The Effect Of Fine Motor Skills And Vocabulary Development

Trubek wishes to provide her audience with a convincing argument that shows how handwriting in this time is inferior to typing on computers. In other words, her primary purpose is to illustrate the idea of focusing on typing automaticity (the ability to type without looking at keys) in schools over handwriting automaticity (the ability to write without conscious effort). This is seen when Trubek explains how if “…the goal of public education is to prepare students to become successful, employable adults, typing is inarguably more useful than handwriting.” (Trubek, 2016, para. 4) Trubek argues that if public schools are working

Nevertheless, not all researchers think alike, some of them will probably dispute the contradict claim such as what Dr. Clare Wood; Reader in Developmental Psychology at Coventry University has said in her article, “We were surprised to learn that not only was the association strong, but that textism use was actually driving the development of phonological awareness and reading skill in children. Texting also appears to be a valuable form of contact with written English for many children, which enables them to practice reading and spelling on a daily basis (Plester and Wood).” However,

The development of writing skills largely relies on fine motor skills. First the child must master the holding of writing implements (Huffman & Fortenberry, 2011). There are four stages in the development of holding a writing implement and depending on the culture the child grows up in, the final stage may be attained at an earlier time (Walcer, 2016a). The last stage of learning to hold a writing implement is called the dynamic tripod. In this stage the child has finger coordination and displays a mature way of holding a writing implement (Walcer, 2016a). The dynamic tripod is usually present at the same time that the mature writing pattern is observed,

Respond to prompts 4a–c below by referring to children’s range of vocabulary development related to the learning segment—What do they know, what are they struggling with, and/or what is new to them?

Teachers, who are aware of children becoming emergent writers, can better understand the amount of effort and concentration required. Teachers can appreciate the value of observing children’s early writing for evidence of children’s developing phonological knowledge of written language.

These people would say that handwriting is passe’, or outdated, and that in the future, everyone will be using word processors to do their writing. Education is important, but schools already have ways to get students to write, that doesn’t involve the repetitive time to practice your writing to make it better. They can enforce these rules of writing without having to practice everyday. For instance, homeschooling parents can be quite confused by the subject of handwriting, so whenever Sam Blumenfeld lectures at a homeschool convention, he always asks if parents think that handwriting should be formally taught. Usually the response is unanimously positive. Mr. Blumenfield, raised this statement for parents to think about,“So you agree that teaching your child to write is an important part of you homeschooling curriculum.”, the next question he raises is if you believe that handwriting should be formally taught, he asks “do you believe that your child should be taught manuscript, also known as “ball and stick” first or cursive first?” Most parents assume that “ball and stick should precede cursive, because that’s the way they were taught in school. ( Sam Blumenfeld, The Benefits of Cursive Writing)

Many others believe that cursive writing should not be taught in school because the technology we have now doesn’t require us to use cursive writing. However, by writing in cursive, it allows students to write faster due to only having to connect the letters together. Students who took notes using cursive learned better, retained information longer, and got the concept of new ideas quicker than students who took computer notes. Studies show that after just 24 hours after a lecture students who take notes on the computer were more likely to forget

Technology offers children an additional tool to learn and to develop learning skills. Computers can reveal hidden strengths about a child. For example some children have difficulty developing their fine motor skill,

So many children this day in age, are sat in front of a television or a tablet and expected to keep quiet. Children are built to explore, move, and learn from their experiences, and this cannot happen when a child is inside, being distracted by technology. No matter how busy parents are, they should find at least thirty minutes a day to go outside and play with their children. If the weather does not permit outside play, then playing games inside is always a great alternative. Parents should be encouraging their children to develop the motor skills that they are going to need in order to succeed in school and later in life. Many parents encourage the development of their children’s gross motor skills by involving them in sports, dance, or gymnastics. These programs are great for not only teaching children how to be good at something they love, but they also encourage children to develop their motor skills. If parents find that they cannot afford programs such as these, they can focus on providing multiple opportunities for play. For example, one day they could go to the park or they could go over the neighbor’s house to play. Ultimately, the best thing that parents can do to encourage the development of their children’s motor skills is to allow them to play as much as possible and to allow them to try new activities, even if they are

incompletion. Further breaking down the letters into simpler steps has been proven to promote writing

As children progress through the early stages of their lives they will continually reach milestones that are somewhat of a tracker as to where they stand in their development, but at the same time it’s important to remember that even though there are suggested milestones as to a maturing task for a specific age and month, each child may mature differently than the next. One part of this progress that children will continually develop through in the early stages of their lives is motor skill development, which is the use of their larger and smaller muscles to perform adult like tasks. More specifically this development can be categorized into fine and

This kind of skill enables children to take more responsibility for their personal care. Example of fine motor activities includes writing and drawing. The writing skill of children in middle childhood tends to be large, and clear enough to be read easily. Besides that, schoolchildren show improvements on drawing skill in organization, detail, and complexity representation (Papalia et al., 2009).

Fine motor skills refer to the ‘small muscles’ in the hands. Proper development of these muscles is crucial for children to succeed academically in writing and self help skills. According to the National Childcare Accreditation Council (NCAC), “Fine motor skills form an important foundation for the acquisition of many other skills, including literacy, numeracy, self-help and the ability to perform many everyday tasks” (2008). Children start to develop motor skills from birth, and the ways in which children’s muscles develop will later affect their motor function. Caretakers often look for the typical milestones that infants develop; however, infants acquire development at different rates benefiting child growth. From birth through the early grades (preschool to second grade) children are constantly using their fine motor skills to eat, dress themselves, and in social settings such as school. These skills link to infancy development and are factors in knowing how well children will succeed. The following sub-topics address fine motor development and the importance of occupational therapy interventions:

In a world driven by technology, it is easy to throw away learning methods of the past in favor of following up and coming trends. However, when it comes to writing by hand versus typing, the advantages to learning of writing by hand far outweigh the ease of use of typing. Through academic research of college note-takers and primary students as well as research on how the neuroscience behind hand writing works, it is proven that hand writing is superior to typing for learning.

A few examples of Fine Motor activities displayed during the early years include handwriting skills, drawing pictures, making objects out of clay, and even cutting with scissors. Each of these activities is characterized by including the small-muscle developments that involve finger-thumb coordination, hand-eye coordination, and the development of muscle strength in the hand and arm. All in all, motor skills are an important part of the learning process, and as these “fundamental motor skills are learned...[they] serve as the foundation for more specialized motor skills that will be