Features of teaching writing to left-handed children. Left-handed child in elementary school

DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING LEFT-HANDERS

The problem of left-handedness remains one of the most serious problems in pedagogy and psychology. For a long time it was believed that left-handed children needed to be retrained, adjusting them to general standard. As a result of retraining, children developed neurotic reactions. At the current level of knowledge, this is explained by the fact that left-handedness is not just a preference for the left hand, but also a completely different distribution of functions between the hemispheres of the brain. Making a left-handed child write right hand- means intervening in an already established and quite complex functional system and strive to rebuild it without sufficient prerequisites for this.

Left-handedness is not a habit, not a disease, not the result of teacher mistakes, it is one of the options for the normal development of the body, which often depends on the innate genetic characteristics of the structure of the child’s brain.

In addition to genetic left-handedness, there is also pathological and social left-handedness. While genetic left-handedness is inherited, pathological left-handedness may result from “minimal brain dysfunction,” occurring either in utero or at birth. A high frequency of left-handedness is observed among patients with epilepsy, mental retardation, and schizophrenia. Social left-handedness arises as a result of forced retraining.

Left-handed children are more likely to have neuroses, since in a right-handed world they experience “dextrastress” (right-handed stress). Left-handed people face the fact that the world designed for right-handed people (doors, lighting fixtures, musical instruments, etc.). Left-handed people are often very musical people, but most musical instruments are asymmetrical. Music teaching methods are also designed for right-handed people.

In children, the dominant hand is mainly formed by the age of 4 years, and before this age, hand preference may be unstable. If at the age of 4 a child prefers his left hand, and especially if there are left-handed relatives, then the child cannot be retrained. By retraining a left-handed child to use the right hand, you can develop neurosis: restless sleep, sleepwalking, tics, obsessive movements, stuttering, bedwetting. The child may develop a feeling of inferiority, an inferiority complex, an inability to communicate with people, etc.

If the child has equal command of the right and left hand, he is considered “two-handed”, or ambidextrous (both hands work like the right hand). The mental characteristics of such children may be the same as those of left-handers, but they easily get used to writing with their right hand and do not suffer from dextrastress.

If you arrange all people according to the degree of right-handedness, you will get a huge variety from pronounced right-handers through weak right-handers, ambidextrous people, weak left-handers to pronounced left-handers.

To increase the effectiveness of teaching left-handed children, it is necessary to turn to the capabilities of the right hemisphere as often as possible, taking into account their greater speed and emotionality of perception, generalization, integrity, imagery, and the involvement of involuntary memory. It is necessary to include manipulation with models and layouts in the educational process. You can activate the capabilities of the right hemisphere using all kinds of schemes. When learning, left-handed people focus more on sensory sensations (visual, tactile, etc.) rather than on speech. To better understand the material, they need support from a drawing, an object, visual material. For left-handed people, it is difficult to work in large groups under strictly regulated conditions and strict subordination. They need their own initiative and intuition, individual work, when there are no strict regulations or strict obedience.

The high verbal talent of left-handed people is explained by the fact that their speech centers are represented symmetrically in the left and right hemispheres. The joint work of speech centers acts as a condition for the emergence of special talent. Writing and reading are asymmetrical activities. Writing is done with only one hand, and is read in Russian from left to right. In addition, the shape of most letters is asymmetrical. In young children, brain asymmetry is not yet fully formed, spatial relationships are difficult to analyze, so sometimes it occursmirror reflection. It is important to understand that the direction preference for left to right or right to left is regulated by the brain. The most characteristic manifestation of mirror reflection is mirror writing, reading, drawing, and perception. The frequency of mirror writing in left-handed children is 85%. Elements of mirror reflection are also found in children with unstable right-handedness. A decrease in the frequency of manifestations of mirror reflection and the complete disappearance of this phenomenon is usually observed after 10 years, since the phenomenon of mirror movements is associated with the functional insufficiency of the corpus callosum, which usually reaches its functional maturity at this age.

