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333: 5 Ways to Help Students with Writing Challenges, with Kelli Fetter · Beautifully Complex

0:01
Speaker 1: Handwriting is so complex, and so when a student is
0:05
Speaker 1: having to think about how to form a letter, remember
0:08
Speaker 1: to how to place it on the line and the
0:10
Speaker 1: correct spacing. Oh but yeah, then we also have to
0:13
Speaker 1: think about how to spell the word and what makes
0:16
Speaker 1: a good sentence again and what did I want to
0:19
Speaker 1: write about anyway?
0:20
Speaker 2: And what was the topic.
0:21
Speaker 1: And then you can just see you can see the
0:23
Speaker 1: spiral because every part of it is challenging.
0:31
Speaker 3: Welcome to Beautifully Complex, where we unpack what it really
0:34
Speaker 3: means to parent neurodivergent kids with dignity and clarity. I'm
0:39
Speaker 3: Penny Williams, and I know firsthand how tough and transformative
0:43
Speaker 3: this journey can be. Let's dive in and discover how
0:46
Speaker 3: to raise regulated, resilient, beautifully complex kids together. Oh and
0:51
Speaker 3: if you want more support, join our free community at
0:55
Speaker 3: hub dot beautifully complex dot life us. Welcome back to
3:20
Speaker 3: Beautifully Complex everyone. I'm so glad you're here, and I
3:24
Speaker 3: have with me today Kelly Fetter of Handwriting Solutions, and
3:29
Speaker 3: we're going to talk about writing challenges dysgraphia, but also
3:35
Speaker 3: other challenges and how I hope to kind of identify
3:40
Speaker 3: when this might be what's going on with your kid
3:42
Speaker 3: when it might be more of a learning disability. And
3:44
Speaker 3: also five things that you can do right now that
3:46
Speaker 3: are going to help a kid who's struggling with writing. Kelly,
3:51
Speaker 3: thank you for being here. Will you start by sharing
3:53
Speaker 3: who you are and what you do?
3:55
Speaker 1: Absolutely? Yeah, thanks for having me, Penny, so again, Yeah,
3:58
Speaker 1: my name's Kelly. I am the Elder of Handwriting Solutions,
4:01
Speaker 1: and I'll start kind of at the beginning because I
4:04
Speaker 1: think it helps knowing where I came from. So I
4:08
Speaker 1: originally went down the path of I'm a pediatric occupational therapist,
4:14
Speaker 1: and so I worked in pediatrics for many years, seeing
4:18
Speaker 1: a variety of students in their schools, outpatient early intervention,
4:23
Speaker 1: and so I had a pretty good broad exposure to
4:26
Speaker 1: a variety of kiddos. And then I had my own
4:30
Speaker 1: and then shifted over to an adjunct professor position, also
4:37
Speaker 1: teaching kinesiology and pediatrics. So I loved that academia world
4:43
Speaker 1: and that research world. But life pretty much shifted when
4:47
Speaker 1: my daughter was five and started to struggle with reading
4:51
Speaker 1: and writing, and my OT brain said, what is going on?
4:58
Speaker 1: How can I help? How did this even happened? But
5:01
Speaker 1: I came at it from a very medical model, and
5:04
Speaker 1: I was like, well, her motor skills are fine, her
5:07
Speaker 1: fine motor skills are great. I don't understand her visual
5:11
Speaker 1: spatial skills were through the roof. I don't understand what's
5:14
Speaker 1: going on. And so of course I go to the
5:17
Speaker 1: school and I'm like, I'm seeing a disconnect and they're like,
5:20
Speaker 1: she's fine, We're going to wait and see.
5:22
Speaker 2: You know, all typical response that we get.
5:26
Speaker 1: But given what I knew, I knew early intervention matters,
5:30
Speaker 1: and so we started tutoring when she was between kindergarten
5:34
Speaker 1: and first grade that summer and really focusing on the
5:38
Speaker 1: reading skills because I knew we had to make some
5:40
Speaker 1: gains there before we started first grade. And she was
5:44
Speaker 1: just things were not connecting, they were not clicking into place.
5:47
Speaker 1: First grade rolls around, and then the school says, oh,
5:52
Speaker 1: my goodness, we've got to get all these evaluations done
5:55
Speaker 1: and she needs to do OT and she needs to
5:58
Speaker 1: do speech, and she needs to do get under O psyche.
6:01
Speaker 1: And then I hit the parent overwhelmed, which I know
6:03
Speaker 1: some of our listeners made me familiar with this so
6:07
Speaker 1: many h and I just I still could not get
6:12
Speaker 1: my head wrapped around you know. And obviously during this
6:15
Speaker 1: whole time too, I was really honing in on how
6:19
Speaker 1: I can help her with her handwriting skills, because that
6:21
Speaker 1: was something that I at least knew a little bit
6:23
Speaker 1: about as a no tee.
6:25
Speaker 2: So I said, I just.
6:26
Speaker 1: Need to get her evaluated first. I need to know
6:28
Speaker 1: what we're working with because all of this other stuff
6:30
Speaker 1: just I can't wrap my head around. And we need
6:33
Speaker 1: to go about this in a way that makes sense.
6:36
Speaker 1: So I am the biggest proponent of evaluations. I think
6:41
Speaker 1: it just gives family so much useful information about how
6:46
Speaker 1: a child learned. And so that was my first step.
6:49
Speaker 1: It was probably like November of her first grade year.
6:54
Speaker 1: And turns out, yes, dyslexia dysgraphia. So get this, Penny.
7:00
Speaker 1: I had never heard of dysgraphia before. I was an
7:04
Speaker 1: OT practicing in pediatrics, and I had never heard of
7:08
Speaker 1: dysgraphia before. That's crazy, and so it is right. It's
7:12
Speaker 1: very alarming, and I would venture to say most of
7:16
Speaker 1: her teachers in her school didn't really understand it either,
7:20
Speaker 1: And so I said, I've got to figure this out.
7:23
Speaker 1: I've got I was on a mission. Meanwhile, we went
7:25
Speaker 1: ahead and started her in a very intensive dyslexia remediation
7:30
Speaker 1: programming that spring of her first grade, which also happened
7:33
Speaker 1: to coincide with COVID, so.
