Left-handed child in a right-handed family. Left-handed child. Psychological characteristics - Psychologist Development of left-handed children

Have you ever wondered why in the subway the slots for tokens and cards are always on the right side of the turnstile? A lot of things are “sharpened” for right-handed people - from scissors to computer mice, from copybooks in notebooks to machine tools in factories. Some companies, however, produce special products for left-handed people (mainly stationery, work tools and household appliances). But there are still few such exceptions. The older our beloved left-handed child gets, the more things he has to adapt to in a right-handed world. In kindergarten, the issue is not so acute. But problems arise at school - both those foreseen by the parents and those completely unexpected for them. After all, the developmental features of left-handed children are not always taken into account. What are they?

There are things that are initially more difficult for left-handed people than their right-handed peers.

* Many left-handed children develop phonemic awareness (the ability to distinguish different sounds) and the ability to articulate more slowly. Therefore, they can speak later than their peers, but in rather long and complex phrases. Relatives can only be amazed at their “adult” speech. As one mother said, her daughter was silent almost until she was two years old. An unpleasant diagnosis “loomed” on the horizon – “delayed speech development”. And suddenly, going out into the street in the morning, the girl made a hilariously disgusted face and said: “Ugh, how wet it is here!” After this, the parents only had the opposite problems - sometimes it was impossible to calm down the “talking” child.

* Lefties have complex relationships with space and time. Even at primary school age, he may sometimes doubt which hand is his right and which his left. Left-handed children often experience disturbances or insufficiency in the development of spatial perception at the visual level, visual memory, and motor coordination. For example, a left-handed child has great difficulty remembering directions in unfamiliar places.

* Sometimes it is difficult for a left-handed child to determine the time using a clock with arrows. He confuses the hour and minute hands, perceives them as a mirror image or displaced.

* Sometimes such children are delayed in the development of such an important skill as the formation of rows of words, signs, images, objects. It is difficult for them to remember the relative position of something in space, it is difficult for them to assemble a mosaic or lay out a pattern in a certain direction. It would seem that such features can prevent a left-handed child from navigating and acting successfully in the world around him. But nature is fair in its own way. And she more than compensates for all these difficulties! After all, it has long been proven that left-handed people are amazing people. Every time a left-handed person invents, or even in an unimaginable (for those around him) way, highlights his own way of building and taking over the world of right-handed people... All left-handed children, without exception, are able to colossally, almost magically control the course of their mental activity. Often they achieve the desired results in a seemingly “indirect” way, sometimes finding absolutely unthinkable accessible and inaccessible means. A little four-year-old left-handed child easily retells entire pages from the book he has “read”, and then it turns out that not a single letter is known to him. So who taught him this way of reading? Who taught a six-year-old child to solve numerical problems of considerable difficulty, despite the fact that he changed and altered the spelling of numbers that were similar to each other? Did you subtract the top one from the bottom row, and denote the word “task” itself as “chdz”, that is, using the mirror method, skipping all the vowels? Every intelligent adult has understood for many centuries that time is a clock hanging on the wall. But to the eternal child, like all geniuses, A. Einstein suddenly saw this as an absolutely incorrect formulation of the question. We all know the result. Although, most likely, he sometimes used the watch for its intended purpose.

Yes, it is more difficult for a left-handed person to build verbal sequences and remember unrelated things and concepts than for a right-handed peer. But if he can somehow “mark” them in his mind, find logical connections and associations, then he remembers them easily and in large quantities. And what a non-standard view of the world a left-hander has, what an ability to find logical and figurative connections, what a desire for something new and original... According to recent studies, left-handed university graduates earn 13-21% more than their right-handed colleagues. In addition, as researchers suggest, there are a lot of left-handed people among various types of arts. For example, among artists, musicians, and also some categories of athletes. In certain sports, left-handers are literally “worth their weight in gold.” For example, in tennis, fencing, boxing, and most martial arts, they are considered the most dangerous and “unpredictable” opponents. No wonder 40% of world boxing champions are left-handed.

“Left-handed” at school and at home.

In elementary school, left-handed children often encounter difficulties. Don't be scared! This applies not only to your child, but to most lefties in general. Usually, by the fourth grade, the differences are smoothed out, and the left-handed child normally “merges” into the educational process. But he needs help with this.

When raising and training a left-handed person, you must always remember about his increased emotionality and vulnerability. The left-handed child is extremely sensitive to external evaluation. He needs acceptance, approval, respect, and sympathy even more than an ordinary child. Don’t be lazy to praise him for a job well done! The task of parents is to develop in him optimism, self-confidence, and an active attitude towards life. Mental processes take a lot of energy from left-handers. The consequence is rapid fatigue and exhaustion of the nervous system. Therefore, carefully ensure that the student maintains a constant daily routine and does not overwork.

Left-handers are slower than their right-handed peers to develop simple skills that allow us to perform some familiar actions automatically, without thinking. It is more difficult to force a left-handed child to do something according to the rules, according to an established pattern. For example, brushing your teeth at night, changing clothes after coming from the street, etc. How to proceed here?