Functional asymmetry of the hemispheres is a property of the brain that reflects the difference in the distribution of neuropsychic functions between its right and left hemispheres.

Left hemisphere type - dominance of the left hemisphere determines the tendency to abstraction and generalization, verbal and logical character cognitive processes. The left hemisphere deals with words conventional signs and symbols; responsible for writing, counting, analytical ability, abstract, conceptual, two-dimensional thinking.
Right-hemisphere type - dominance of the right hemisphere determines the tendency to creativity, the concrete-figurative nature of cognitive processes. The right hemisphere of the brain operates with images of real objects, is responsible for orientation in space and easily perceives spatial relationships. It is believed to be responsible for the synthetic activity of the brain.
Equihemispheric type - the absence of pronounced dominance of one of the hemispheres implies their synchronous activity in the choice of thinking strategies. In addition, there is a hypothesis of effective interaction between the right and left hemispheres as the physiological basis of general talent.

However, innate prerequisites are only initial conditions, and asymmetry itself is formed in the process of individual development, under the influence social contacts, especially family ones.

School teaching methods train and develop mainly the left hemisphere, ignoring half of the student’s mental capabilities, and do not take into account the peculiarities of the sexual lateralization of the hemispheres, remaining asexual and widespread. Education in our schools is not only left-hemisphere, but also academic, that is, the material is presented in finished form, is repeated several times. In such an education system, left-hemisphere and equal-hemisphere girls feel comfortable and quickly become excellent students. Right-hemisphere boys find themselves at the greatest disadvantage and are more susceptible to school neuroses.

HOW TO DETERMINE LEFT-HANDEDNESS

As a rule, parents themselves identify a child’s left-handedness by observing what part of the child’s activities he performs with his left hand. However, it must be borne in mind that for most children under a certain age, it is sometimes difficult to determine the dominance of one or another hand only on the basis of observations of their playing actions. Only in the eleventh month can parents establish a clear preference for the child for one or another hand.

At the age of four, a clear preference for one of the hands is formed, and by the age of five, the final dominance of the right or left hand is established.

TESTS FOR YOUNG CHILDREN

Which hand does the child draw with?
Which hand throws a stone or a ball?
Which hand holds toothbrush?
Which hand does he comb his hair with?
Which hand erases with an eraser?
Which hand does one deal cards when playing lotto?
With which hand does he string beads and build a tower of cubes?

APPLAUSE

When applauding, the leading (usually the right) hand is more active and more mobile, making striking movements against the palm of the non-dominant (usually the left) hand. This test has great information value.

LEFT-HANDED CHILD AT SCHOOL

The methodology for teaching writing and its organization are designed for children with a dominant right hand, so parents and teachers have difficulties in proper organization working with children who write with their left hand. This concerns such issues as the position of the notebook when writing, the need to maintain the inclination of the letters, and the correct posture when writing. Below we will try to consider all these issues in detail.

SITTING WHEN WRITING

At correct landing Left-handed children should sit upright without their chest touching the table. The entire feet are on the floor or stand, the head should be slightly tilted to the right.

In the classroom, at a desk, a left-handed child should ALWAYS sit to the left of his neighbor so that the right hand of his desk neighbor does not interfere with his writing.

The table lamp is located to the right of the child.

HANDS POSITION

The hands should lie on the table so that the elbow of the left hand protrudes slightly beyond the edge of the table, and the left hand moves freely along the line from top to bottom, while the right hand lies on the table and holds the sheet.

POSITION OF THE HAND

The left hand should have most of its palm facing the table surface. The fulcrum points for the hand are the nail phalanx of the slightly bent little finger and Bottom part palms.

TECHNIQUES FOR HOLDING A PEN

The handle is placed on middle finger, on its upper nail part. The nail phalanx of the thumb holds the handle, and forefinger easily placed on top of the pen at a distance of 1.5-2 cm from the writing ball and controls the movement of the fingers. In the process of writing, a movement occurs 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).

There are several ways to write with your left hand.

