Dysgraphia toolkit

A practical toolkit for supporting students with handwriting difficulties at key stage 3 and key stage 4. Dysgraphia toolkit is intended to help young people develop the fine motor skills they may be lacking and offers a full dysgraphia intervention programme targeting specific areas of need.

What’s included?

This 71-page toolkit includes:

• information about neurodiversity, the strengths of neurodivergent people and some of the challenges they face
• information about dysgraphia and the difficulties in obtaining a dysgraphia diagnosis
• a CPD PowerPoint for staff training, parents’ evenings and senior leadership meetings
• handwriting assessment tools for you to monitor and record students’ specific difficulties
• display resources on writing posture and pen grip
• general classroom strategies, including whole-class warm-ups
• activity ideas and games for practising visual motor skills and fine motor skills
• letter tracing worksheets and cursive writing patterns worksheets

How does it support dysgraphic students?

Dysgraphia toolkit offers time-effective and straightforward ways of diagnosing and supporting dysgraphia in teens. It suggests warm-ups and motor skill activities that are helpful not just for teaching students with dysgraphia but for teaching all young people, and it presents simple ways of supporting dysgraphia in the classroom, without the need for special equipment – although examples of assistive technology are suggested where appropriate.

The intervention programme that it proposes does not need to be followed systematically and can be dipped into by subject teachers and teaching assistants in the mainstream classroom.

The toolkit presents arguments for and against print and joined/cursive writing and recommends that at secondary school students should not be required to adopt one or the other as long as their handwriting is legible and pain-free. It outlines the additional challenges faced by left-handed students and suggests specific support strategies.

Finally, it includes editable handwriting worksheets that can be adapted for any age group and printable handwriting practice sheets for older students.

About the writer

Dysgraphia toolkit was written by Abigail Hawkins, who runs SENDCO Solutions, an SEN consultancy, and SENsible SENCO CIC, a not-for-profit networking support group. She has been a SENDCo for over 25 years and has taught a multitude of subjects across all phases, from two-year-olds to adults. Abigail works with software companies developing supportive software for SEN and safeguarding purposes, has developed and delivers a teaching assistant apprenticeship programme. She has authored several books on SEN and exclusions, and runs a support network for over 10,000 SENDCos.

Abigail has a no-nonsense, practical approach to SEN issues faced by schools, believing that many high-incidence needs can be met in the classroom with basic teaching tweaks.