7:35
Speaker 2: That was fun.
7:36
Speaker 1: But I was like, let's tackle this. I'm going to research,
7:40
Speaker 1: I'm going to learn, I'm going to take any course,
7:42
Speaker 1: any training. I just did a huge deep dive in
7:45
Speaker 1: the dysgraphia piece and then was able to support her
7:50
Speaker 1: and started building her skills and coming at it from
7:53
Speaker 1: a different model than what I was used to as
7:55
Speaker 1: an OT. And here we are today. She's in seventh
8:00
Speaker 1: grade and no longer qualifies for dyslexia or dysgraphia diagnosis,
8:05
Speaker 1: so we have come full circle.
8:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, but all of.
8:09
Speaker 1: That to say, you know, as the years went by
8:12
Speaker 1: and I was able to help her and see her progress,
8:15
Speaker 1: and I thought, why is nobody else doing this and
8:18
Speaker 1: these kids need help. Maybe I should help bridge the
8:22
Speaker 1: gap for these students.
8:24
Speaker 2: And so what.
8:24
Speaker 1: Started as a very small two afternoons a week, that's
8:28
Speaker 1: going to be just like a little a little like
8:31
Speaker 1: side gig that I was going to help some friends
8:33
Speaker 1: out here. We are fully virtual providing dysgraphia and dyslexia
8:40
Speaker 1: remediation worldwide.
8:42
Speaker 2: So big, big, one story.
8:44
Speaker 3: Isn't the Internet amazing?
8:46
Speaker 2: It really is.
8:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I came into this work the same way.
8:50
Speaker 3: I never thought about any of these things. What I
8:52
Speaker 3: came to know is that I knew nothing about ADHD.
8:55
Speaker 3: I knew nothing about autism because I only knew what
8:58
Speaker 3: the general public understand standing was. I knew nothing about dysgraphia.
9:02
Speaker 3: I didn't even hadn't even heard it before either. Oh,
9:05
Speaker 3: I don't have any formal training where it might have
9:07
Speaker 3: been helpful, and I should have learned it, but like,
9:09
Speaker 3: I just didn't know anything. Executive function didn't know that
9:14
Speaker 3: term either. And I've run across over the years so
9:17
Speaker 3: many educators who don't know these things also have never
9:20
Speaker 3: heard of them, also because they don't have to take
9:23
Speaker 3: any training in special education in any form or fashion
9:27
Speaker 3: in order to become a teacher. So it's not that
9:30
Speaker 3: they don't care, it's that they don't know that they
9:32
Speaker 3: need to know. Right And then, Yeah, and so like
9:37
Speaker 3: we went to OT for dysgraphia. So it does sort
9:40
Speaker 3: of boggle my mind that you were in OT and
9:43
Speaker 3: didn't know what dysgraphia was. I guess we lucked out
9:46
Speaker 3: and we went somewhere where they knew what dysgraphia was,
9:49
Speaker 3: but I found it really challenging all the way through
9:53
Speaker 3: my son's school career because people didn't understand it, and
9:57
Speaker 3: because they didn't like a lot of the accommodations that
10:02
Speaker 3: we're going to be helpful, they don't want to go there.
10:04
Speaker 3: They still wanted to force him to hand right things
10:08
Speaker 3: a lot, and so it was really challenging. But I
10:12
Speaker 3: think we need to start with making sure that everybody
10:16
Speaker 3: listening understands what is dysgraphia?
10:19
Speaker 1: M M, yeah, yeah, because that's you. You can't address
10:22
Speaker 1: it unless you understand it. And so yeah, so dysgraphia,
10:26
Speaker 1: what I like to think of is specific learning disabilities
10:31
Speaker 1: are It's an umbrella term, and so you have the
10:36
Speaker 1: specific learning disability in reading and so that's dyslexia. You
10:40
Speaker 1: have the specific learning disability in writing, so that's dysgraphia,
10:45
Speaker 1: and then you have it in math and that's the
10:47
Speaker 1: dysc calcula. So most people know about the dyslexia one
10:51
Speaker 1: the SLB and reading, but the other two not so much, right,
10:56
Speaker 1: and so what does dysgraphia actually look like? You know,
10:59
Speaker 1: This is where it gets really tricky and really challenging
11:02
Speaker 1: because there is not a gold standard tool to evaluate
11:06
Speaker 1: for dysgraphia, and there is not really great diagnostic criteria
11:12
Speaker 1: for dysgraphia. So if you were to say, look at
11:15
Speaker 1: the DSM, the Diagnostic Statistical Manual, you're going to see
11:19
Speaker 1: a very broad definition. Same thing with the IDEA or
11:25
Speaker 1: the ICD ten. Those are all diagnostic criteria in tools
11:31
Speaker 1: that someone like a psychologist would look at when giving
11:34
Speaker 1: a diagnosis, but they're all very broad and there's not
11:39
Speaker 1: a clear tool or assessment tool to use. So that's
11:45
Speaker 1: tricky because then kids either slip through the cracks or
11:50
Speaker 1: maybe be misdiagnosed. There's just there's a lack of understanding
11:54
Speaker 1: with that. So with all of that said, the biggest
11:57
Speaker 1: thing that I personally look forward now, we do not
12:01
Speaker 1: do diagnostics. Sots are it's not in our scope of
12:04
Speaker 1: practice to diagnose, so we refer out to that, but
12:07
Speaker 1: we can certainly say if your child is showing some
12:10
Speaker 1: red flags and so some of those might be the
12:14
Speaker 1: obvious one, the messy, illegible handwriting. That's the one we
12:17
Speaker 1: see often on those Facebook groups where parents are in
12:20
Speaker 1: there and they're like, does this look like my kid
12:22
Speaker 1: has dysgraphia? And they show a picture and if only
12:25
Speaker 1: that was that easy. Yes, it is helpful for us
12:29
Speaker 1: to see a child's output, but even more helpful is
12:33
Speaker 1: to see them as they're completing that output and to
12:36
Speaker 1: kind of get a more holistic view of their learning.