There is no need to be angry and nervous. But you shouldn’t expect that the child himself will learn (just by looking at you) to sew with a needle, use scissors, tie shoelaces, make the bed, draw, write letters. It is difficult for a left-handed person to learn any skills “closely.” He cannot, looking at you, understand how this is done. He needs his movements, the relative position of his hands, fingers, and head to be “remembered” by his entire body. It is better to take his hands in yours and perform the desired action with him several times. If you can’t remember a letter or number, don’t just try to copy it by looking at the sample, but trace it several times using a stencil or a carbon copy. And then he will admire the neat, beautiful drawing.

Parent, get ready!

School difficulties most often relate to learning to write and count. The fact is that the basis for primary skills here is visual perception. And, as we remember, it “limps” in left-handed people.

1. “Which direction is the ponytail?” The child confuses letters and numbers that are similar in spelling (for example, “d” and “b”: one has a “tail” on top, and the other on the bottom), adds extra elements or, conversely, does not complete elements of letters and numbers. “Mirror” spelling of letters, numbers and graphic elements occurs in 85% of left-handed first-graders. Don't worry, though: most right-handed children between the ages of three and seven also sometimes write some letters in reverse. This is a normal stage of mastering writing. “Normally,” according to the observations of psychologists, such errors completely disappear after 10 years.

How to help. Left-handed people think in emotions and solid images. To remember something, he needs a figurative “binding”, an association. A classic example: “d” has a tail down, like a woodpecker, and “b” has a tail up, like a squirrel.”

2. Letter order. Sometimes (especially in a hurry) a left-handed person may swap or skip letters in a word. From a “cow”, at best, he gets a “carpet”... Some left-handers have very persistent dysgraphic errors. Children get confused in the order of letters and forget to leave gaps between words. This is all due to the same undeveloped ability to form rows, distinguish sounds and their sequence.

How to help. Often lay out patterns of various elements or mosaics with your preschooler. Place the elements strictly from left to right. First, fold the top row, and then, as it were, “move” to the line below. Do “visual dictations” with your child. To do this, you can use two identical sets of geometric shapes - squares, triangles, diamonds and circles, cut out of multi-colored cardboard. A row is laid out from one set. The child examines it and lists it out loud several times from left to right, remembering the sequence: “Blue square, red triangle, yellow circle,” etc. The pattern is closed, and the child reproduces it from memory, laying out figures from the second set. Then you should check the correctness of execution and “reward” a small prize for a good result. Such training begins with very short rows of 3-4 figures, and then their length increases. It would be useful to invite a left-handed child to compose a story based on a series of plot pictures, again, observing the direction from left to right. You can use children's comics for this if the pictures are arranged in that order. Early learning to read gives good results. If a child reads a lot, he simply visually remembers the “appearance” of words.

3. This terrible handwriting. Are large, stretched out, uneven letters leaning in different directions? Writes slowly and ugly? But there’s nothing you can do about it – it’s not due to inattention or lack of effort. A left-handed person sometimes puts more effort into penmanship than his right-handed peer, and the result is worse. For some left-handers, their handwriting improves by the time they reach high school, and for some, it remains that way for the rest of their lives.

How to help. It’s worth talking to the teacher and explaining that the cause of problems with penmanship is the child’s left-handedness, and not his inattention and laziness. It is necessary to relieve psychological pressure at school so that your child does not feel “behind” or “worse” than other students because of poor handwriting. Indeed, in the era of computerization, the skills of speed typing and searching for the necessary information on the Internet become much more important.

Note to the teacher.

When a left-handed child works at a table, the light source should be on the right side. When seating children in the classroom, it is better for the teacher to seat the left-handed person so that the board is to his right. The position at the desk is standard, but the left shoulder, not the right, should protrude slightly forward. The notebook or sheet of paper should be laid so that the upper right corner is tilted to the right, and the upper left corner is located opposite the chest. If a left-handed person sits at a desk with a right-handed child, it is better to sit him on the left, and the right-handed child on the right, so that they do not interfere with each other by colliding with their elbows.

"Left-handers use their left hand for almost all needs: from cooking to any delicate work. In this case, the hand with which they write is not an indicator. I tell you this as a left-hander. And this article is especially for left-handers and their parents.

To explain everything about left-handers, many books have been written that reveal some secrets (one of them is the book of the French researcher Pierre-Michel Bertrand “Mirror People. The History of Left-Handers”), but many people still do not understand what it means to be left-handed, whether it is necessary they understand this and why people who use their left hand as their dominant hand remain practically helpless in a right-handed world.

Why is the child left-handed? Or what are the reasons for the appearance of left-handed children

Such reasons may be:

Compensation. If the left hemisphere of the brain is damaged, the right hemisphere takes over its functions. You probably know that the hemispheres of our brain perform different tasks and they function crosswise. That is, the right is responsible for the left side, the left for the right.

