Mark making

Mark making is the first step towards writing.  For young children, learning to control any mark making tool, such as a pencil, pen or paintbrush, is hard and requires many skills.  

They need to develop whole body muscles (gross motor), to control their upper body and shoulders as well as develop the desire to sit still and concentrate. 

Many of these initial skills can be supported by play through being active and being outside.  Hand-eye coordination is also key for writing as is the need for children to build up the control in their hands and fingers (fine motor skills).

The marks children begin to make slowly start to have more meaning for them and at first may seem like random swirls but soon you may see the emergence of circles, lines and dots. They will then start to bring this into their role play in copying marks they see and create their own 'pretend' writing.  

Once children begin school, we will start to teach them how to form their letters and we will give you guidance on how they form the cursive letters.  In the meantime, we need to encourage them to play at writing.  We find that children who are corrected too often, or asked to write things out ‘properly’ may lose interest.  On the other hand, children who enjoy the process of mark making and ‘writing’ notes that are praised and valued will naturally want to do it more often, and so get better at it.  

Ideas to encourage mark making

Some children love to use pens, crayons, pencils or even felt-tipped pens to colour and draw.  Not every child is so keen on activities like this so you may have to be inventive.  You can use a range of different materials around the house such as: 

• Foil, cling film, greaseproof paper
• Feathers, leaves, sticks - anything from outside!
• Felt 
• Pipe cleaners
• Cotton Wool
• String 
• Pens, Pencils, Crayons
• Spatulas, Spoons, Forks, Whisks
• Carrots, cucumber, potatoes

You can dip these in paints, cornflour and water, sand, flour, or even shaving foam.

Here are a few ideas that we have used in our homes and school...

Draw patterns for them to copy

Use chalks to write names or make patterns

Role play 

These are chalk pens that can write on glass

Nail varnish can be quite toxic but paints do the job just as well

     
                                      

You can freeze poster paints and use your hands to melt them.  It can get messy!  
Drive cars through paint

Number rhymes

We don't expect children to be writing numbers when they start school.  It is helpful if they can count to ten.  Nursery rhymes are a brilliant way to embed these and the BBC has a brilliant website of counting rhymes to support children. 

BBC nursery rhymes

We say these little ditty's to children when they start to form the numbers and it can be helpful to say the rhymes to help them recognise their numerals to 9.

0 - Around and round and round we go, when we get home we have a zero.

1 - Start at the top and down we run, that's the way to make a one.

2 - Around and back along a railway track - two, two, two

3 - Around the tree and around the tree, that's the way to make a three.

4 - Down and over, down some more, that's the way we make a four.  

5 - Down and around, then a flag on high, that's the way to make a five.
(Although I prefer - Down and around with a big fat tum, number five has got his hat on)

6 - Down we go and make a loop, number six makes a hoop.

7 - Across the sky and down from heaven, that's the way we make a seven.

8 - Make an 's' and do not wait! when it's joined up you have an eight.

9 - Make a loop and then a line, that's the way to make a nine.

Yikes... they can't write their name!

We absolutely do not expect them to be able to write their name before they start school.  You will of course know some children who can write their full name beautifully but remember there will be other children who refuse to even hold a pencil.  

Recognising their name will of course be extremely helpful for their independence.  If they do not recognise their name at all, don't panic but now is the time to give them a helping hand.  Obviously if your child has special educational needs, we will fully support them and it may be that they have other much more important goals that they will be working towards.  

Name recognition activities

- focus on the sound that their name begins with first, eg.  Ssss for Sam, and make the sound rather than saying the letter name.  

-label everything that belongs to your child and make an effort to draw their attention to it.  

-post-it game.  Write the letters of their name on post-it notes and hide them around the room.  Can they find the letters?  When they have them - get them to lay them in order.  You could start with their name written on paper for them to lay the post-it's on top of.  Hopefully once they get used to it they can order them independently.  A similar activity could be to cut it up as a puzzle that they fit back together.

Name writing activities

Once they can recognise their name, you can start practising how to writing it.  As we already said, this is not essential and even if they can write the first letter, that is a really big help as they can label their work.

We have emailed you their name in cursive lettering so that you can see how we form the letters once their start learning to write in school.  You might well be wondering why we use cursive.  The reason being is that once children work their way through school, they get to the end of year two and year three and here the expectation is that they write in joined handwriting.  Some schools start writing in non-cursive lettering but then the children have to re-learn how to form the letters at the end of year two.  We feel that if they learn how to form the letters in this way from the very start, it makes life easier for them in the long run.  Once we start learning sounds - we will send you clips on how to form the letters so that you can swat up and also practise these at home.  You will be amazed at the end of the year just how neat their handwriting looks.  

Here is an alphabet so you can see how the letters should look - Cursive Alphabet

Here are a few  ideas for name writing...  

- rainbow letters:  write their name on a large piece of paper and get them to write over the letters with lots of different coloured pens or crayons.

-write it on the ground in chalk and get them to practise painting over it with water and a paintbrush.

- use masking tape to write it on the floor and get your child to use their little cars to drive over it.