First way is mirror image"right-handed" position. It is most often used by children who have not been trained in more convenient and the right techniques letters. This position of the hand seriously complicates the learning process, since all the samples in the notebooks (copybooks) are located on the left. When starting to cheat, the child does not have the opportunity to focus on the model. There is a decrease or increase in the size of letters in a line and their spelling is incorrect.

Second way . The left hand with the handle is located above the line. This method gives the child the opportunity to focus on a sample or what Rene has written and reduces the number of errors when writing. It is this method of writing that left-handed children spontaneously and most often come to.

Third way . The left hand and pen are 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. However, when writing in this way, the requirements of “right-handed” calligraphy are violated: the letters do not tilt to the right, rather, they are even tilted to the left. But this is not so important. Many “right-handers” often write left-handed. The main thing is to give the child the opportunity to write in a way that is convenient for him, and to minimize the likelihood of involuntary errors.

It is necessary to do gymnastics for the left hand:

straighten the hand, clench the fingers tightly and slowly press them first to the third joints, then to the plane of the palm;
straighten the hand and alternately attach the ring finger to the little finger, the middle finger to the index finger;
Place your hand firmly on the table and alternately bend your middle, index, thumb, the remaining fingers should gradually rise upward;
open your fingers as wide as possible and, slowly connecting them, lower your hand down;
clench your fingers into a fist and rotate the hand in different directions.

What requirements should be made for the writing of a left-handed child? Here are the main ones:

correct spelling of letter forms and their compounds;
maintaining the distance between letters and words;
maintaining linearity and rhythm;
straight letter with a slight slant to the left.

Based on materials from a lecture by O.I. Inshakova. teachers of school No. 57, Moscow at the pedagogical marathon.

The main thing is to feel and understand in time that your child is not like other children. The fact is that he can draw and use a spoon with his right hand, although he has other signs of left-handedness. But at the same time, for example, he does not like to draw, he is slow, he stumbles a little at the beginning of a sentence, for some reason he does not count well, and he reads slowly, without increasing his reading speed at all... It is not at all necessary to have all the listed signs. And many “true” left-handers do everything with their left hand, do excellent math, read a lot, and are often excellent students, but the mothers of these fortunate left-handers know many of the hardships of raising their beloved children.

The child comes to school and the difficulties begin! After all, it’s not about the hand, although, of course, it’s about it too. Various kinds problems are caused by many reasons: the state of a number of higher mental functions, such as, for example, memory, the level of development of visual and auditory motor coordination, immaturity of spatial representations, the type of functional asymmetry of the cerebral hemispheres and interhemispheric interaction.

But, in spite of everything, non-handers learn, and their successes are much more valuable than the victorious advancement of confident right-handers. Over the years of working with elementary school students, I have never ceased to be amazed by the ingenuity of left-handers. The main thing is to accept them, understand the reasons for their behavior, so as not to be offended. But left-handed people do not adapt to those around them; it is necessary to explain to them what seems to be completely understandable and teach them to ask questions in time so as not to miss the moment from which the misunderstanding began.

How many difficulties await a little left-hander around, and especially in a school created for right-handers! A left-handed baby should sit so that he is not pushed by the arm, which means on the desk on the left. The location of the desk should correspond to his dominant eye and ear, that is, be as far to the left as possible, because most often the field of vision of a left-handed person is shifted to the right.

You should not seat a left-handed person in the aisle; he is very sensitive to constant movement between desks, and the order in his workplace often leaves much to be desired.

On a sheet of paper in a notebook, a left-handed person ignores the left side and, without a twinge of conscience, goes to the adjacent right page. Having no sense of boundaries, a left-handed person does not favor word wrapping, preferring to mercilessly squeeze a word into a tiny interval, or leaves half the line on the right empty so as not to get involved with the rules in which he is mercilessly confused. And intelligence has nothing to do with it, space creates obstacles for the poor left-hander at every step. A right-handed person does not know these torments! And the inventive left-hander comes up with his own ways of navigating the world.

How to work with left-handed people.

