Handwriting Assessments
Writing is a complex process and requires a combination of hand strength, fine motor skills, core strength and visual co-ordination. It is common for children to experience difficulties with one, or more of these areas, resulting in a difficulty in handwriting skills. We provide in-house Handwriting Assessments, run by our Occupational Therapy team, to gain further insight into any challenges your child may be facing in relation to their writing and what can be done to support this.
What Can a Handwriting Assessment Support With?
- Shaky or sloppy handwriting
- Poorly formed letters
- Writing drifting un-aligned across the page
- Letter size seeming too large or too small
- Writing difficult to read or illegible
- School have identified difficulties compared to other children
- Incorrect pencil grip present / No tripod grip present
- Hand/arm physically shaking when writing, or fatiguing quickly
- Poor fine motor control in general
If you think your child struggles with their handwriting, or appears to be behind their classmates, they will likely benefit from an Occupational Therapy Handwriting Assessment. Please note, this is a stand-alone assessment; if your child has any further difficulties that you are looking to identify, or difficulties with gross motor skills, you may be better suited booking a full Occupational Therapy Assessment.
Assessments are provided from our larger therapy room.
Although your child will at times be seated at the desk, we will often need to utilise the space to assess balance, core strength, and shoulder stability which provide the foundation for the fine motor skills needed for handwriting.
What Happens in the Assessment?
A handwriting assessment lasts 45 minutes and the process will differ slightly depending on your child, their age and the presenting concerns. The aim of the assessment is to evaluate the underlying components that support a child’s handwriting, such as muscle strength, endurance, coordination, and motor control using a variety of formal standardised tests and informal free writing tasks.
Depending on concerns, the Detailed Assessment of Speed of Handwriting (DASH) may be used to evaluate your child’s handwriting speed, fluency and endurance using a series of standardised writing tasks. As well as measuring how quickly your child writes compared with other children of the same age, the assessment enables the Occupational Therapist to observe letter formation, sizing, spacing, pencil control and overall handwriting legibility. These findings help to identify any underlying difficulties affecting your child’s written work and inform personalised recommendations to support handwriting development both at home and in school.
Depending on concerns, the Beery-Buktenica Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration (Beery VMI) may be used to assess how effectively your child integrates visual information with fine motor skills. In simple terms, it measures how well they are able to coordinate what they see with the movements of their hands. This skill is essential for handwriting, drawing and many everyday classroom tasks. The assessment helps to identify whether difficulties with visual-motor integration may be contributing to handwriting challenges and informs recommendations to support your child’s development at home and in school.
Other tests and activities may also be used. After the assessment, results and recommendations will be shared with parents, as to how they can support their child at home or/and at school. In some cases a series of Occupational Therapy sessions may be suggested to help target any difficulties revealed.
Our Occupational Therapy Service is provided by our HCPC OT Charlotte Francis Registration: OT082528