31 August 2016

“More movement needed for handwriting” – Dr Christian Marquardt in an interview with the Tiroler Tageszeitung

In a discussion with Phillipp Schwartze, Dr Christian Marquardt talked about problems with handwriting, the causes of these and the best way to tackle them. Here are a few quotes from the interview:

 “Many children do not have sufficient hand coordination when they start school. So it certainly doesn’t cause any harm when children have good coordination. But the hand needs to be specially trained.”

“Many things can be trained in a playful way. We recommend that children play as many dexterity-training games as possible before they start school. For example, playing with building blocks, which requires relatively complicated movements, and also crocheting and gluing together little models.”

“The transition from the writing initially taught at school to an individual writing style happens at the age of 10 – when moving up to secondary school. From this point on, they have to write much more. Those who have yet to develop their own handwriting will have problems. Writing is required as a skill. You can still work on your handwriting later, but this has to be done in special lessons outside of regular school hours. School children who have difficulties with handwriting will then have a whole host of problems, for example, not keeping up and lacking motivation.”

“The way the pen is held plays a role – many children hold the pen too tightly and too cramped. This is a sign of overstraining. You can change the rhythm of the movement and simplify the handwriting.”