Does Letter Formation Really Matter?

Let’s answer this question once and for all.

“Although skilled handwriting is required for 30% to 60% of an average child’s school day, 10% to 30% of school-age children struggle with this activity and, in fact, have handwriting difficulties.”¹

One of the most common reasons for referral to school-based occupational therapy (OT) services is illegible or labored handwriting. Once I complete and review the assessment results of such a student and determine they are likely to qualify for OT, I explain to their Individualized Education Plan (IEP) team—their parent(s), teacher(s), and pupil services representative—my plan to start with a focus on the student’s letter formation.

One of the most frequently asked questions that I receive from parents during and after these meetings is, “Does letter formation really matter?”

Often, members of the student’s team don’t care whether the student forms their letters correctly; they simply want the student’s handwriting to be legible and performed at an increased rate of speed.

What they struggle to understand is the relationship between these components of handwriting.

Handwriting is a skill that many of us take for granted; we forget the process of learning it. Unlike many gross motor skills, such as rolling a ball or jumping, handwriting is a more complicated skill that requires the coordination of many intricate, fine motor movements and “involves 26 different letterforms of varying style (joined, unjoined, capitalized).”²Written another way, “Skilled handwriting is a complex activity that entails an intricate blend of cognitive, kinesthetic, and perceptual motor components.”¹

The many motor movements involved within each of the 26 different letters of the upper and lowercase alphabets, combined with the additional components of cognitive sequencing, pencil pressure and grasp, and visual involvement, make the automation of the motor movements imperative.

Prunty and Barnett, of the Department of Clinical Sciences at Brunel University London, explain the role of automaticity in performing the skill of writing. They refer to Kandel et al (2006) who explain “within-word pauses” as a lack of automaticity or “fluency” and further elaborate the following: “. . . skilled writers have the ability to program the spelling and movement components for a word prior to commencing it, following by an ability to execute the word without stopping.”²

Building automaticity takes practice: “Acquiring automaticity in a skill requires that similar movement patterns be executed consistently.”² Asher, an Occupational Therapy Coordinator of Sycamore Community Schools, comments on the importance of consistency as well: “for students with poor memory, lack of consistent practice during the initial instruction may exacerbate handwriting difficulties.”³

One way that occupational therapists ensure that habualization occurs is by teaching students correct letter formation. We do this through the therapeutic introduction of letters that are alike and assigned to certain groups due to the similar movement patterns they involve. I use the recommended groupings and developmental sequence of letters that is recommended by Learning Without Tears.

For example, when teaching the letters of the lowercase alphabet, I typically start with the “Magic C Letters.” This group of letters include c, o, a, d, g, and q. These letters are a part of the “Magic C” group because they all start with the same, “c” movement pattern. When using three-lined paper, they all begin on the middle, dotted-line and go around to the bottom line.

A study completed by Prunty and Barnett found that using the correct starting position was the most common error that occurred between both participant groups—typically developed children and those with a diagnosis of developmental coordination disorder (DCD).² When students don’t know where a letter begins, they must pause to think about it—they picture the letter in their head and make up the sequencing of pencil strokes as they go—therefore impeding on their writing fluency, or speed. When student start a letter at the incorrect starting position, they then either overwrite on top of previously-made pencil strokes, use additional pencil strokes to “build” their letters, and/or omit pencil strokes.

When students associate a letter with a particular letter group, they are able to quickly identify the correct starting position and move forward in producing that letter with less concentration.

Asher comments on the importance of adult observation to protect the habitualization process: “Close adult supervision is needed to ensure that students are practicing correctly, because using a consistent letter formation helps to strengthen the kinesthetic memory of that letter formation.”³Once correctly rehearsed enough times, which is individualized and dependent on the student, the movement pattern becomes automatic.

With instruction in correct letter formation, students are provided a road map for their writing. Once a student knows how to correctly form their letters, they can spend their cognitive energy elsewhere—such as on spelling, sentence structure, or the content of their writing piece.

Engel-Yeger, Nagauker-Yanuv, and Rosenblum of the University of Haifa in Israel explain the relationship between letter formation and the quality of written composition: “Difficulty in the mastery of the mechanical aspects of handwriting, which is a transcription ability, may interfere with higher-order processes required for the composition of text and, hence, influence the quality and quantity of the written product.”¹Prunty and Barnett support this claim, stating that there is “substantial evidence to support the relationship between transcription skills (handwriting and spelling) and the quality of written composition.”²

Using correct letter formation, students know what the letter is supposed to look like, where to start it, how to form it, and no longer have to make it up as they go; it supports a student’s ability to write legibly and fluently. Legible and fluent writing increases the quality of written composition. Difficulty with speed and legibility, on the other hand, correlates with poor writing composition skills and therefore, due to the relevance of writing composition skills across all content areas, reduced academic performance overall.³

Supporting the earlier claim by Asher, Prunty and Barnett declare: “It . . . is imperative that educators and clinicians observe children as they handwrite. By simply watching how a child produces letters, teachers could facilitate early identification and remediation of letter formation issues, which would support the development of handwriting speed later on.”²

Engel-Yeger, Nagauker-Yanuv, and Rosenblum found that in addition to the impact that legibility and speed has on the quality of a student’s written composition, these aspects of handwriting also impact students’ beliefs about their ability to succeed: “The less that children feel their handwriting is legible and the less capable they feel of keeping pace with time constraints in class, the lower their perceived self-efficacy.”

Legibility and fluency of writing is important. It matters to parents and teachers, influences the beliefs students hold of themselves, supports further development of writing skills, and is necessary for optimal academic performance and participation. To improve a student’s legibility and speed of writing, we must start with the foundational problem and correct their letter formation.