Long-term injury to the right hand (more than 6 months).


Geschwind's theory that the fetal brain in the womb is exposed to high doses of testosterone and slows the growth of the left hemisphere.


Ultrasound and its effect on the fetal brain. This is just a theory and it continues to be studied to find a pattern.


Evolutionary theory of asymmetry V.A. Geodakyan, which states that left-handedness and right-handedness are not a pathology, but a phenomenon of adaptation in response to the creation of extreme conditions for the embryo.


The “left-handed gene”, which was discovered in 2008 by British scientists. According to this theory, the gene for right-handedness is inherited, and the gene for left-handedness is random.


And in 2012, a researcher from Canada found that left-handers are born in late marriages (after 30 years).

How can you accurately determine whether a child is left-handed or right-handed?

There are many tests for parents to determine their child's dominant hand. Psychologists say that the dominant hand can be determined even in newborns. The “fencer's pose” helps in the interpretation - this is the body position that a child occupies in the first month of life, lying on his back (for a left-handed child it looks like this: the right hand is pressed to the body, and the left is extended forward).

Psychologists have also noticed that the leading hand can be determined by the direction in which the child turns his head in the first days of life.

For older children, there are other diagnostic methods. But at the same time, you must sit opposite the child and place all the things that you will offer him for testing strictly in the center. And don't rush your child.

Invite him to comb his hair and place the comb in front of him. Pay attention to which hand he reaches for the object. Observe in which hand the child holds writing instruments, with which hand he performs tasks aimed at using fine motor skills (making a chain of paper clips, cutting with scissors, unscrewing and tightening caps, etc.). If here everything is quite vague, then the task can be complicated with the help of a small hint - pour beads or peas into a glass and invite him to take them out one by one with a spoon. In this case, the child will definitely use his dominant hand.

As a left-handed person with great experience, I will tell you that personally, when I take a fork in my right hand, I would rather stab the person sitting on my right than be able to stab what’s on my plate.

There are many tests for determining “left-/right-handedness” and they can be found on the Internet with all the explanations.

For you to understand what’s going on, you need to know the psychological characteristics of left-handed children and understand the peculiarities of their development, and not sound the alarm, sound the alarm and tell the child that he is wrong.

As stated earlier in the article: the right hemisphere of our brain is responsible for the left side, the left for the right. And, in fact, the right hemisphere itself is responsible for imaginative thinking and visual perception, while the left hemisphere is responsible for speech, writing, analytical and logical thinking. Body movement is also cross-coordinated.

Doctor of Science, Vigen Geodakyan, noted that the left hemisphere, which serves for semantic perception and logical/abstract thinking, self-awareness and positive emotions, when switched off, leads to depression. While the right, responsible for intuition, situational thinking, spatial-visual functions and negative emotions, in the same situation led to euphoria. Conducting experiments, turning off one hemisphere and then the other, they noted that identical objects were perceived differently. And when they conducted group studies, right-handers behaved as more optimists than left-handers.

So from all of the above, it turns out that right-hemisphere, left-handed children are very emotional and creative people.

Practical psychology gives us the characteristics of a left-handed child:

Stubborn for a long time.


They often have perfect pitch and good musical abilities, but at the same time they can be “delayed” in the reproduction of individual sounds.


They often “slip” while learning writing, mathematics and reading.


They can be capricious, whiny, prone to anger and irritability. But even right-handed people often behave no better!


Even small left-handed people may complain of pain in the right hand, sleep disturbances, loss of appetite and fatigue.

Left-handed child at school and at home

And yet, left-handed people have a certain peculiarity. And this manifests itself when such a child comes to school (to understand: about 17% of the planet’s population is left-handed) and picks up a pen. All teachers unanimously trumpet that the child is holding the pen incorrectly. And it’s even worse when a left-handed person comes to school and already knows how to write. Then he is shown “how to hold a pen correctly”, not caring at all that his brain is not able to digest it (personally, I am a “defective left-hander”: my parents retaught me to write with my right hand, despite the fact that my mother is also left-handed ... retrained at one time by her father).

Often left-handed children at school become the object of ridicule from their peers and condemnation from teachers. They try to diligently ignore their left-handedness, providing them with right-handed conditions during classes. Is it good or bad? On the one hand it's good. The child does not break away from the group. On the other hand, this is undoubtedly a problem (in teaching, in particular). Because left-handers need certain conditions to solve difficulties with organizing their studies: a seat (light on the right, board on the right), no space restrictions on the left. You can position the notebook so that the upper left corner is located opposite the chest, and the right corner is tilted to the right.

What not to do?

Gone are the days of the Dark Middle Ages, when right-handed inquisitors considered left-handed women to be witches and burned them at the stake; the time of the conservative Soviet Union has passed, when they argued that left-handed people are a disgrace to the nation, a trend of the West, etc.

Do not try to retrain your child to be right-handed.