- use a stick and sand to practise writing it out in the sandpit or in a tray of flour.  

Scissors and Pencils

Using pencils and scissors can be really tricky for little hands and it requires practise.  In school we will do lots of activities to strengthen gross and fine motor skills but there are lots of fun things you can do at home to help too.  

Cutting skills

We will teach your children how to hold a pair of scissors and handle them safely but there is no harm in giving them a head start.  Cutting accurately is hard and children can become very frustrated if they struggle.  Make sure you use child friendly scissors and not great big cutting shears. If your child is left handed, do invest in left handed scissors.  Start with a smiley face on their thumb for them to hold upright as they cut.  Try to start with cutting soft things that don't require strength, such as spaghetti.  

Other nice cutting ideas include: 

-make play dough sausages/worms for them to cut in half.

-grow cress in an egg shell to make a little cress person and give them a haircut.

-head out into the garden and cut grass along the boarders or cutting herbs for the kitchen

-use other soft materials like jelly as part of some messy play.  

-draw wiggly lines on A4 paper for them to follow

Fine Motor skills

These are such important skills that enable children to do little fiddly independent tasks, such as their own zips and using cutlery, and are the starting point for their writing skills.  There is a wealth of ideas on Pinterest but here are a few simple things you can do at home to help:

-make pasta necklaces

-thread cheerios onto uncooked spaghetti

-threading beads

-playing with play dough

-peel off stickers when playing with a sticker book

-use the kitchen tongs or a pair of tweezers to pick up objects

-give them all sorts of pencils and crayons to practise drawing on paper

Independence, independence, independence....

One of the very best ways that you can prepare your little ones for starting school is to encourage them to have a go at doing things by themselves.  In a class of 25 children, the teacher can't always be on hand to help them in the same way that you are able to at home.  That said, please don't worry - we help them as much as we can but it's much better when they have a go themselves and we can just support.

Getting dressed

Some children are super quick and have mastered zips and turning clothes inside out while others are soooo unbelievably slow that you get into the habit of just doing it for them to get out the house before midday!  If you have a plodder - please invest the time over the summer.  Give them challenges of turning a jumper or pair of trousers the right way round if they are inside out; this is usually where they come a cropper! Can they pull up a zip?  It is incredibly hard on some coats to start a zip.  Do consider this when you are buying them their new school winter coat as you may see them running around the playground with it flapping in the wind as they have darted out the door to play instead of waiting for our help.  The good news, for everyone concerned, is that for PE days you can send your child to school in their PE kit.  Once they have started school, we will let you know which is your PE day.  By the summer term, we have swimming, this is when we really need them to be confident.

Take responsibility for their own belongings...

Once they enter the classroom, it is their responsibility to look after their belongings.  It is so tempting to carry their rucksack, their coat and water bottle.  You give it to them at the door and in they go.  Remember to give them to responsibility of carrying these items to school.  Ensure that you talk to them about what their coat looks like and how they distinguish it as theirs.  If they don't recognise their name yet, put inside a little sticker or a keyring - think of some way that they know this is their coat.  It could be quite stressful if another child has the same coat as them and some of the special little things they had hidden in the pocket have disappeared.  

Rucksack

We had a quandary as to whether children should bring rucksacks or book bags and have decided that rucksacks are the best solution.  If you can find one with an external bottle holder/side pocket - this might help the spillage problem.  You can keep their coats, bottles, snacks and books in a rucksack and they can put these on their pegs.  Hopefully they will recognise their pegs and also their rucksack but it may be worth putting on a keyring and clearly labelling it for them.  You never know - someone else might have the same bag.  They do get in a pickle if they think someone else has stolen their belongings!  

Cutlery

All of the EYFS team of teachers and teaching assistants, as well as lunchbreak supervisors, are with the children in the first fifteen minutes of lunch to support them as much as they can.  We appreciate that the dinner hall can be a daunting place.  If they don't know how to cut up their food and you do it for them everyday, now is the time to start practising.  You can use a paper plate and plastic cutlery as part of a role play game.  It is a really important skill to teach children how to hold their knife and fork properly to cut up food.  Obviously there are some things that are tricky to cut and we will of course help them but, especially in the current times of hygiene being of upmost importance, we feel so sorry for those children who resort to just eating with their hands.  

Bottom wiping

Many children carry on through pre-school being very good with going for a wee independently but when it comes to poo's, they don't always wipe themselves quite so well and will often ask an adult for help.  In school, this is not something that we are able to help them with.  Obviously if your child has an accident or if they are struggling with particular needs and are yet to be potty trained, we support them with this issue.  On a day to day basis, they nip off to the toilet by themselves.  Particularly at present, they need to be accessing the toilet alone as part of our social distancing rules.  Over the summer, please ensure that they are practising this skill and that they are confident to look after themselves in this regard.

Our top tip for accidents - which do frequently happen once they start school as it is a daunting new environment - is to bring spare pants and tights or trousers and a plastic bag and keep it in their book bag.  If they are still not great at wiping, maybe slip in a little pouch of flushable wipes that they can use if they need to.