B's and D's Q's and P's: How to Guide Your Child Struggling with Reversals

      With the implementation of the Common Core, increased demands are being placed on children to produce high quality writing.  Despite children’s best efforts, the content may be overlooked due to the presence of reversals, lack of spacing, and random capitals interspersed throughout their writing.  While I have seen teachers use a multitude of methods to guide children in correcting these mistakes, the strategies implemented often only offer a temporary fix or teach a reliance on a tool to compensate.

      Let’s take a closer look at the mistakes children can make in their writing.  I will then offer a solution to train children’s brains to eliminate these errors and increase writing production.

      The conventions of writing can be challenging for students.  Beyond age 8, some students continue to struggle with distinguishing b and d in reading and writing.  This behavior in turn impacts their comprehension and readability of their written work.  Others may write words as one continuous unit as opposed to incorporating spaces between words in their sentences.  I have seen students incorporate capital letters randomly throughout their stories as well. 

      While all of these behaviors may distract the reader and interrupt the flow of writing, these behaviors tell a much deeper story.  While observing a student writing, whose work contained these traits, I noticed many of her letters including t’s, b’s and y’s were formed beginning at the bottom.  While this method is not inherently wrong, the amount of effort and stamina required exceeds that needed by beginning at the top.  Also, for letters including p and q, requiring the student to cross the given line, she stopped at the line.  Thus indicating neural misfiring, causing many of the writing characteristics described earlier.    

      How can these neural pathways be strengthened thus eliminating many of the earlier described behaviors?  Tutor Wise offers clients brain training sessions specifically targeting children’s production of written work.  This program is designed to strengthen the neural pathways and in turn makes writing easier for children.  The end results in an improvement in the quality of children’s writing and an increase in their confidence.  Contact us today to find out more about how our services can assist your child in the process of becoming a better writer!