12:40
Speaker 1: But yes, definitely that messy, illegible writing. Maybe it's the
12:45
Speaker 1: formation of their letters or the sizing or the spacing
12:49
Speaker 1: that can be challenging for them. A big one is
12:52
Speaker 1: that difficulty translating their thoughts to paper, So there's that
12:57
Speaker 1: barrier there. Some of our disgraphic students actually have really nice,
13:00
Speaker 1: neat handwriting, and it's that written expression piece that getting
13:04
Speaker 1: our thoughts out that's the most challenging part. Some students
13:08
Speaker 1: might struggle with sentenced skills, capitalization, punctuation, grammar. Some dysgraphic
13:14
Speaker 1: students struggle with spelling. So there's a bit of an
13:17
Speaker 1: overlap there with dyslexia and dysgraphia and the spelling part,
13:21
Speaker 1: which again is why I want to see that holistic
13:23
Speaker 1: learning profile of a student. And then one of the
13:27
Speaker 1: bigger red flags that I see is frustration around writing
13:32
Speaker 1: and avoidance of writing. If your child is really frustrated
13:38
Speaker 1: ripping up the paper, this was my child ripping up
13:42
Speaker 1: the paper and crumpling it and throwing it at you.
13:46
Speaker 1: There might be something going on, maybe not dysgraphia, but
13:49
Speaker 1: something that you would want to further explore. And then
13:52
Speaker 1: that avoidance too, we see that sometimes in schools, the
13:55
Speaker 1: avoidance of anything, the meltdowns around writing. That's not a behavior.
13:59
Speaker 1: I know, you know we talk a lot about behavior,
14:02
Speaker 1: and I know you do in this podcast, but it
14:04
Speaker 1: is telling us that there's something more that's going on.
14:07
Speaker 1: And then there's those soft skills, you know, the pencil grasp.
14:09
Speaker 1: We're looking at that because that can sometimes be tricky.
14:12
Speaker 1: If the child is experiencing fatigue or discomfort with writing,
14:16
Speaker 1: that is something we want to look at too. So
14:18
Speaker 1: you can see a disgraphic student is going to look
14:21
Speaker 1: very different from another disgraphic student because the signs and
14:24
Speaker 1: symptoms there are a lot. There's a lot going on
14:27
Speaker 1: and there's a lot going on in the brain when
14:29
Speaker 1: we do right right Writing by hand is so complex,
14:33
Speaker 1: and so it's figuring out where that breakdown and barrier
14:35
Speaker 1: is happening for the student so that then we can build.
14:37
Speaker 2: Up their skills.
14:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, and really understanding, like really having somebody help me
14:42
Speaker 3: to sit back and think about all the things that
14:46
Speaker 3: are going on in the brain and the body when
14:48
Speaker 3: we are writing something down. Really helped me understand the
14:53
Speaker 3: fact that for some it's completely just automatic. We don't
14:58
Speaker 3: think about it, we just do it. And for others
15:01
Speaker 3: it's too much. It's too many things at one time
15:05
Speaker 3: we can't manage. And as you mentioned with your daughter earlier,
15:09
Speaker 3: my son also has amazing fine motor skills, which I
15:14
Speaker 3: assumed as we were walking into this journey his motor
15:18
Speaker 3: skills were gonna be terrible, and I was shocked to
15:21
Speaker 3: find that they were not. And hand eye coordination is unbelievable.
15:27
Speaker 3: He now plays he likes to play rhythm games, like
15:30
Speaker 3: video games with rhythm, and there is one that he's
15:33
Speaker 3: been playing for years and when I watch him play, like,
15:37
Speaker 3: I just I'm in shock in awe. When he plays
15:41
Speaker 3: these games, he can go so fast. You have to
15:43
Speaker 3: hit different keys for different things that are going right,
15:46
Speaker 3: and he will get ninety nine percent of these things
15:50
Speaker 3: with hundreds of them just blasting through really fast, and
15:53
Speaker 3: I'm like, holy cow. And then I'm like, what can
15:56
Speaker 3: we do with the skill which we have not figured
15:58
Speaker 3: out yet? But like it's not affecting everything the way
16:02
Speaker 3: you would think it would write like, it really is
16:05
Speaker 3: more about the writing, either the physical act of writing
16:10
Speaker 3: or that written expression piece, putting your thoughts together, getting
16:14
Speaker 3: them on paper, expanding on them. Like my son wouldn't
16:17
Speaker 3: necessarily avoid writing altogether, but he would write as little
16:22
Speaker 3: as he thought he could possibly get away with, and
16:25
Speaker 3: then he would always be asked to edit, and then
16:27
Speaker 3: he would get really upset and he would not edit right.
16:30
Speaker 3: And so that was a real signal yep yep, and
16:33
Speaker 3: then there's that spiral and so yeah, a lot of
16:36
Speaker 3: assist of technology came in for us. But what I
16:39
Speaker 3: noticed was that he was never taught letter formation. And
16:44
Speaker 3: I feel like if he had been taught letter formation
16:47
Speaker 3: at the beginning, it wouldn't be as bad as it
16:52
Speaker 3: has been bingo, because every single letter that he writes,
16:57
Speaker 3: I'm like, huh, that's an interesting way to do that,
17:00
Speaker 3: write all of them. And he did a lot of
17:04
Speaker 3: handwriting without tears at ot. He did a lot of
17:07
Speaker 3: practicing trying to change the letter for me, and it
17:11
Speaker 3: just wouldn't stick. What stuck is what he made up
17:15
Speaker 3: at the beginning. Because he wasn't taught and I don't
17:18
Speaker 3: know why we're not teaching that in school now.
17:21
Speaker 1: Oh, I know, I could really get on my soapbox here,
17:24
Speaker 1: But the biggest thing I want to point out is, yes,
17:27
Speaker 1: handwriting is more than a fine motor skill, and we
17:29
Speaker 1: have got to understand that from a teacher perspective, from
17:33
Speaker 1: an OT perspective, and from a parent perspective. And something
17:36
Speaker 1: I talk a lot about is that cognitive load of writing.
