when should i teach my three year old to write?

Question

my son is three and half year old,he likes to hear stories ,rhymes all the time than to write alphabets!we are planning to admitted tp kinder garten one by april 2007.by the time he will be quarter to 4 yrs.now frm the last two weeks i was trying to make him drwa line like lseeping,standing,then wth letter L and A.but he is not at all interested and drop his pencils or ask me to stop or stubborn enough that he does not want to write anything.one day i even spanked him for not writing.i feel really bad after doing that.i fear whether my spanking will have adverse effect on his studies.please suggest a help ful way to teach him wthout showing frown to him and spank him.please do help me.by the way now my son read all alphabet including the small letters,but dont no to read words.how should i make him teach that?please do advise.

Answer 1

Don't grow up kids to fast, let them stay kids, there is plenty of time.

Answer 2

At three he should be drawing not writing...he still sees the alphabet as pictures. Let him play and encourage him to continue to draw. Start introducing him to his name and what it looks like, he should be able to recognize it by 4 and write it by the time he is 4 and a half, sometimes earlier but there is no need to push. Most children do not have the ability to form letters at the age of three because their small motor skills are not advanced enough.
Continue to read to your child, following the words with your finger and let him hear the first sounds of the words, especially ones that start with the same sound as his name..."look Jacob, that word starts with the letter J, just like your name...Jam...J..J...Jam"
If you push your child too hard it will have an adverse affect on him, he will not want to learn and will begin to hate it. Be patient some kids just aren't ready.
At 3 and a half now would be a good time to get him in a part time preschool program, they will teach him what he needs to know for Kindergarten. You seem to want to put him in Kindergarten at 4, this is not a good idea, especially if he is just turning 4 when you are putting him in. Keep him in a preschool program until he turns 5, if you believe he is ":gifted" you can ask to have him tested and the school can decide if they want to move him up.

Answer 3

Your spanking will have an adverse effect on him wanting to learn and study. He's simply not ready. Let him have crayons and colored pencils to draw or scribble or do what he will call writing but won't look like it to you. I know parents want their kids to be really smart and ahead of the rest, but why? My daughter could write her name right before she turned 4, and she knew how to spell it verbally at two. We would encourage her, but not push her. And she didn't start kindergarten until last year, right before she turned 6, this was partly because of the age requirement of our school, but we didn't fight that because there is no hurry. Kids are getting burned out at younger ages and it's because of this big push to have our kids be better and smarter and more advanced than the next kid. Let your son be a kid and have fun. Don't punish him for not wanting to write. Wait until he's old enough and has homework, then you can punish him for not wanting to do it! Several weeks ago a Newsweek came out and on the cover it said, "The new 1st Grade" or something to that effect. The article talked about how all of this pushing we are doing to make our kids smarter is actually harming them in the long run. Go to your library and see if you can find that magazine and read the article. Good Luck, to you and your son, and remember, let him be a kid, he'll grow up soon enough anyway!

Answer 4

He's 3 , and he should learn other things before he can get the concept of writing. Can he draw shapes? Can he name colors and numbers? Can he count and say the alphabet.. there are MANY things that HAVE to come before writing will ever be able to happen.

Writing is a difficult skill, and most 3 year olds can't do it. They just don't have the mental capabilities to do something as complex as writing, and I know that you don't think it's complex, but it is. Where saying something takes one part of the brain to do, writing takes 3..

Let him out of writing, and encourage these rudimentary skills by giving him some crayons and paper and just letting him color a picture..

Also, you cannot spank a child into writing. He should NEVER be punished for not wanting to sit there and be bored by something that he probably can't even do yet, by something that his brain can't even get around the concept of yet.

How would you feel if you went to medical school, and on your first day they told you to perform a life saving surgery? What if because you said you couldn't do it, they punished you?

That's what it is with your son. Writing is hard.. let him ease into it. Besides, that's what they teach in kindergarten

Answer 5

Go to Smiths or a good book shop and look at the wide range of books they do to teach your kids to read and write. Pick a series of books that YOU like the look of and you think you can work with - then use those. I helped my son to read and write before he went to school and once he was at school we always sat down in the evenings for 10 minutes or less and looked through the books I had bought to teach him and did a bit of "homework" - it was always enjoyable and never forced (that's very important). I am pleased to report that he loves reading (he is 11 now). He reads for half an hour every night at bedtime and its a struggle to take the book off him! He is top in his maths group and English. He has just started secondary school and I am really pleased I made the effort when he was younger - I am convinced it has helped him. There is also no trouble with homework either - if he has homework then its done straight away and there are no arguments. He accepts it as he has always done "homework". Hope this helps you and good luck.

Answer 6

Due to his age his fine-motor skills (moving the fingers in a co-ordinated manner) probably aren't very advanced so before writing you need to do some activities to develop these skills. Things like cutting out shapes, colouring, threading strands of wool through a coarse material (hessian is good) using a very blunt plastic needle. You could also try getting him to trace the shapes of the letters, but make sure they are over-sized to make it easier. As for reading, try picture/word association. E.g. get a picture of and animal, write the word under it and get him to spell and then say the word.