Do not oppose him to other children and do not raise the bar for your child, citing his “specialness.”

Remember how fragile the psychology of left-handed children is (at least until the formation of the psyche is complete). In addition, many famous and talented people were left-handed.

Modern parents often come for consultations with psychologists and ask for advice and recommendations on what is the best thing to do and whether it is worth retraining the child or not? After all, this phenomenon has its pros and cons.

If your boy or girl was born left-handed, then your main task is to intelligently raise your child, taking into account the peculiarities of learning, and not to wean him from using what he came into this world with. Knowing the characteristics of such a person and his main features, one can find out the specifics of training and what conditions need to be provided.

Such children should engage in activities that promote the development of motor skills of both hands (modeling, embroidery, knitting, weaving macramé, etc.) and activities that contribute to the training of both the right and left hemispheres.

Great people are left-handed

In music: Niccolo Paganini, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Frederic Chopin and others.

Writers/philosophers: Friedrich Nietzsche, Lewis Carroll, Leo Tolstoy, Herbert Wells and others.

Artists: Raphael, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Albrecht Durer, etc.

Scientists: Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, Nikola Tesla, Ivan Pavlov.

Politicians/military: Guy Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Joan of Arc, Mahatma Gandhi and others.

Judging by such an impressive list, everything is not so bad for left-handers... Do we need to change anything? "

left-handed child,

If you have any suspicions that your baby is left-handed, first you need to figure out whether this is really the case. Until the age of 4, children are able to use both hands equally. It is enough to observe an older child during the day and then answer some questions. For example, with which hand does the baby open doors, pet a dog, take an apple, throw snowballs, hold a lollipop by a stick, scratch the top of his head... At the same time, when offering a child candy, an apple or a pencil, it is better to put this item on the table rather than give it to him. some specific hand. Remember the results and evaluate them at the end of the day. If out of ten tasks at least seven were completed with the left hand, most likely your child is left-handed.

In order to finally make sure that the child is left-handed, you can use special tests:

• "Napoleon's Pose" With the arms crossed on the chest of a left-handed person, the left hand is on the right forearm.
• "Interlocking fingers." Invite your child to fold his hands and interlace his fingers. The baby is left-handed if the thumb of the left hand rests on top.
• "Gesticulation." Typically, a person (whether a child or an adult) gestures with their dominant hand.
• "Simultaneous work with both hands." This test is revealing and simple. The baby should be given a pencil in each hand. Then ask them to draw two squares. A drawing made with the dominant hand will be more perfect than the other. At the same time, the movements performed by the dominant hand are slower, but more precise. The lines drawn with the leading hand are smoother and the angles are more precise. If the child is blindfolded (or asked to close their eyes) before completing the task, the results will be even more obvious. A child who has learned to write can be asked to write his name with both hands. Usually a left-handed person puts his hands in the middle of a sheet of paper and begins to write with his right - from left to right, and with his left - in a mirror.
• "Cutting along the contour." Give the baby scissors and offer to cut something out of paper. The child will complete this task with his dominant hand.

The main causes of left-handedness in children

All living things are characterized by asymmetry, and the paired organs of the human body are no exception to this. One of the organs, as a rule, takes precedence. The human brain consists of two hemispheres - right and left, each of which has its own function.

The left hemisphere processes information sequentially, sorting through possible options in a logical manner. As a result, a person thinks concretely, understands the meaning of speech, masters reading and writing, is able to perform mathematical calculations, classify and analyze objects in the surrounding world. But processing information through the perception of a holistic image, abstract thinking, orientation in space, intuition, a sense of rhythm and music is the task of the right hemisphere.

Which hemisphere of the brain is dominant determines which hand will be the dominant one. Moreover, this connection is carried out “the other way around”. With a more active left hemisphere of the brain, a person becomes right-handed. If the right hemisphere has primacy, then you are left-handed.

To understand why exactly your child got this feature, it’s worth finding out if there are left-handed people in your family. Having relatives with a dominant left hand significantly increases the chance for a child to be left-handed. Well, to parents, one of whom prefers the left hand to the right, left-handed babies are born 12 times more often. There is another reason - imitation. When there is a left-handed person among those around, the baby can adopt this feature without being left-handed by nature.

Left-handedness is not a bad habit or a quirk, but a consequence of the structure of the brain, an individual characteristic of the child. And retraining him to use his right hand is as fruitless as forcing him to change his eye color.

How to develop a left-handed child

The differences between left-handers and right-handers do not end with the fact that one child uses his left hand more actively, while the other uses his right. Everything is much more complicated, because a left-handed child processes information coming from the outside world in a different way and reacts to it in a completely different way.

Therefore, there are some psychological characteristics of left-handed children. They often differ from their peers by a prolonged period of stubbornness and a heightened sense of justice. The little left-hander is spontaneous and trusting, impressionable and vulnerable. The failures of a cartoon character can bring him to tears, while a right-handed child will learn to sympathize with the grief of others at a more mature age.