17:39
Speaker 1: So I love that you brought that up. Is handwriting
17:42
Speaker 1: is so complex and so when a student is having
17:46
Speaker 1: to think about how to form a letter, remember to
17:49
Speaker 1: how to place it on the line in the correct spacing.
17:52
Speaker 1: Oh but yeah, then we also have to think about
17:54
Speaker 1: how to spell the word and what makes a good
17:57
Speaker 1: sentence again and what did I want to write about anyway?
18:01
Speaker 2: And what was the topic.
18:02
Speaker 1: And then you can just see you can see the
18:04
Speaker 1: spiral because every part of it is challenging. The cognitive
18:09
Speaker 1: load is too heavy for them. And so yes, if
18:12
Speaker 1: we could front load it and have good, high quality,
18:16
Speaker 1: explicit and systematic instruction in school, embedded in the school day,
18:22
Speaker 1: it does not take much time. I think that's the
18:24
Speaker 1: key there is the research supports it is does not
18:27
Speaker 1: take a ton of time in that classroom day to
18:31
Speaker 1: provide this good quality handwriting instruction. All students are going
18:36
Speaker 1: to benefit, but particularly our dist graphics students, and sure
18:40
Speaker 1: they may need a little bit more even beyond that
18:43
Speaker 1: instructional that tier one approach, if you will, if you're
18:47
Speaker 1: in public school systems. But it's kind of like with dyslexia.
18:51
Speaker 1: You know, the pendulum have swung back to more of
18:54
Speaker 1: a phonics based instruction and reading, and it's benefiting all students,
18:59
Speaker 1: and it's especially enough fitting students with aslexia, and students
19:03
Speaker 1: with dyslexia still probably need some outside support too to
19:06
Speaker 1: really spend more time on the phonological awareness or the
19:09
Speaker 1: phonemic proficiency. Same thing with dysgraphia. Ideally we're getting that
19:14
Speaker 1: really quality instruction in the school, and then yes, we
19:18
Speaker 1: may need some outside support to help bridge the gaps
19:22
Speaker 1: and help kind of eliminate some of those barriers for
19:25
Speaker 1: the child.
19:26
Speaker 3: M Yeah, I mean eighteen years ago my kid entered kindergarten.
19:29
Speaker 3: Then they expected him to already know how to form
19:32
Speaker 3: all of his letters. They assume that kids are going
19:34
Speaker 3: to preschool and they're learning it there, And I'm like,
19:39
Speaker 3: what like, that doesn't make sense to me. You know,
19:43
Speaker 3: that's not a requirement, That doesn't make sense. So anyway,
19:45
Speaker 3: these things happen, and I think it's really hard to
19:49
Speaker 3: identify early, Like if your kid is foreign, they're not
19:52
Speaker 3: writing yet, you don't know that they have dysgraphia, to
19:55
Speaker 3: go ahead and start working on letter formations with them
19:58
Speaker 3: right before they go to school. Really tricky timing there,
20:03
Speaker 3: And I think just a lot of kids end up
20:05
Speaker 3: in school then we realize, okay, there's a problem here.
20:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, or it's late elementary before we realize it,
20:13
Speaker 1: because the demands are then above what they kind of
20:17
Speaker 1: they fake their way through, they've masked a little bit,
20:20
Speaker 1: they've compensated, they've avoided, and so then you hit fourth
20:24
Speaker 1: fifth grade and the expectations have just really grown and
20:30
Speaker 1: then it all starts crumbling and falling apart. And I
20:33
Speaker 1: see this a lot with spelling and that written expression
20:37
Speaker 1: piece too, because they these kids, some of these kids.
20:40
Speaker 2: Are really good memorizers.
20:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so then you get to longer passages that
20:46
Speaker 1: you need to write and more complex words, and it
20:50
Speaker 1: just it falls apart. And then we have to go
20:53
Speaker 1: back to those foundations because those foundations were just never
20:57
Speaker 1: built or not for long enough.
20:59
Speaker 3: Yeah. I just a little aha. And you said that
21:01
Speaker 3: because my kid is a great speller, but he had
21:05
Speaker 3: to do it verbally, And now I'm thinking, no, he
21:07
Speaker 3: was a great memorizer. He learned how to spell it
21:11
Speaker 3: and it's stuck and he could repeat it right, and
21:15
Speaker 3: so maybe he wasn't the best speller. We always thought, well,
21:18
Speaker 3: you just couldn't read it to tell if he had
21:20
Speaker 3: spelled it right or not. And he had the most
21:22
Speaker 3: amazing first grade teacher who would let him take the
21:25
Speaker 3: test like everybody else did, but then if there was
21:28
Speaker 3: something she wasn't sure about, she wouldn't just mark it wrong.
21:31
Speaker 3: She would ask him to spell it verbally, and he
21:33
Speaker 3: would get one hundreds on every spelling test until they
21:37
Speaker 3: stopped doing spelling tests, like because he was able to
21:40
Speaker 3: just memorize it.
21:41
Speaker 1: Yeah.
21:41
Speaker 2: Wow, yep. Yeah.
21:43
Speaker 1: The kids are just they are master like compensators. It's
21:46
Speaker 1: so interesting. But I do like that strategy. I think
21:49
Speaker 1: that's a great accommodation that schools can make. And then
21:53
Speaker 1: even at home that you can make is that verbal
21:55
Speaker 1: versus written to see if they truly understand the skill
21:59
Speaker 1: or if it's just that writing component. And then you know,
22:03
Speaker 1: I think a good test of spelling is like to
22:06
Speaker 1: throw in those nonsense words and that really is your
22:09
Speaker 1: good sign of are they truly able to decode and
22:12
Speaker 1: encode those words or are they just taking that little
22:16
Speaker 1: snapshot in their brain and yeah, verberating it.
22:19
Speaker 3: And kids who are extremely verbally fluent, like my kid
22:24
Speaker 3: is off the chart verbally fluent can sit down at
22:28
Speaker 3: a piece of paper and have no capability of writing something.
