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Benefits of Handwriting

What led to this learning?
There was a desire by both parents and teachers alike, to balance learners time spent on digital devices and paper and pencil. As teachers we were also noticing that student s were coming back from lunch quite wound up and needed an activity to bring them back to a learning frame of mind.
Summary of learning design:
We discussed the importance of routines, as well as mindfulness. We set up a scaffold for the learners by having them learn the standard cursive letters, one letter per day. Once they were comfortable they then were given sentences to trace and then rewrite on their own. Currently they are being given poems in print and then rewriting them in cursive. Each day they bring the writing to the teacher to get individual feedback.
Reflection on Learning Design
Our hub has seen an improvement in how the learners return from lunch. They head straight to the cubbies to get the pencil and handwriting books. They settle right into their cursive challenge for the day and seem eager to receive feedback once they have completed the task. The learners are then ready to complete the roll and move on to the next activity of the afternoon. Some student are choosing to write in cursive on their own and other that were not a part of the original group are asking to join in.
Curriculum Links
Literacy, The Arts
Agentic Capabilities
Self Aware, Determined/ Resilience

Link to Evidence

Comments

  1. Sounds like your students have made significant progress with their handwriting and mindfulness because of your reflection and new learning design. I am following in your footsteps and have created an event in our class calendar for students to complete a handwriting activity in the afternoon after big break. A couple of questions - how long did you spend on this each day? Was handwriting explicitly taught? What year level are these students? Did you create the printable handwriting sheets?
    Thank you for sharing!

    ReplyDelete

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