Usually left-handed children are endowed with talents and rich imagination. Already at the age of three they draw wonderfully, sculpt from plasticine or clay, and are distinguished by good musical abilities and perfect pitch. However, they often begin to speak later than their peers, and the pronunciation of some sounds can be difficult for left-handed children.

How to teach left-handed people to read and write

Teaching left-handed children to read and write has its own characteristics. When starting to read a sentence, the baby does not pay the slightest attention to where reading should begin: from the beginning, middle or end of the line. When writing, the child does not complete sentences and loses a line. The words he displays are often mirrored - they are written in reverse, from the last letter to the first.

A right-handed child quickly learns to determine where is left and where is right. But for a left-handed child this is not an easy task, because difficulties with spatial orientation are one of the main characteristics of left-handers. To help your child master correct reading and writing (from left to right), you can mark your left hand and put a bracelet or watch on it. Which side the marked hand is on is the beginning of the row. To practice this skill, you can add cubes and mosaics from left to right, explaining to your child that this is how we read and write.

A left-handed child faces even greater problems when rewriting text. After all, he must not only focus on what he needs to rewrite, but also transfer the text into a notebook, arranging the letters in the correct order. For a left-handed person, such a task turns out to be extremely difficult and takes a lot of time and effort.

When learning to read, left-handed children tend to lose lines. To solve this problem, you can use an opaque ruler or pieces of cardboard to cover the text being read, word by word, as the baby progresses. Thus, it is necessary to practice until the habit of holding the desired direction becomes automatic.

The main problem with left-handers is that they belong to a minority. The realities of our lives are such that often those who are stronger or belong to the majority are right. Subconsciously, the baby may worry about his “wrongness”. This anxiety can trigger the formation of the so-called “left-handed complex.”

How not to behave with a left-handed child

The main advice in raising a left-handed person is to not try to make him right-handed, much less punish him for using the “wrong” hand. Retraining a left-handed person to hold a pen or spoon in the right hand means transferring the innate functions of the leading right hemisphere to the left. The result is the following:

• a child who is being retrained begins to show excessive stubbornness, sleeps poorly and loses appetite;
• due to nervousness, a child may experience abdominal pain, headaches, and enuresis;
• speech formation in the baby occurs with a significant delay, speech therapy problems appear;
• an adult who was retrained in childhood is characterized by an inability to navigate the terrain, an inability to dance, and does not perceive melodies well.

When communicating with a left-handed child, one should not focus on his “peculiarities”, emphasizing the differences between right-handers and left-handers. A constant reminder of this, as well as attempts to retrain a child, can lower self-esteem and create a loser life scenario for the little person.

The natural vulnerability and excessive impressionability of the baby will show itself if you shout at him. Intemperance of parents, as well as excessive pedantry, can lead to the loss of their contact with the child. Don't fight with him because of his constant stubbornness; try to smooth out rough edges through play.

If a left-handed child has shown any talents, you should not strive to bring them to perfection, constantly raising the bar. In the case when parents decide to teach their child writing and reading on their own before school, you cannot scold him for failures. Remember that there is a time for everything.

When school time comes, you should not send your left-handed child to a class with in-depth study of subjects. Left-handed children often cannot cope with an overloaded school curriculum. And educational institutions with strict discipline and statutory order (like the Suvorov Military School or the Cadet Corps) are not at all for them.

What to do when raising a left-handed person

Make sure that your child's left-handedness does not irritate you. Left-handed children need three times more parental attention and patience than their right-handed peers. In addition, do not allow others to give advice on how to retrain your child to use his right hand.

A left-handed child needs praise. Encourage him for the slightest successes, give him surprises and gifts. Be sure to support your child’s talents and help them develop.

The life of a left-handed child should be organized taking into account his needs: the light from the window and the table lamp should be on the right, the notebook or book should be tilted from right to left, thereby facilitating the process of writing and reading. If possible, purchase left-handed accessories. A pen that does not cover what is written, scissors and even a special toothbrush will help the baby not to be distracted once again by his “peculiarity” in everyday life.

Due to differences in the nervous system, left-handers quickly become overtired. Therefore, classes with them should be carried out no longer than 20 minutes, after which you must rest. A break will restore the child’s strength, and he will be ready to work again.

For a left-handed person, a section with a sport in which both hands are equally involved is perfect: skiing, swimming, basketball. A modeling or knitting class, a piano class at a music school - these are the things you can choose for a left-handed child.

Finally

1. If you are convinced that your child is left-handed, do not be upset and do not exaggerate the difficulties ahead in learning (for example, in learning to read and write) and in the child’s daily life. Treat this feature positively and always be ready to help.
2. Do not listen to advice and recommendations on how to retrain a left-handed person. Don't try to change it. Love your baby for who he is and be proud of his uniqueness.

Each child is unique in his development, view of the world, preferences and temperament. But among the many unique children, there are those whose dissimilarity from others immediately catches the eye - children who perform actions not with their right hand, but with their left hand.