Deal with them about mistakes.
9 may seem like 6 is upside down to them.
In mathematics they confuse + and -
Blots in the work of left-handers are confusing.
The weather greatly affects your mood.
They are forgetful.
The rules are taught automatically; you need to learn how to apply them in practice.
Examples with a window are difficult for left-handed people because they have problems with spatial orientation.
Lefties can't draw. They begin, for example, at 4 years old (and from above).
It is better to explain addition by drawing arcs along a number line.
Not everyone is left-handed to learn the multiplication tables.
They have a colored perception of the world, which can be used in mathematics when memorizing numbers and the composition of numbers.
They can count well in threes and tens without memorizing.
It is good to use rhymes, puzzles, and associations in your work.
Lefties learn well as long as they are interested.
Don't forget about repetition.
A friendly atmosphere is required in the classroom.
Left-handers have a field of vision shifted to the right, so the teacher can say: “Let's move to the left.”
They are pessimistic and touchy.
They can start reading a word from the middle.
They need to be taught to move their eyes.
They don’t know how to lie, but they usually try to absolve themselves of responsibility.
If you place the counting sticks unevenly in 1st grade, left-handed people may get confused.
They chew on their hands.
Shoelaces are always untied. They are not taken to the team.
Their coordination of movements is impaired, so they are not taken to the team.
Lefties are very suggestible and can raise their temperature.
They are very strict with themselves.
They often have dirt in their notebooks.
Often left-handers cannot count orally, they count in a column.
They find it difficult to study.
Can write numbers and letters in mirror image.
They may not see the cells, they need to be shown.
A short note for left-handed people can be drawn.
Lefties do not need to be limited in time.
You need to practice right and left with them.

Many inconsistencies arise for non-handed people, most of whom are very sensitive, in the process of adaptation to school. And for that category of children who do not bother themselves much with the complexities of human relationships, every misunderstanding that has arisen must be explained.

And if your seven-year-old child at the end of the term is surprised when asked directly about the name of his desk neighbor, wondering who needs this, then it’s time to get down to work called psychological and pedagogical support for left-handed people.

Literature

Sirotyuk A.L. Teaching children taking into account psychophysiology: Practical guide for teachers and parents. M.: Sphere shopping center, 2001

Features of teaching left-handed children to write.

According to M.M. Bezrukikh, preparing for writing is a special system of step-by-step lessons. Writing is one of the most difficult types of human activity, and learning to write is not as simple as it seems at first glance. It is certainly possible to help children avoid serious difficulties in learning to write.

It is advisable to highlight the basic requirements for writing in the preparatory period - what the child must learn:

Learn to sit correctly (correct posture, position of a notebook or sheet);
Learn to hold a pen correctly;
Clearly differentiate the line (top, bottom, midline), be able to write printed letters in line;
Be able to allocate 2/3 above the top line and 2/3 below the bottom line to write letters whose elements extend beyond the line;
Be able to perform (write) the basic elements of letters:

Vertical lines, parallel and oblique lines (right and left);
Ovals;
Curved lines at the bottom and top;

Be able to distinguish and write vertical (right and left) elements well;
Be able to perform connected rhythmic movements(the child chooses the number of movements in the cycle himself, the pace of work is not set, the baby also chooses it himself);
Be able to copy complex combinations winding lines, for example, simple hieroglyphs;
Be able to copy a simple phrase of several words written in written letters;
Be able to distinguish letters written in italics.

In everyday life, the child should be allowed to decide for himself which hand he will perform usual actions with. When teaching writing, based on what is comfortable for the child, you can suggest mastering the actions first comfortable hand, and then, if desired, try another one, as during the game. Then the child himself chooses the method of performing the action, and the adult observes the mandatory training of this action and its high-quality execution (which different children achieved at different speeds that are unique to them).

From this position, the task of the adult is to re-master the world together with the child, perhaps through a slightly modified version of actions. IN in this case we can say that a routine event - the transfer of knowledge using a well-known stereotype - turns into an amazing process of adaptation to a different vision of the environment, a different feeling. This process of mutual enrichment: the child gains the experience of an adult that is not yet available to him, and the adult again looks at the world through the eyes of a child.

