Starter quiz
- True or false? Warming up your hands before writing will help to improve your handwriting.
- True ✓
- False
- Cursive handwriting involves ...
- forming the letters separately by lifting your pencil.
- joining letters together by not lifting your pencil. ✓
- joining all of the letters in a sentence together with no finger spaces.
-
- How many tramlines are there usually?
- 3
- 5
- 4 ✓
-
Put the tramlines in the correct order, from the top to the bottom.- 1⇔ascender line
- 2⇔x-height line
- 3⇔baseline
- 4⇔descender line
- Which of these letters has a descender?
- a
- c
- f ✓
- g ✓
- y ✓
-
- Which of these letters has an ascender and a descender?
- y
- p
- f ✓
- g
-
Worksheet
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Presentation
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Lesson Details
Key learning points
- Cursive handwriting involves joining letters together.
- The letters all have a lead in starting at the baseline.
- The first join goes from the baseline to the x-height line.
- The pencil does not lift when forming the join.
- The letter w lead out "finishes with a small dip down" to aid joining.
Common misconception
Children will often want to take their pencil off to form the join.
Emphasise the flowing motion of cursive writing. The letters need to be joined together so the pencil needs to stay on the page.
Keywords
Join - connecting together
Lead in - the stroke or line that guides us into starting a letter
Lead out - the stroke or line that guides us to smoothly finish a letter
Baseline - the line that most letters sit on
X-height line - the line that x-height letters reach
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