And this is far from the only difference between these kids and their peers. What should parents of a left-handed child know about and how can they help him adapt to the structure of a world designed for right-handers?

Where does this feature come from?

There are many reasons for left-handedness. They can be completely harmless or have very serious prerequisites:

• This may be a congenital feature. Often left-handed children appear in families where one or both parents have this distinctive feature. By the way, there is an opinion that from birth a baby uses both hands equally, simply copies the actions of adults, and grows up right-handed or left-handed, receiving the appropriate example.
• More often, this feature manifests itself in twins. In this case, scientists associate the phenomenon with a lack of nutrition or oxygen, when the more sensitive left hemisphere of the brain, responsible for the functioning of the organs on the right side of the body, develops more slowly than the right hemisphere, responsible for the left.
• A third, less harmless reason may be a brain injury, as a result of which the left hemisphere was damaged and some of its functions were taken over by the right. The prerequisite may be birth and even postpartum trauma, as well as fetal hypoxia, stress and others.
• Finally, the development of left-handedness may be associated with damage or underdevelopment of the right hand. In this case, the child is simply forced to use predominantly the left one.

Are left-handed and left-handed the same thing?

Currently, no one can say unequivocally that such special children need to be retrained to write and draw with their right hand. On the contrary, you should not insist under any circumstances. However, there are exceptions to any rule. To understand when and how to intervene in a child’s development, it is worth understanding the concepts of “left-handed” and “left-handed.”

If for some reason, even during intrauterine development, one of the cerebral hemispheres becomes dominant, then already from three months the mother may notice that the baby uses one side of the body more often. If the left hemisphere has received greater development, then the right arm and leg are more active, if the right hemisphere is more active, then the left hemisphere is more active. That is why another name for left-handers is right-hemisphere.

The baby begins to turn his head more often in a certain direction, reach for toys not one by one, but one, and turn over on one side. Innate reflexes also disappear faster on the dominant side of the body.

In this case, from a very early age it can be assumed that the child is a true left-hander or right-hander. That is, with a clear dominance of one hemisphere over the other in controlling movements.

By the way, a true left-hander has more than just his left hand as his leading hand. He will hear better with his left ear, see better with his left eye, and use his left foot more often. For a right-handed person, the opposite is true. We can speak of true left-handedness if a child performs more than 75% of actions using organs on the left side of the body.

When can you accurately determine that a child is left-handed?

Much more often, the dominance of one hemisphere over the other is not noticeable from birth. Moreover, at different times, attentive parents may note the predominant use of one hand or the other.

It is much more accurate to determine that a child is left-handed only by the age of 4-5 years. At this age, the child finally determines the dominant hemisphere of the brain, and, consequently, the predominant use of one hand.

Until this point, it is completely acceptable to encourage your baby to use his right hand to draw. However, if the child stubbornly wants to use his left hand, do not insist.

Forced retraining can have the most unpleasant consequences:

• It will be more difficult for the baby to speak;
• difficulties may arise with learning and perception of information;
• against the background of pressure from others, nervousness, enuresis, and stuttering appear;
• Many of the child’s innate abilities may be lost, especially those related to creativity, ear for music, orientation and coordination of movements.

Even pulling on the dominant hand in infancy can interfere with harmonious development. This is one of the arguments in favor of free swaddling.

Left-handed, right-handed or ambidextrous?

When a child reaches the age of 4-5 years, you can playfully invite him to complete a number of tasks to determine the leading hand.

The simplest test involves 3 exercises:

• cross your arms over your chest (the elbow of your dominant hand will be on top);
• clasp your fingers together (the thumb of your dominant hand will also be on top);
• clap your hands (leading hand on top).

There are also more detailed tests that include common everyday activities, for example:

• brush your teeth;
• throw the ball;
• pour water;
• unscrew or screw the cap on the bottle;
• open the box;
• pick up a small object with a spoon;
• take a book from the shelf.

Thus, you can simply watch your child and note for yourself which hand he uses more often, more actively and more accurately. It is also worth offering your baby unusual actions. In this case, the likelihood of using the dominant hand increases, since the child does not yet have a stereotype for performing the task.

Who is ambidextrous?

The word ambidexterity comes from two Latin words ambi - “both” and dexter - “right”. An ambidextrous person is a person who has both arms equally developed. He can perform the same actions with the same efficiency with both his left and right hands. According to statistics, only 1% of newborn children have congenital ambidexterity.

The most complete test system is offered by M.G. Knyazeva and V. Yu. Vildavsky. It includes both everyday activities and graphic tasks that allow you to determine not only the dominant hand, but also the child’s ability to use the other hand when writing.

If the baby turns out to be “graphically right-handed”, but in most ordinary manipulations he is left-handed, it is advisable to gradually teach him to write with his left hand. Conversely, it may turn out that the baby is right-handed, but due to injury or habit, draws with his left hand. It’s worth retraining such a left-handed child.

