Difficulty regulating pencil pressure

Some children can either press too hard or too light and there may be a number of reasons why they do this.

The following activities will help them learn to regulate their pencil force.

Place a piece of carbon paper underneath their work and tell them that you do not want their writing to come through onto the underlying paper if they press too hard, or that you want their writing to press through to underlying layers if they are pressing too light. The child may need to practise this first with writing shapes and then with letters.

To keep the pencil from slipping, start with using larger pencils or use pencil grips over the pencil. You could wrap a rubber band around the pencil about one inch up from where the point begins and the child can place their fingers on the rubber band to reduce slippage.

You can get the child to rub a crayon hard on large paper to cover a picture.

Writing on a vertical surface, such as the chalkboard, whiteboard or wall, for part of the day.

Try using a sloping desk or desk top.

See Using my senses, Co-ordinating my body for play and activities and Using my hands advice sheets.