Conquering Handwriting Hurdles with Handwriting Skills Simplified

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I distinctly remember Honeybun coming home with her pre-k work in those first weeks, working hard on her name and other simple words. She was having a hard time forming her letter ‘A’ and every time I helped her, she would get so mad at me because her teacher said to draw and uppercase ‘A’ down. down. across. All as separate strokes.

But she wasn’t getting the slant on the down strokes so wasn’t connecting them at the top which left her with a funny ‘H’ looking letter.

I tried (and tried and tried) explaining the her that it would be easier to make a mountain then across (up, down. across. Two strokes) and she insisted that was not right. We’ve fought about handwriting ever since and that experience has made me more relaxed with trying to teach Sugarplum proper handwriting.

Except Sugarplum’s handwriting is atrocious and Honeybun has struggled for almost a year with trying to even start to grasp cursive. A year ago I thought I had found some great resources to help them but after months of not getting any better and more frustration, I realized we needed something better.

And that is when I discovered Handwriting Skills Simplified.

The series of six books are designed for first through sixth grade and start with the very basics, straight across, down and diagonal strokes for printing and undercurves for cursive. The program then builds upon itself until the child is writing full letters and words with tons of practice with not only letters but also tracing lines and circles on pictures.

But what is best about the Handwriting Skills Simplified program is that it doesn’t teach letters in alphabetical order, it teaches in a logical order based on letter formation.

Each book then builds upon the former, aimed at increasing fluency and decreasing writing size so that by the end of the sixth book, the practice is done on lines equivalent to typical ruled paper.

Both girls advanced grade levels over the break (Honeybun to fourth and Sugarplum to second) but I decided to start Sugarplum at the beginning of the Handwriting Skills Simplified program with the first grade book and Honeybun with the third grade book which covers cursive (though basic cursive technically starts at the end of the second grade book) in order to give them plenty of practice and help them to build confidence in their writing.

Both girls have been breezing through their books without complaining and I can see a vast difference between before they started and now. Handwriting Skills Simplified is definitely a program I recommend for teaching handwriting in a simple and logical way and will be continuing to use with both my girls and my boys in the future.

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