If by the age of 5-6 years the leading hand is not determined, and the baby copes with tasks with one hand or the other approximately equally, then he remains ambidextrous. In such people, the hemispheres of the brain act together. An ambidextrous child will be able to write, draw and draw with both right and left hands without any consequences from the nervous system.

But even if you notice that the baby uses both hands almost equally, you should not insist on writing exclusively with the right one. It is better to go to a child psychologist who will help the child decide.

Lefty is a special child

Disputes continue about how else a left-handed person differs from a right-handed person. Some consider such children to be more gifted, others note the difficulties with which they are given the exact sciences and mastery of literacy. However, right-brained children share common features:

• emotionality;
• developed spatial thinking;
• a penchant for the humanities;
• ability to master technology more easily;
• ability to quickly adapt;
• some slowness in solving assigned tasks;
• creative approach to everything;
• developed imagination;
• artistry;
• greater contact and sociability.

Due to the more developed “creative” hemisphere of the brain, such children are prone to creation and are more multitasking. But mathematical operations and logical constructions can cause difficulties for them.

Problems with teaching a left-handed child

Even when preparing for school, parents of a little left-hander may encounter a number of problems. The fact is that such children reason and think somewhat differently than their left-hemisphere comrades. They tend to generalize and perceive objects and phenomena as a whole, and not as a collection of individual elements. Accordingly, analysis for a left-handed child is a rather incomprehensible matter.

It is much more difficult for a left-handed person to navigate when working with text, whether writing or reading. Such a child often begins to read from right to left. Even when writing letters, a child can “mirror” their image.

There is nothing wrong with this, this also occurs in left-hemisphere children, but parents will have to do additional training with their child so that first grade does not become a cause of grief for him. For example, mark the beginning of a line with a symbol or color.

By the way, it is also much easier for a child with a more developed right hemisphere to perceive words as a whole, and not as a composition of letters. It will be easier for such a child to remember whole syllables. Thus, if at an early age you notice that a little left-hander is growing up at home, it would be advisable to approach his training using the global reading technique.

There may be problems with arithmetic. But with due diligence, the child will fully master algebra, sometimes surprising the teacher with an unconventional approach. But geometry will be easy for the child thanks to his developed imagination.

How to help a child if he is left-handed?

It is not easy for a left-handed child to live in a world of right-handed people. If you are right-handed, then at least pay attention to the door handles. Are most of them comfortable to open with your left hand?

Set an example

A left-handed child cannot exactly copy the movements adults make with their right hand. It turns out that such a child needs to figure out how to perform a similar action “in a mirror manner.” Therefore, the first thing you can do for a little left-hander is to set an example using your left hand.

Train your arms

Another problem is that the motor skills of the upper limbs directly affect the development of the corresponding hemisphere. Therefore, it is extremely important to offer your baby activities that require the use of both hands. For example:

• games with the ball: catching, throwing, pushing, hitting with both hands and alternately with one or the other;
• swimming;
• gymnastics with dumbbells;
• jumping rope;
• knitting;
• kneading clay.

As well as fine motor skills exercises that are recommended for all preschool children:

• shifting and sorting cereals;
• drawing up applications;
• unwinding of small parts;
• lacing;
• tying knots, bows, etc.

Let your talent come true

Due to the child’s great artistry and penchant for creativity, it is advisable to send the baby to the appropriate club or theater studio. If your child has expressed a desire to take up dancing, painting, or some kind of sport, meet him halfway. In any case, it is worth helping your child develop his creative abilities.

Don't hurt the baby

You should remember about the high excitability and vulnerability of the little left-hander. Do not under any circumstances focus on this feature in a negative way. Even if a child has problems with writing, there is no need to say that the whole problem is in the left hand. Such statements can leave a mark on a child’s soul for many years.

Such a child will react sharply to any reproach, raising his voice or simply being too strict. Like all artistic people, your child especially urgently needs support, understanding and acceptance. Therefore, in order to maintain a trusting relationship with your child, praise him and encourage him more often, and express your dissatisfaction in a calm tone.

Make your child's life more convenient

Buy any items that can make your baby's life easier. Recently, more and more of them have appeared - special scissors, pens, pencils. Not long ago, even copybooks appeared for children using their left hand. The letters in them are arranged with a reverse slant. This allows left-handed people to develop calligraphy, which until recently seemed almost impossible.

Of course, it is worth warning the kindergarten teacher and school teacher that the baby is left-handed. This will allow the mentor to better organize the child’s workspace and protect him from unnecessary questions.

Psychologists identify some qualities of left-handed children, which in most cases distinguish them from right-handers:

Left-handed children are usually much more stubborn than their right-handed peers, and their period of stubbornness is protracted.

Often such children are artistically gifted; they draw well and with pleasure, and sculpt from plasticine and clay.

Many left-handers have good musical abilities and perfect pitch.

Many of these children begin to speak later than their peers and also have difficulty pronouncing certain sounds.

Sometimes problems arise with writing, reading and mathematics.

