pencil grips

you don’t have to order over the net to find pencil grips - if you have a school supply store near you or a teacher supply store, they sell them. They are so cheap that they would be expensive to buy online. They work great!

Ashley,

I was told by my sons OT that the latest research was not in favor of pencil grips. I don’t know why. I haven’t looked into it specifically myself. She is someone who seems up on all the latest research in her field.

Linda

If anyone is looking for pencil grips or any other OT type of supplies a great site is www.pocketfulloftherapy.com.

It has alot of sensory integration, fine motor, bilateral coordination etc. supplies.
I have the catalog and it is great because it organizes the information by area of deficit. Makes it easy to decide what works for specific problems.

The pencil grip question made me remember that I had this.

Does anyone know of any forums where OTs discuss issues? I have questions that they would be the best to ask but I don’t know where they congregate.

My daughter used one and she still doesn’t hold a pencil correctly. She is now 11 and types. She didn’t like it and so didn’t do it all the time so that may be why.

Beeth

My son refused (?) to hold a pencil correctly, even with repeated encouragement from his teachers and my husband and I through the end of first grade. His second grade teacher put a pencil grip on his pencils, and he holds them correctly now, with or without the grip, unless he feels like he is under great stress. Worked like a charm, and worth a try!

Lil

An OT may have not favored it because it may have limited the development of the skill (fine motor). However, if you need something that will “lighten the load” of writing - use one. Many kids won’t use them because they are obvious on the pencil and so they appear different from their peers. It does help the kids write, which is my main concern.

and it is comphrensive. thnks

I note that one person spoke against these.
Personally, I HATE the things.
The soft rubber they are made of feels icky and gets sticky and unpleasant; if they have a texture it is even more icky (Ok, I do have some personal sensory issues — but then so do a lot of people here).
The pencil grip makes the pencil heavier, and that adds more stress to my hand, not less.
Then they try to force my hand into the “correct” grip — and I’ve never been able to use that grip in my life. By the way, my normal writing is quite decent copperplate (thank you Mrs. Ross from Grade 3, wherever you are) and I can do several forms of calligraphy and one of my hobbies is miniature watercolours — and I don’t hold any pencils or pens in a “correct” grip, but rather between my first and second fingers — it’s more stable for me. The “correct” grip puts too much strain through my joints and causes pain.
My daughter has a similar pattern; she took a long long time for her hands to grow — in Grade 10 bought he shoes in the men’s department, clothes in the women’s. and gloves in the children’s. She doesn’t have a “correct” grip either, but finally (junior in university) is getting compliments on her handwriting, and does beautiful calligraphy.
I also type at a very fast rate using six finger hunt-and-peck (see length of posts); just can’t use those little fingers that hard and fast and long without pain.

If you REALLY want to reduce the load on your poor kid and improve his reading and writing, throw out all those yellow pencils, period. They require simultaneous fine coordination/control to form tiny letters, with hard pressure — almost impossible to achieve.Most kids cheat in one way or another and lean on their pencils, with the result of writer’s cramp, refusal to write more than a sentence at a time, cramped and illegible writing, and so on. Get markers and actively encourage him to write large and loose; use whiteboards or invest five dollars in five hundred sheets of plain white paper. Then when he is more comfortable and not so forced, get a pen that requires no pressure at all. Mrs. Ross had an entire class of thirty-five kids in Grade 3 using dip pens and inkwells — as she said, if you make a mistake, you’ll know it (the Montessori idea of self-correcting materials). After Grade 3 we had to use fountain pens. And I write a nice copperplate … Good-quality rolling writers, *frequently* replaced, work OK too. But throw out the pencils and the cheap ballpoints.
A second advantage of throwing out the pencils — you can spend your time teaching writing, not erasing. As a teacher, I get extremely frustrated when my students work one step forward and two steps back, erasing for two minutes or more for every minute they spend writing. No wonder getting students to write is like pulling teeth. Cross out your errors and move on, and it’s amazing how much fluency picks up.