22:33
Speaker 3: And those two things can coexist at the same time,
22:36
Speaker 3: which I think was really part of his struggle in
22:39
Speaker 3: school was when I talked to him about this, Oh
22:42
Speaker 3: my gosh, he blows me away. But then when he
22:45
Speaker 3: writes about it, it feels like he's being lazy because
22:47
Speaker 3: he's just not living up to that standard that he
22:51
Speaker 3: showed me verbally, right, we would always have those comparisons
22:55
Speaker 3: or intelligence. You know, kids who are gifted can struggle
22:58
Speaker 3: to write something. Those two things can coexist. I think
23:02
Speaker 3: it's really important that everybody understand that. And so if
23:06
Speaker 3: you're met with educators, professionals, people who are saying no,
23:11
Speaker 3: you know, they're showing us this ability over here. You
23:14
Speaker 3: have the knowledge to push back on that you have
23:17
Speaker 3: the knowledge to keep asking questions, to go to the
23:19
Speaker 3: next person to get it figured out for your kid.
23:23
Speaker 3: I'm not saying don't believe everyone, but kind of like,
23:26
Speaker 3: if you feel it in your gut, then keep going.
23:29
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, yeah, the mismatch is very common. I
23:34
Speaker 1: think in children with dysgraphia, the mismatch of ability and performance,
23:38
Speaker 1: and that's where the frustration comes in. So when I
23:41
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier that frustrating. That is so frustrating. Yeah, to
23:44
Speaker 1: be able to verbally communicate and share your amazing ideas
23:47
Speaker 1: and then just come up to this like brick wall
23:50
Speaker 1: of when you go to write, like, I can't even
23:53
Speaker 1: imagine how frustrating that would be. And I love that you.
23:56
Speaker 2: Mentioned that you know schools too.
23:58
Speaker 1: I think something that I've observed over the years as
24:01
Speaker 1: well is sometimes in the school systems they take a
24:05
Speaker 1: zoomed out approach, and so on average, your child might
24:08
Speaker 1: be performing okay because we're zoomed out, but we have
24:13
Speaker 1: to zoom in to see the big picture. Same thing
24:16
Speaker 1: with even just interpreting different assessments. If your child has
24:20
Speaker 1: had an assessment through the school, outside of the school,
24:23
Speaker 1: if we look at that composite score that's not always
24:26
Speaker 1: going to give us great information, but I want to
24:29
Speaker 1: zoom in to these individual scores and see exactly what
24:34
Speaker 1: is happening, and likely you're going to see that spiky
24:37
Speaker 1: profile of strength and then barrier strength and barrier.
24:42
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, very asynchronous. So let's dive into five things
25:00
Speaker 3: that parents or educators can do. Right now, we are
25:05
Speaker 3: starting to run up against our time limit here for
25:09
Speaker 3: folks to be able to have enough time to listen
25:11
Speaker 3: in between all of the busy stuff they're doing. So
25:13
Speaker 3: do you want to start with the first one?
25:15
Speaker 2: Absolutely?
25:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, the first one I think we've alluded to. So
25:19
Speaker 1: be aware if you are a parent, be aware, if
25:22
Speaker 1: you're the teacher, be aware. If we can be empowered
25:26
Speaker 1: as parents especially and monitor our child's development as best
25:31
Speaker 1: as possible. I mean, we all don't have to be
25:33
Speaker 1: writing experts or desgraphia experts, but just being aware and
25:37
Speaker 1: monitoring and noticing any gaps or noticing any frustrations, that's
25:42
Speaker 1: going to be huge. And so part of that I
25:44
Speaker 1: can absolutely share with the listeners is that we've created
25:48
Speaker 1: sort of an expectations because again, most parents, we're not
25:52
Speaker 1: going to know what to even expect at each grade level.
25:55
Speaker 1: So we created just a super easy PDF basically that's
26:00
Speaker 1: parents exactly what to expect at each grade level so
26:04
Speaker 1: that they can ensure that their child is able to
26:08
Speaker 1: keep up and if they're not knowing what to do again,
26:11
Speaker 1: I think we know that early intervention is best and
26:14
Speaker 1: best practice. So I think knowing when progress is just
26:18
Speaker 1: not happening, or it's lower than we expect, or just
26:21
Speaker 1: that gut, you know, that gut feeling that I felt that,
26:25
Speaker 1: I'm sure you felt, Penny, that a lot of our
26:27
Speaker 1: parents can relate to. I like, just something is not clicking.
26:30
Speaker 1: That awareness will be huge. The second I would say
26:35
Speaker 1: is go ahead and start building those foundations. If you're
26:39
Speaker 1: a parent of a younger child, this is a perfect time.
26:42
Speaker 1: But even if your child is in middle school, it's
26:44
Speaker 1: not too late to go back to the foundations. I
26:46
Speaker 1: like to think of writing as kind of the tip
26:48
Speaker 1: of the iceberg. So what you see at the top
26:52
Speaker 1: of the iceberg is that output, right, But there's so
26:55
Speaker 1: many foundational skills that have to happen to get to
27:00
Speaker 1: that tip of the iceberg. So really digging in, you know,
27:03
Speaker 1: maybe maybe it is a fine motor concern or maybe
27:06
Speaker 1: it's a visual concern or sensory or attention or executive function.
27:11
Speaker 1: All of these skills can certainly impact that writing eventually,
27:15
Speaker 1: so really working on building out those foundations is helpful.
27:20
Speaker 1: Number three would be as much as we can bring
27:24
Speaker 1: in multisensory learning, because chances are your disgraphic child, the
27:29
Speaker 1: comorbidity of ADHD or another SLD is significantly high. And
27:37
Speaker 1: so we know that when we can engage students and
27:40
Speaker 1: really get them excited about learning and light up multiple
27:43
Speaker 1: senses while we're learning, while we're having that explicit systematic
27:49
Speaker 1: instruction and practice, that's going to be when like things
27:53
Speaker 1: start to click into place that is going to get
27:57
Speaker 1: better gains and better out comes in better progress. The
28:02
Speaker 1: research is very very clear on that. So and I'm
28:05
Speaker 1: happy to share more ideas with your listeners as well
28:08
Speaker 1: for what multisensory really looks like because that could be
28:11
Speaker 1: a whole other podcast.
28:12
Speaker 2: That we do.
28:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, what is quality instruction and what is multisensory?
28:17
Speaker 1: So I'll leave my information at the end and your
28:20
Speaker 1: listeners can certainly follow up to learn more about that too. Yeah,
28:24
Speaker 1: and then number four would be that quality practice. So
28:28
Speaker 1: quality practice is not copywork, and I think sometimes we
28:32
Speaker 1: forget that.
28:33
Speaker 3: Our education system forgets it for sure.
28:36
Speaker 1: Huh Yeah, quality practice looks very systematic, and we're explicitly
28:44
Speaker 1: teaching a child how to form a letter where it
28:47
Speaker 1: sits on the line, what spacing, what sizing, what you know, capitalization,
28:52
Speaker 1: punk with all of those again that come kind of
28:55
Speaker 1: automatic to us as adults. Kids have to be explicitly taught.
29:00
Speaker 1: I think I was reading a research article the other
29:02
Speaker 1: day and it said handwriting has to be taught, not caught,
29:06
Speaker 1: and I'm like, yes, their kids are just gonna I mean,
29:09
Speaker 1: if they do, it will be like your son, where Okay,
29:12
Speaker 1: we'll figure this out. Then let me draw. So you'll
29:15
Speaker 1: see students draw the letter instead of fluently automatically write
29:19
Speaker 1: a letter. And if we don't have that foundational transcription skills,
29:25
Speaker 1: these higher cognitive level writing and written expression skills, it's
29:30
Speaker 1: just going to be ten times harder on that student.
29:33
Speaker 3: Because they're putting it all into that mechanical part, right,
29:37
Speaker 3: and then they don't have room for that written expression piece.
29:40
Speaker 3: Maybe yeah, I think executive function challenges play a huge
29:44
Speaker 3: role in writing challenges.
29:47
Speaker 1: It does, It really really does. And I think part
29:50
Speaker 1: of it too is that automaticity. You know, it's when
29:53
Speaker 1: we can automate the physical act of handwriting, then we
29:56
Speaker 1: don't have to think about it, and then we can
29:58
Speaker 1: think about what we're writing and have yeah, kind of
30:00
Speaker 1: freeze up some of our executive function abilities.
30:04
Speaker 3: And in that number four piece that you were just
30:05
Speaker 3: talking about, like, we had tools that we also added
30:09
Speaker 3: when we were trying to work on those mechanics, like
30:13
Speaker 3: raised line paper, pencil grips. There's a million different kind
30:17
Speaker 3: of pencil grips now and we probably tried ten or
30:19
Speaker 3: twelve before we found one that he felt comfortable with.
30:23
Speaker 3: So there's lots of things out there that can help
30:25
Speaker 3: you to facilitate highlighted every other line paper was another one,
30:31
Speaker 3: and graph paper, Like we really leaned into some different
30:33
Speaker 3: papers to try to help with that and it does
30:37
Speaker 3: some And then he got old enough where he didn't
30:39
Speaker 3: want to have different paper, and then that became a thing, right,
30:42
Speaker 3: So you know, there's always some sort of challenge and
30:45
Speaker 3: ebb and flow to what will work and changing things
30:48
Speaker 3: as you go.
30:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I love those low tech accommodations. And I
30:52
Speaker 1: was just on a call with a parent right before
30:55
Speaker 1: this and she asked that same question because she has
30:58
Speaker 1: a kiddo going into middle school and like, he doesn't
31:01
Speaker 1: want to look different. And I get that, and I said,
31:05
Speaker 1: what I've done is I take ten of them to
31:08
Speaker 1: the classroom and so everybody gets, you know, access.
31:12
Speaker 2: To this, so it's not so exclusive.
31:15
Speaker 1: And let's be honest, if your kid is struggling, they're
31:19
Speaker 1: not the only kid in that classroom in strug Yeah,
31:21
Speaker 1: and so I educate teachers a lot on like, have
31:25
Speaker 1: a variety of these tools, have a variety of paper types,
31:30
Speaker 1: because what works for one kid is not going to
31:31
Speaker 1: work for another kid as well. So it just makes
31:34
Speaker 1: for a nice, accessible classroom environment that's free from stereotypes
31:39
Speaker 1: and and awkwardness for our students.
31:42
Speaker 3: I love that. Yeah, I'm just thinking back, like how
31:45
Speaker 3: many times could I have taken extra stuff in and
31:48
Speaker 3: made it easier. But also it has to be received.
31:52
Speaker 3: Teachers have to be open to that, to allowing kids
31:56
Speaker 3: to choose what they want to do and use, and
31:59
Speaker 3: that is an all is the case.
32:00
Speaker 1: But we can try to educate, yes, exactly, educate, advocate. Yeah,
32:05
Speaker 1: it certainly has to be an approachable environment for sure.
32:09
Speaker 1: And one thing I tell parents a lot of times too,
32:11
Speaker 1: because I think there's this this this nervousness going into
32:16
Speaker 1: a new school year of is this teacher going to
32:19
Speaker 1: get it? And there's this fear. And so I think
32:23
Speaker 1: every school that I've ever been in, because we have
32:26
Speaker 1: shuffled around some schools, I meet with the teachers before
32:29
Speaker 1: school even starts, and I set the stage for what
32:34
Speaker 1: would be a collaborative environment. I come at it from
32:37
Speaker 1: a here is how my child learns best. Here are
32:41
Speaker 1: her strengths, Here are her areas that might be challenging
32:46
Speaker 1: for her, Here's what has worked in the past. I
32:49
Speaker 1: am on this team as well. I want to collaborate.
32:52
Speaker 1: How can I support you as the teacher?
32:55
Speaker 2: And man, it just.
