How do you teach a 5 year old to hold his pencil properly?

Question

I'm having such a horrible time teaching my son to properly grip his pencil/marker/crayon when he writes. I want to have him practice his letters, but worry that until he learns to get the right position he'll be learning incorrectly.

Answer 1

Your 5 year old will have difficulty with this but sometimes showing and doing does help. Mommy make sure you are modeling the right way to hold the writing instrument and sometimes if he is an early five show him how to form letters with his fingers in paint, sand on a pan, and playdough. 5 year olds love making messes, shaving cream cleans your tables but it's awesome for them to write in and they love they way it feels.
And if he is an early 5 sometimes it will be war getting them to use a pencil until they are ready themselves without cajoling.
Although there are some reasons why this is difficult some factors to consider would be if he has a pincer grasp problem like does he show problems actually moving his fingers in that shape, to hold a pencil. Are his fingers strong enough to hold the small pencil? There is no proof that shows using a large elementary pencil works better than an ordinary pencil but it would get him ready for the smaller diameter of a regular pencil.
You should make sure his hand is relaxed and not knotted up and tense at the beginning. Have him pick up the pencil with two fingers and have it lined up properly with the graphite pointing down. Have him put his thumb to about his first joint of his pointer finger and support the pencil inbetween the pointer and middle finger(making sure the middle finger is bent with his other fingers curled but relaxed onto the paper.) Show him how his hand should be pointed because this is hard for them to understand. He will get it. Another easy thing would be to use the big primary pencils....or get a gripper that can be bought at any school supply store that forces the fingers to fall in the correct writing position, but you will still have to show him how to hold his hand on the paper. They don't cost much at all and they last a LONG time. The paper needs to be straight when writing manuscript and slanted for incursive.
Another option are wrapping rubberbands on a traditional pencil until there is larger base near where he would hold the pencil. That works well and is cheap. If he has problems holding the pencil for a long period of time have him wrap a piece of clay or playdough around his thumb and pointer finger, and have him move his thumb and pointer finger apart which strenghten his finger and will allow him to hold the correct positioning. I have taught school for over 3 years and at primary level with lots of kids, so some of the suggestion might help. Another thing you might want to try is getting a wipe on/wipe off board with different color markers and let him make his letters that way or buy some ever so cool color pencils and let him have at it! Let him mess around with the pencils for a little bit before deciding him to teach anything. If you have him draw a picture you can have him tell you what he wants to write about (or rather you will write it for him and then ask him if he wants to help) He won't know what you are writing but you are showing him that letters have sounds and letters make words. Just choose some words that have letters that he/she could start with, which might just be the letter A. And from that point have her practice the letter A on the wipe on/off board. She needs to know her letters first but sometimes introducing the letter A as both a letter and a word excites them!
LOL! Have he/she find the letter A and highlight it with a marker in a paper or magazine. They love that! I teach school and love the littles, good luck.
Special Educator
Pre-k-K Elementary Ed BA
K-8
K-12 MA Special Ed

Answer 2

He's 5 YEARS OLD !!!!

Do you really think if you don't get it right now, he'll never be able to hold a pencil correctly when he grows up?!

He'll hold the pencil the way he needs/wants to in order to write. Gheesh, give the kid some slack and quit micro managing his growth.

Answer 3

His little bones haven't really completely formed yet. The Italians don't emphasise writing skills until children are about seven They regard forcing children to write before they are physically ready as a peculiarly Northern European form of child abuse. Let him hold it whatever way is comfortable for him for the next year or two, then gradually introduce the 'correct' grip. Forcing it on him now will only cause him pain and make him regard writing as an odious chore! Concentrate on developing his reading skills first.

Answer 4

Maybe you should hold off for a bit - fine motor development is slower in boys (meaning they aren't ready to write until a later age). He will get PLENTY of practice writing his letters - as long as you give him plenty of opportunity to write once he does start.

Give him a break for a month or two and let him work on fine motor skill development activities (picking beans up with just the thumb and first finger, etc). When you start writing again, you'll be surprised by how much better he does.

Answer 5

My daughter had the same problem. I finally decided to have her show me all the different ways she could hold the pencil. Once I saw the one that was the correct way I said "That's it!" and I called it "Crab Claws". So now, even two years later when I catch her mistakenly holding the pencil the wrong way I say, "Oh, don't forget the 'crab claws'!"

Goofy, yes. But works everytime! Good luck!!

Answer 6

Yup, it's difficult. I hated it all through school. You just need to keep correcting him. Eventually, we all grow up and give up on silly stuff, but until then, he may keep wanting to switch around. This will teach you as much about discipline as it teaches him about writing. It'll be a good experience for both of you.

Answer 7

Let the child hold the pencil as is comfortable for him/her. More important to learn writing skills.

Answer 8

Ive seen some pretty weird ways people told a pen to write, with my kids I didn't have them hold it a certain way or left or right you let them pick it up and they will adapt to whats comfortable for them.

Answer 9

I agree with the previous answerrs wich said let him hold it however he wants...also are you usng the special oversize pencils designed for very young children? or are you just using regular #2 pencils?

Answer 10

Gently encourage him to hold it the way you do, he'll only hold it the way he feels is "comfortable" and the way we write isn't exactly comfortable to the human hand. But keep trying to encourage him, maybe show him by example.