Left-handed children are spontaneous, trusting, and easily influenced by momentary feelings and moods. Hence - tearfulness, capriciousness, susceptibility to rage and anger, persistence in fulfilling desires.

But psychologists emphasize that left-handedness is not a pathology, but an individual version of the norm.

Reasons for the differences

If the left (it is responsible for the right side of the body), then such a person is right-handed, and if the right part of the brain dominates, which is responsible for the left side of the body, the person becomes left-handed.

Scientists have identified degrees of dominance: strongly expressed (“one hundred percent” right-handed or pronounced left-handed) and weakly expressed (there may be 1-2 signs of “left-handedness”: the dominant left eye and left ear, but the dominant hand is the right).

Each hemisphere of the brain is responsible for specific human abilities.

Why is he like this

Modern science identifies four main causes of left-handedness:

Genetic feature. Right hemisphere dominance is inherited. And not only from parents to children, but also through a generation, that is, from grandparents to grandchildren, and sometimes to great-grandchildren.

Birth injuries or pathologies of late pregnancy that affected the development of the child’s brain. But it will be very difficult for such children. After all, it will be equally difficult for them to use both their right and left hands. Speech delays, mental and physical development, and motor impairment may occur. Classes according to a specific program with a neuropsychologist and speech therapist will come to the rescue.

"Forced left-handedness." Occurs most often due to injury to the right hand at an early age.

Imitation. It happens that a child simply imitates, for example, one of his left-handed parents, and as a result, left-handedness becomes a habit.

Why you can't retrain

By retraining left-handedness, we are unsuccessfully trying to remake the biological nature of the child. We can force a child to write and eat with his right hand, but we cannot change the leading hemisphere of the brain.

What problems can you encounter when retraining a little left-hander? Your baby can get a wide variety of signs of neurosis. This may include blurred vision, abdominal pain, enuresis, various sleep disorders, changes in appetite, headaches, and stuttering. These disorders can manifest themselves either individually or in combination. In addition, retraining is fraught with the fact that your child will do poorly at school and, as a result, at the institute, he will have problems at work.

Looking for confirmation

So, your child writes, draws and eats mainly with his left hand - can we call him left-handed based on these signs? If you answer yes, it will not be entirely true. After all, a true left-hander is one who not only has a left hand, but also a left eye and left ear that are superior to the right.

Give your child a little test.

So, you have already dealt with the definition of a hand, because the baby picks up objects, writes and draws more often with his left hand. Now let’s determine which ear he uses as the dominant one. Ask him to hold the alarm clock with both hands and listen to the clock tick. See which ear he puts them to. This makes it easy to identify the leading eye. Roll a piece of paper into a tube and give it to your baby in both hands. Offer to look through this “spyglass” for various objects.

Surely the sheet will be brought exactly to the dominant eye. Pay attention to which leg is more comfortable for your baby to jump on and which leg he kicks the ball with. These tests should be done around age five because children under five can use both their right and left hands equally often.

We help you develop

The leading hand of a left-handed child must be developed from childhood. It’s easier to do this in a playful way. Invite your baby to press his palm tightly to the table and lift each finger off the surface in turn - let the fingers alternately look up and lie back down. And any other exercise for developing a child’s motor skills will undoubtedly be beneficial.

To make learning the alphabet easier, you should rely on imaginative thinking. For example, the letter “F” looks like a tasty pretzel or glasses, and “X” is a walking man, “H” is an upside-down chair. Let the child come up with other associations himself. And so with each letter. It will be a fun and useful game. It happens that left-handed children write letters in the wrong direction when writing, that is, they “mirror” them. In such cases, special exercises will help. Choose the letters that your baby “mirrors” and write them in a row yourself, with several letters in this row written in the wrong direction, the way the child usually writes them. Let him find the “mirror” letters on his own.

Handwriting in left-handed children is slanted to the left or may not have it at all.

It is important to remember that when doing activities related to writing, the light should fall on the left for right-handers, and on the right for left-handers.

Help your left-handed child position his hand correctly when drawing and writing with his left hand. The baby’s hands should lie on the table so that the elbow of the left hand protrudes slightly beyond the edge of the table and the hand moves freely along the line, while the right hand lies on the table and holds the sheet. The left hand should be facing the table surface. The fulcrum points for it are the nail phalanges of the slightly bent little and ring fingers, as well as the lower part of the palm.

The fountain pen is placed on the upper, nail part of the middle finger, and the nail phalanges of the thumb and index fingers hold it at a distance of 1.52 cm from the end of the rod. In the process of writing, a left-handed person moves from left to right (the direction of the pen is to the left, and the movement of the hand and fingers is to the right). The left hand with the handle is located under the line. This is the most convenient way of writing, since the child does not have to twist his hand, the sample is clearly visible, and what was previously written does not become blurred. Naturally, the letters will be written slanted to the left. In this case, the notebook lies tilted to the right, the lower right corner of the page is directed towards the middle of the chest.