Supporting Your Child’s Pre-Writing Skills

Carly S
23 hours ago
3 min read

Writing is a complex skill for young children. It requires:

Strong hand and finger muscles
Good hand-eye coordination
Fine motor control
The ability to use a pincer grip (thumb and forefinger)
Control over arm and shoulder movements

By developing these skills early, children are better prepared to hold a pencil comfortably, control their movements, and enjoy mark-making and early writing.

These pre-writing skills are the building blocks that help children the building blocks that help children gain the strength, control, and coordination needed for writing later on. And these skills don’t come from sitting down with a pencil and paper. Instead, they develop naturally through play, exploration, and everyday activities.

Here’s how we encourage these prewriting skills at Hassocks Day Nursery, and how you can further support your child’s development at home in fun and engaging ways.

Building Hand Strength

Strong hand muscles are essential for holding and controlling a pencil. There are so many fun ways we work with your children to help build these muscles:

Playdough fun – playdough is a constant resource here as squeezing, rolling, pinching, and shaping playdough helps strengthen all the tiny muscles in their little hands
Sponge squeezing – similarly to playdough, squeezing sponge full of water also helps strengthen their hand muscles. Sponges are always included in our water play where we encourage the children to squeeze out the water
Using spray bottles – learning and practicing how to use spray bottles is great hand strength but also for hand-eye coordination and problem solving skills

Developing Fine Motor Skills

Our fine motor skills involve small, precise movements of the hands and fingers. The different activities we do to help build these skills include:

Threading and lacing – threading with beads, pasta, or laces encourage careful hand movements
Building with small blocks – Lego or similar toys help develop control and coordination
Stickers and peeling – Peeling and placing stickers is great for finger control
Using tweezers or tongs – Picking up small objects like pom-poms or pasta

Encouraging a Pincer Grip

The pincer grip (using the thumb and index finger together) is key for holding a pencil correctly, but there are so many activities we do to help develop this skill, before a pen is used, including:

Picking up small items – Encourage the children to pick up small food items e.g. peas, sweetcorn, cereal or small toys using their finger and thumb
Posting games – Posting coins into a money box or cards into a slot
Pegging games – Using clothes pegs on a line or box

Improving Hand-Eye Coordination

Hand-eye coordination helps children control their hand movements based on what they see. There are so many ways we help children develop this including:

Ball games – Rolling, throwing, and catching balls
Puzzles – Simple jigsaws help children match shapes and spaces
Drawing and painting – Even simple scribbling helps connect movement with visual outcomes
Pouring and scooping – Using cups, jugs, and spoons in water or sand play

Encouraging Early Mark-Making

Before writing letters, children need to explore making marks in different ways. Every day our children have access to different mark making activities including:

Drawing with crayons, chalk, or paint
Mark-making in sand, flour, or shaving foam
Using sticks to draw in mud or sand outdoors
Large-scale drawing – Using big paper to encourage whole-arm movements

These activities help children develop control and confidence without the pressure of “writing correctly.”

Supporting Shoulder and Arm Strength

Strong shoulders and arms help children control their hands more effectively. Again there are a number of different activities that we do with the children to help this development:

Painting on vertical surfaces (like easels or chalkboards)
Wall drawing with chalk or water brushes
Pushing and pulling toys
Crawling through tunnels or obstacle courses

With all these activities, please remember that every child develops at their own pace. The most important thing is to keep activities fun, relaxed, and pressure-free.

At nursery, we focus on building these skills through play-based learning experiences that support each child’s individual development. By working together, we can help children build the confidence and abilities they need to become happy, capable writers in the future.