Handwriting Without Tears : A Handwriting

The product being evaluated for this paper is the Doodle Pro by Fischer Price, designed for children 3 and up. This product has been available for 42 years, or since 1974 when originally created as the “Magna Doodle” by Pilot Pen Corporation. It was later bought out by Fischer Price, the specific creator is unknown (Freudenrich, 2008). The Doodle Pro contains an attached stylus and 4 different shapes. It works as a magnetic drawing board that has 2 screens with a honey-comb lattice like structure in between the screens that contains finely cut iron. When the stylus touches the screen it draws the iron to the top layer of plastic, where it stays in whatever shaped intended until erased, creating a no-mess chalkboard (Fischer-Price, 2016). It is designed to allow children to explore and practice writing and drawing in a more creative and open way, where it is seen as fun and not work. The product works to mimic an individual writing or drawing normally, the child picks up the attached stylus and draws as they like, and when they are finished with that particular picture they slide the eraser button across the bottom of the screen to clear the picture and start again. To see a visual of the product, Doodle Pro, please refer to Appendix A. This allows for practicing of the essential skills and penmanship, and confidence children will need throughout their lives.

Shelfs were labeled with what is inside of them along with children's cubbies. In the UPK room two classes take place in this room throughout the day. The younger class has a picture of the child with their name to help with literacy, while the other class does not because they have already learned their names. The two classes names are written on two different color paper. Another important literacy element found was a list of events that would take place in the children's day this was found in both the UPK room and the other center. A welcome sign was shown by the entrance to the classroom along with important information in bold large letters. Names of the teachers and their pictures are displayed, showing that literacy is found in names as well. Unlike The Effie-Bennett Powe Center the UPK classroom has a computer center for more literacy enrichment games. CDs are in the classroom that promote singing, using listening

When I first started school my parents brought me a chalkboard easel. I would line up my teddy bears and act like I was their school teacher. I didn’t realize it then but I have a deep affection for young children and my heart fills with joy when I see them learn something they didn’t know before. That’s why I am attending Tuskegee University and majoring in education. I want to continue to see the spark in their eyes and I want to guide them through the early stages of school with your help that could become a reality.

For this project, we worked with Eloise Leatham. She is a kindergartener, 5 years old, from St. Paul. She attends Saint Paul Academy, a secular private school in St. Paul. She is exposed to books on a regular basis, as she has an 8-year-old sister who loves to read. Her parents, who are both working professionals with a relatively high income, read to Eloise and her sister every night before bed. Both parents enjoy reading, and have instilled a value for reading in their girls. Eloise attended preschool for 3 years, and was exposed to reading and writing there as well. She speaks fondly of her preschool experience, and continues to enjoy going to school now that she is in kindergarten.

Writing is a complex social and cognitive process and requires fine motor coordination. Students with learning disabilities (LD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) struggle with remembering what to write, rules involved in writing, or facts needed for the writing prompt. Students with LD and ADHD require explicit and direct instruction in writing. In Head Start, we use a program called Handwriting without Tears. Handwriting without Tears is a scientifically based program used to teach young children how to form letters using a variety of methods. Many students with LD and ADHD struggle to learn the mechanics of writing, such as capitalization, rules such as I before E except after C, or write about scattered facts they have

Literacy is a vital part of all later learning. Because of this, the children will engage in hands on activities that relates to what they have read and give them opportunities to make up their own versions, as well as make up their own stories. They will have a large group story time and a partner reading time. An ample variety of books will be available at all times. Signs with words and pictures will be posted around the classroom showing, daily activities, objects that are used daily, and the placement of toys and

My mother woke me up early on a Monday morning, and told me something special was here for me. She brought me into the kitchen, I saw a big envelop on the kitchen table. The post said it was from Washington for Octavius Bellamy. When I got the invitation out of the envolpe there was this big golden sticker that kept the invitation together. The sticker had some fancy writting that said something. When I finally got the golden sticker to unattach from the invitation there was some blue cursive writting. As I read though the invitation my mouth was watery to see what the thing was.

In the 1940’s, times were obviously very different than they are today. Bottles of milk were delivered to front door steps, the boy down the street would deliver your newspaper, and working in the coal mines was common for young children. Just like in the outside world, there were also differences in the classroom, specifically cursive handwriting. To see the differences between the ways cursive was 70 years ago and now, I interviewed my 80 year old grandpa, and my 8 year old sister Carly. I asked them the same exact questions, but the answers greatly varied.

Putting print to paper simulates the brain like nothing else. writing in cursive shows that people improves brain development in areas like memory, thinking and language. writing on cursive simulates brain synapses and synchronicity between the right and the left hemispheres, this is absent from typing and printing. college Board found that students that wrote in printed for SAT tests scored a little bit lower than those who wrote cursive.

Further, this website focuses on motivation for children and an integral development for professionals. Starfall’s reading and Language Arts standards are in correspondence with the multiple state “Standards of Learning” for Pre-K, Kindergarten, 1st and 2nd grades, however in some areas, the starfall’s curriculum criteria exceeds from the common core states learning levels. Plus, this website has a teacher’s lounge that provides a ton of resources, projects, corresponding tools, and lesson plans for educators. Additionally, in teacher’s lounge, teachers are provided with the teacher’s guide that provides a detailed significant metrical for the classroom. Such as, student’s progress monitoring throughout the year, holiday plans, support materials that include computer center system, weather cards, and seasons poster/poems. Plus a plush Backpack Bear which is phonemic awareness and phonics teaching tool, alphabets cards, spellings’ sound posters and instructional cards, sentence segment cards. Additionally, the short vowels pals, a teaching tool; it is a set of phonic puzzles and games with five plush characters that are Zac the Rat, Peg the Hen, Max the Fox, Tin Man, and Gus the Duck. Aforementioned material vary by each class’s

putting pen to paper stimulates the brain like nothing else, in this age of e-mails, text and tweets. Learning to write in cursive is shown to improve brain development in the thinking area. language and thinking. Cursive handwriting stimulates brain synapses and between the left and right hemisphere. The college board found the student who wrote in cursive for an essay portion of the SAT, slightly scored higher than the ones who printed.

Handwriting has been taught to children for hundreds of years, but should the children of today be forced to learn handwriting? Although the history of things written down on paper goes back thousands of years, today our writing is mostly digital, and we record our thoughts on computers and tablets.

Crayola was founded by Joseph Binney in the year 1885, in upstate New York. He later partnered with his son and nephew to create the company, Binney & Smith. The first product of the company was slate pencils that were distributed to schools in Easton, Pennsylvania. The original Crayola products included red oxide pigment and carbon black. The first official box of Crayola crayons was introduced by the company the following year after the founding, and consisted of eight different colors per box. The original colors were red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown, and black.

Creating a literacy-rich environment is one of the key elements of supporting children’s literacy development. Literacy-rich classrooms tend to look quite different than the traditional classroom, covered in pre-made posters and arranged with individual desks in rows, and instead, allow for teachers to design their classrooms with their students’ needs in mind. According to an article on the Sadlier School’s blog, all elements in a classroom must be meaningful, intentional, purposeful, and engaging when creating a literacy-rich classroom. This means that classroom design is created in a way that it provides frequent opportunities to be exposed to text via environmental print, instruction, and hands-on learning as well as encouraging communication and collaboration (Sadlier School, 2017).

Handwriting is a skill many people acquire at a young age. Handwriting is something that is individual to a specific person based on individual characteristics. Special examiners who are trained to examine documents and handwritings can compare samples and identify class characteristics, individual characteristics, and use vision and technology to make a positive connection or disconnection between a subject sample and the comparison sample.