Answer 7

Children do not need to learn how to write until about 4 when they first write their name. After that 5 years old is adequate to learn writing.

Pushing your son to write now - when he is not interested or ready is creating problems for you.

It is more important at his age to Play. Play = learning for a 3 and a half year old.

Be a really good parent - not by forcing him to learn to write - but by providing stimulating and different toys and objects and environments for him to play with/in.

Spanking has been researched to be unhelpful. It creates your child to not trust you and teaches him to hit others when they do the wrong thing. If you spank your child and then your child later hits another child - will you be cross at your child even though you taught him this?

Please dont ever spank. Teach your child instead.

Answer 8

Its good to teach soon but don't push him make it fun .......he will learn all this in school kids do not start really learning to read till kindergarten that is very short stories.....and don't spank him..kids get over loaded as we do...get a PC learning game for him.....matching, ABC's, how to write letters, learn shapes,and colors... make it fun not brain surgery....I did this with my girl she is in 1st grade makes 100 on spelling & reading test, matching, reading.....her teacher told me she will be an A student that I have been doing something right....take your time don't over load take breaks have a snack then do more later. he is 31/2

Answer 9

Initiate with colorful building block with alphabet written on all blocks -
With different sets of flashy colors. Let him play with them for just fun first. Then let him scribble on walls and paper or on wallpaper or big scribbling boards. Put him amidst of other children writing and he will automatically start writing and becomes great man. I did it with my nephew and he is a success story now. All the best.

Answer 10

From the sounds of things, you are pushing this child a bit beyond his ability just yet, and will make him detest schooling if you keep on. Children of this age have limited fine motor skills, needed to coordinate things like writing.
At his age, he will learn what he needs to master through play much better than through a formal school curriculum. If you want to encourage development of the motor skills, get large fat crayons and colored pencils. Let him color, draw- whatever he likes, however he likes. If you really must, you can get pre-writing exercise booklets to help- but I certainly wouldn't push the point.
All of the skills you are trying to get your son to master are determined by brain maturation- not a calendar, not by you, and not by him. He isn't interested because he can't do it yet. By forcing the issue, you make him frustrated and he feels stupid. He's not being stubborn, he's being normal.
I have homeschooled all of our six children. I start with basic preschool activities on a limited level when they are four. We do some simple prewriting activities, and begin letter recognition. I write the letter of the week- not day, mind you- for them to trace over. We make the letter again by gluing on rice, or beans- even macaroni or spaghetti. I also use computer programs designed for preschoolers, and let them play and learn at the pace they determine. At no point do we do any work for more than about 15 minutes or so, because their attention spans won't handle more.
It is possible to force them to memorize the alphabet, but it is all without meaning for them, and really counterproductive. Boys typically are not ready to read until they are at least 5, sometimes 6. No amount of work or threat on your part will change when his particular window for reading opens. You can begin simple phonics instruction, to connect a letter and sound, when they approach about 5 or so- but not younger. After about a year of phonics sound/letter instruction, they usually begin reading small words on their own.
The only thing you can do to help the process along, and the best thing you can do, is read to and with your child. He may learn to "read" his favorites from memory, but that is actually good. If they enjoy what they are doing, they will learn much faster.
I'm sorry if I sound discouraging, but what you are doing is frustrating not only you but your son. He would like very much to please you, but you must not ask more of him than he is able to do physically or mentally. If you relax, and let him learn through his play, he will do much better and you will both be happier. Get him the big crayons and pencils, blank paper, water colors, and leave him be with it. Display the artwork on the wall or refrigerator, and praise his efforts. Count things with him, up to about 20 is all he needs at this point- count crackers, birds, whatever. Sing songs together, play silly games with him.
If you must have workbooks, get the age appropriate ones, not any more advanced than that. Don't push it, and be prepared for days when he just doesn't want to do it. Find another activity. Children learn in all sorts of ways, just doing what they do naturally and from observing us. Play is the young child's work, and it's all the work they need. You will teach him far more by not trying than you will ever succeed the way you are doing now.
I'm sure you mean to do the best for your son, which is why you are so desperate to teach him and have him learn. That is good to see, and congratulations on being so eager and willing. But honestly, you don't have to be this worried and push him so hard. He will learn to do all the things you want him to learn, when the time is right for him. Your job is to watch and wait, and when the time arrives, you put it out there for him. Young children, by their nature, are learning machines- and if it's there when he's ready, I promise you he will quite naturally and easily master it.

Answer 11

He will do it when he is ready. He will get on better in kindergarten when he sees other kids doing it. Everything is play right now.

Ease off a bit. Punishing him for this is not a good idea. He will grow up associating study with pain, and become a politician. Who wants that for their kid.