makes it easier to recognize them visually (in real difficulty of recognition, air-trace the shape).
This takes time and dedication. If you want the parents to work with you, all of you have to be on the same page as to style and methodology. In general I see great improvements within one to two months, and a real turnaround within six months, and that is with twice-a-week tutoring sessions (so start now and you can get excellent results by the end of the school year). If you can get the parents on track for a steady incremental program, that would be wonderful.
Another thing that helps a lot with smooth unforced writing is to use good tools and materials. For starting lessons in smooth motion and to break the lying-on-the-table-forcing habit, either whiteboards and markers or blackboards and chalk are excellent; these tools allow the student to get his body off the work and see what he is doing, as well as moving freely and putting effort into correct formation of letters and words, not digging into the paper.
Clean fresh paper of a decent quality, not garbage and not cheap newsprint. Throw out the yellow pencils. Get markers or good rolling writers that allow free formation of letters. Encourage the kids to start large and loose, making the correct form with a swing of the arm and developing a kinesthetic feel; smaller and neater can develop in time.
You will have to explain this idea to the parents; they are often terribly concerned about neatness, having been taught that way themselves, not relaizing that a focus on details too early can lose the forest for the trees.
Buy a good letter formation guide which uses the consistent left-to-right and top-to-bottom directions, as well as a semi-script style with no excess pen lifts (ie not the old ball and stick which is too clunky and gets dropped immediately). Follow your guide exactly and insist that the students do the same. Put a copy on each desk and send a copy home with each student — plastic binder holders and/or lamination help make this permanent. Students can use wipe-off markers to trace over the plastic-wrapped or laminated guide, a useful exercise, first one problem letter at a time and then the whole alphabet.
As in all learning, and especially learning of a physical skill, short frequent practice sessions are the way to go; long stretches reach diminishing returns. If you give a ten to fifteen-minute lesson each day, focusing on one lower-case letter per day, and then making words with all the previously-learned letters, you will see results. Start with the most common letters. You can often buy a little how-to-print book to copy — just make sure to choose one with good directionality and gradual development. Don’t even worry about capitals for the first two months, then do them the same.
Besides the daily lesson, as the students are writing *and* reading, correct them as much as possible. If it is a letter that has been studied, have them air-trace it to self-correct; letters than have not yet been taught, show the correct form physically.
Numerals are done in exactly the same way. Yes you CAN write numbers in pen — honest, there is no eleventh commandment forbidding it. It does work.