32:56
Speaker 1: Makes a big difference in this difference. Yeah, setting the
32:59
Speaker 1: stage for the whole school year again, will everybody be
33:02
Speaker 1: a receptive No, But I would say given that little
33:05
Speaker 1: extra effort before the school year even starts, then they're
33:09
Speaker 1: not like blindsided or they're not like, you know, my
33:12
Speaker 1: child also has anxiety, so like we need to catch
33:15
Speaker 1: that before it, you know, even it comes to be
33:18
Speaker 1: a problem. So yeah, I think the collaboration piece can
33:22
Speaker 1: be really, really helpful. And I guess that would kind
33:25
Speaker 1: of just segue into number five, which is get outside
33:28
Speaker 1: help when you need it. So of course we want
33:31
Speaker 1: to utilize you know, especially for families who are in
33:34
Speaker 1: the public school systems, but even if you're in a
33:37
Speaker 1: private school, if you homeschool, we want to utilize as
33:40
Speaker 1: many resources as possible. But I will be the first
33:43
Speaker 1: to tell you that, as you alluded to, oftentimes teachers
33:47
Speaker 1: are not trained in dysgraphia or handwriting instruction. Most schools
33:52
Speaker 1: have removed handwriting instruction from curriculum, and most ots in
33:58
Speaker 1: the school system are so bombarded with caseloads that you know,
34:03
Speaker 1: your student, especially these gifted kiddos, these two E kiddos,
34:07
Speaker 1: see these dysgraphic kids, they're not qualifying for services in
34:14
Speaker 1: school oftentimes because when we zoom out, we see that
34:17
Speaker 1: high IQ and you know, they're they're scraped and bad,
34:20
Speaker 1: they're you know, academically. So you know, sometimes it is
34:24
Speaker 1: worth getting extra outside support whenever your child hits that
34:29
Speaker 1: frustration point. And so what that looks like It could
34:32
Speaker 1: look like a variety of things. It could look like therapy,
34:35
Speaker 1: ot psychological therapy, and mental health therapy. It could look
34:39
Speaker 1: like tutoring specipically forehandwriting or reading or spelling or written composition.
34:44
Speaker 1: It could look like vision therapy. It could look like
34:46
Speaker 1: executive function coaching. It could look like support for you
34:50
Speaker 1: as a parent. It can look like a lot of
34:51
Speaker 1: different things. But I promise that getting that outside support,
34:55
Speaker 1: you'll never regret that in the earlier you get it,
34:58
Speaker 1: truly the better, because I've seen cases where you know,
35:02
Speaker 1: we put it off and we think the school is
35:03
Speaker 1: going to handle it, and we think, just give them time,
35:06
Speaker 1: And I just have never seen a research article that
35:10
Speaker 1: supports that approach. So all of the research says, you know,
35:13
Speaker 1: early intervention makes a world of difference for these students,
35:17
Speaker 1: not only for their academic outcomes, but also for their
35:20
Speaker 1: mental health and their confidence.
35:21
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, But on the flip side too, it's never
35:24
Speaker 3: too late, never too late. Who have older kids, yes,
35:28
Speaker 3: and teenagers, like, it's never too late. I get this
35:31
Speaker 3: question all the time as a parent coach. They will
35:33
Speaker 3: respond to something like a tip or a strategy or
35:37
Speaker 3: anything and say, well, my kid is this age? Is
35:40
Speaker 3: it too late? It's never too late. We talk so
35:43
Speaker 3: much about early intervention that I think sometimes parents take
35:47
Speaker 3: away from that the message that it has to be
35:50
Speaker 3: early or it's not going to be useful, and that's
35:53
Speaker 3: not true. It's just ideal. If it's early, it will
35:57
Speaker 3: be different that way.
35:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm so glad you said this because I
36:02
Speaker 1: literally want a bumper sticker that says it's never too
36:05
Speaker 1: late to remediate.
36:06
Speaker 2: Yes, it's like my slogan, and it's not.
36:10
Speaker 1: And so what I share is a pretty extreme example,
36:12
Speaker 1: but sometimes we need those extreme examples. Is it's like
36:17
Speaker 1: an adult, let's say an elder adult and they have
36:20
Speaker 1: a strike.
36:22
Speaker 2: Are we going to just.
36:23
Speaker 1: Say, oh, sorry, you know you had that brain damage
36:27
Speaker 1: and no, We're going to put them in therapy. We're
36:30
Speaker 1: going to teach them how to write again. Now, obviously,
36:33
Speaker 1: developmental dysgraphia is not an acquired brain injury. But our
36:37
Speaker 1: brains are plastic, and so we have worked with students
36:41
Speaker 1: in college, We've worked with students in high school and
36:44
Speaker 1: middle school.
36:45
Speaker 2: I love that you.
36:46
Speaker 1: Mentioned it is never too late, because it truly isn't
36:49
Speaker 1: you know. Do we take a different approach. Perhaps we
36:54
Speaker 1: want to make it meaningful and we want to have
36:57
Speaker 1: their buy in and their motivation because obviously that will
37:01
Speaker 1: impact outcomes. But with the right approach, we can make
37:06
Speaker 1: gains in adults.
37:09
Speaker 3: So amazing.
37:10
Speaker 1: Yeah.
37:10
Speaker 3: Absolutely, So I have one last question for you before
37:12
Speaker 3: we wrap, which is when do you add or shift
37:18
Speaker 3: to assistive technology? Because you're talking a lot about learning
37:23
Speaker 3: the skills or relearning the skills, learning those foundations, changing
37:27
Speaker 3: the way they're doing things mechanically. Maybe when is it
37:32
Speaker 3: appropriate to add or shift to assistive technology?
37:39
Speaker 2: Yeah?
37:39
Speaker 1: I get this question a lot. Same thing with the
37:42
Speaker 1: remediate too.
37:42
Speaker 2: I don't know why.
37:43
Speaker 1: It's like third grade if your kid has not learned
37:46
Speaker 1: handwriting by third grade, and I'm like, no, why third grade?
37:49
Speaker 1: So what else is there's not a magic age for accommodation.
37:53
Speaker 1: And what I view accommodations because I know that is like, well,
37:57
Speaker 1: if they haven't whatever mastered handwriting, we have to move
38:01
Speaker 1: them to a keyboard. That's like the blanket statement. And
38:04
Speaker 1: oh my goodness, that is so false because keyboarding is
38:07
Speaker 1: also equally challenging.
38:09
Speaker 2: For our discographic kids.
