Gross Motor Skills and Handwriting

Previously, we had shared on how sensory processing affecting a child's handwriting development. In this article, we are going to share on the importance of gross motor skills in a child's handwriting development.

Gross motor skills are skills that involve larger muscle groups that help our body to maintain good balancing skills and coordinate the movements to perform activities such as walking, sitting, jumping, climbing, crawling, etc. Children can benefit a lot by actively participating in gross motor activities.

How do gross motor skills help in handwriting skills?

As a child, their occupation is playing. One type of play is physical play. When participating actively in physical activities, children are not only learning and practicing how to move and coordinate their body, they also able to strengthen up their physical strength, stability and endurance.

The main muscles involve in gross motor skills are core muscles. Core muscles help us to move, support and stabilize our trunk. Strong and stable core muscles help children to maintain a proper sitting posture for a certain period during writing activities.

Core muscles

Children with lack of postural control not only affecting their sitting posture, but it is also affecting their attention span. They might need to change their positions frequently such as leaned over too far, head resting on hand or desk, using the arms to support the head and upper body or moving around due to difficulty to maintain an upright posture for a certain period. Having good core muscle strength and stability also helps children to better functioning and mobility of hand and fingers and also called as fine motor skills.

Here are some suggestions on gross motor activities that can help in handwriting development:

1. Kid's yoga

2. Crawling

3. Obstacle course

4. Wheelbarrow walk

5. Monkey bar

Let your child actively involve in physical activities. They will get a lot of benefits from it!