38:11
Speaker 1: So we can't just give them a keyboard and wish
38:14
Speaker 1: them good luck because they're probably going to struggle with
38:17
Speaker 1: that too, and they probably haven't had explicit and systematic
38:19
Speaker 1: instruction in keyboarding. So I view accommodations as we can
38:25
Speaker 1: pull them in at any time. We can pull them
38:27
Speaker 1: in for the youngest learners if it bridges the gap
38:31
Speaker 1: for that student. So if we can pull in an
38:33
Speaker 1: accommodation that will take them from where they are now
38:37
Speaker 1: to accessing that education and that learning, that's when we're
38:41
Speaker 1: going to bring that accommodation in, whether it's a low
38:43
Speaker 1: tech accommodation or a high tech accommodation like speech to
38:47
Speaker 1: text or predictive text or scribe or again the keyboarding piece.
38:53
Speaker 1: There's not so much a magic age as when do
38:56
Speaker 1: we need it to bridge that gap to help that
38:58
Speaker 1: student show their learning, demonstrate their learning, and access the
39:03
Speaker 1: education environment, which means that accommodations have to be so individualized.
39:10
Speaker 1: There is not one blanket accommodation that works for all
39:13
Speaker 1: this graphics students. That's why I like to really dig
39:16
Speaker 1: into their learning profile and see what is going to work,
39:20
Speaker 1: and maybe trial a few different accommodation tools and strategies
39:25
Speaker 1: for that student, because what works for one is just
39:28
Speaker 1: may not work for the other one. But yeah, hopefully
39:32
Speaker 1: that answers.
39:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, And you know, I always think about how can
39:36
Speaker 3: we help this child feel successful? We need successes for
39:39
Speaker 3: kids to keep trying. So while we're working on skills,
39:43
Speaker 3: is there something we can do to make them feel successful? Yes,
39:47
Speaker 3: And again not everybody is going to get on board
39:50
Speaker 3: with that all the time. You know, I had to
39:52
Speaker 3: fight for before kids had computers in school, not dating
39:56
Speaker 3: myself for my kids, but I had to fight for
39:58
Speaker 3: an iPad. I had to fight for years for an
40:01
Speaker 3: iPad for him because of a lot of executive function stuff. Really,
40:06
Speaker 3: like he would complete a worksheet and he would lose
40:09
Speaker 3: it four times. He was doing assignments four or five
40:12
Speaker 3: times before he got credit for them. Like this is
40:14
Speaker 3: not okay. We have to do something different here. But
40:17
Speaker 3: I think that's the key, Like, is there something we
40:20
Speaker 3: can do different that is going to help this child
40:23
Speaker 3: feel successful, feel like this is doable at least in
40:26
Speaker 3: the interim. Maybe it's not a long term thing. But
40:30
Speaker 3: a lot of adults use voice to text. A lot
40:32
Speaker 3: of adults use you know that we type things now
40:35
Speaker 3: instead of handwriting everything, so avoiding that I don't find
40:40
Speaker 3: useful either. You know, for a long time we couldn't
40:43
Speaker 3: get anything because it was well there's the study where
40:46
Speaker 3: if you write it by hand, you remember it better,
40:50
Speaker 3: it does all these wonderful things for your brain, Like, yeah,
40:53
Speaker 3: if writing is easy for you. Sure, did they have
40:57
Speaker 3: kids with the scraphy in that study?
40:58
Speaker 1: Yeah?
40:59
Speaker 3: No, Right, but that was like the understanding, the basis
41:03
Speaker 3: there foundation that I was fighting against for so long.
41:07
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, I think too that that makes me think
41:10
Speaker 1: of like we don't have to pick one like, it
41:12
Speaker 1: can be both, it can be all, it can be
41:14
Speaker 1: all the things we can be remediating and accommodating and modifying,
41:18
Speaker 1: and we don't just have to pick one path, which
41:20
Speaker 1: I feel like sometimes in that like IEP. Five O four,
41:24
Speaker 1: it feels very much like you have to. But yeah,
41:26
Speaker 1: I advocate for all all the things when the child needs.
41:29
Speaker 3: It perfect well of it. Tell everybody where they can
41:32
Speaker 3: find you online so that they can connect and potentially
41:34
Speaker 3: learn more.
41:35
Speaker 2: Sure.
41:36
Speaker 1: Our website is Handwriting Solutions dot org. My email is
41:41
Speaker 1: also k E. L. L I at Handwriting solutions dot org.
41:45
Speaker 1: We're on Instagram and really all the social media platforms,
41:48
Speaker 1: but probably most active on the good old Instagram. But
41:51
Speaker 1: certainly sign up for our emails because we have a
41:55
Speaker 1: very active weekly email newsletter that is just absolutely full
42:00
Speaker 1: of information for parents and for teachers and for therapists.
42:03
Speaker 1: If you're a therapist listening to we really want to
42:06
Speaker 1: support the entire team.
42:09
Speaker 3: Amazing. I know so many people are going to stop
42:12
Speaker 3: listening and next time they're at the computer or their phone,
42:15
Speaker 3: right the computer, their phone, they're going to look it
42:18
Speaker 3: out for right and find what you offer and see
42:21
Speaker 3: if it might be helpful for their kid. Thank you
42:23
Speaker 3: for being here. I appreciate you coming on and sharing
42:27
Speaker 3: some of your expertise and some of your sort of
42:30
Speaker 3: been there, done that wisdom that I find so useful
42:33
Speaker 3: for parents especially. I appreciate you.
42:36
Speaker 2: Thank you, Penny. I love what you do. Keep doing it.
42:38
Speaker 3: Thank you. I will see everybody in the next episode.
42:41
Speaker 3: Take good care. I see you. You're doing hard and
42:47
Speaker 3: meaningful work and you don't have to do it alone.
42:50
Speaker 3: If you found this episode helpful, share it with someone
42:53
Speaker 3: who needs it and leave a quick review so others
42:56
Speaker 3: can find this support too. When you're ready for next step,
43:00
Speaker 3: the Regulated Kid's Project is here with the tools, coaching,
43:04
Speaker 3: and community to help you raise a more regulated, resilient child.
43:09
Speaker 3: Get more info at regulated kids dot com.