Thus, the task of the teacher is to ensure that, while maximizing his individual qualities, the child does not limit by them either the rights or the possibility of demonstrating the unique qualities of other children and adults. The teacher studies the child’s characteristics and then directs his efforts to maximize the child’s capabilities, use the advantages that he has, and neutralize his weaknesses. From this position, it is worth encouraging a left-handed child to treat writing as drawing. Let him copy the words in a convenient way, achieving maximum accuracy. It is possible to allow him to write more slowly, but more accurately, a little longer than other children. At the same time, the child is not relieved of responsibility for the quality of writing, the ability to write correctly and competently, and to achieve this through exercises.

Difficulties arise not just in left- or right-handed people, but in those children whose control of hand movement is in a different hemisphere than the control of vision and hearing. Due to the mosaic arrangement of various centers and features early development Most children do not have equality between their channels of perception. This means that it is easier for some of them to perceive visual information, for others - auditory, and for others - tactile.

Children with the right type of profile and the leading visual channel usually become excellent students at school. The school curriculum is designed for them. Moreover, when reading books, they memorize the image of words, and then on tests they only compare this image with what they write. They may not learn the rules, but they can write correctly. Reading improves their literacy.

Children whose leading channel is the auditory one study for “B” and “A” grades. Even as they spin, their ears receive the explanation. They may not be taught oral disciplines, but they are not taught the Russian language. They write not what is written in the textbook, and not even what is written on the board. They write only what they repeat themselves in the process of internal speech. This means that they do not look attentively at the text. They pronounce it in some way known only to them, and then reproduce exactly that. There are especially many errors in those children who miss letters when reading, “swallowing them”, because then they will not write them.

And finally, D students and C students are children with left or mixed type profiles in which the tactile or tactile channel is leading. In order to understand something, they must touch and try it. If these children can make it through a school curriculum that does not take this group of children into account at all, then they can become great physicists and chemists. These sciences arose and still exist to a large extent as practical ones. In order for these children to learn to write, it is useless for them to learn rules: they must write and write and write until their hand automatically learns to do it correctly.

When teaching children to write, a teacher should not reinforce the strengths and weaknesses of each group. You can develop all channels in all children, teaching them to see, hear, feel. To do this, from the very beginning it is necessary to offer children the following sequence copying texts from a textbook. First, you need to read the sentence syllable by syllable so that you remember it by heart (training the visual and auditory channels). Then write it down without looking at the textbook (training the visual and tactile channels). Then check the correctness by checking what is written in the textbook (checking the visual channel). This type of training will cause all children to develop weaknesses. The teacher’s task in this case is not to rush the children, but to teach at the speed possible for everyone, perhaps focusing on one of the stages of mastering competent writing.

Writing is a special form of speech in which its elements are recorded on paper (or other materials) by drawing graphic symbols (graphemes) corresponding to the elements of oral speech.

Russian writing is sound-letter. As a rule, the principles of teaching writing are determined by the system of writing itself, and since The Russian writing system is sound-letter, then the main principle of teaching is sound, or rather phonemic, and the main unit of learning is learning to write graphic elements (letters). Writing is one of the most complex skills that are formed in the learning process.

Writing has a complex psychophysiological structure and includes the mechanisms of articulation and auditory analysis, visual memory and visual control, hand-eye coordination and motor control, perceptual regulation and a complex of linguistic skills (the ability to differentiate sounds, sound-letter analysis, etc.).

The most important element of learning to write is the formation of graphic writing skills, in parallel with which the formation of spelling skills occurs.

A graphic skill is certain habitual positions and movements. writing hand, allowing to depict written signs and their connections. Correctly developed graphic skill allows you to write letters clearly, beautifully, legibly, and quickly. Improperly developed graphic skills create a complex of writing difficulties: sloppy, illegible handwriting, slow pace. At the same time, reworking an incorrect graphic skill is not only difficult, but sometimes impossible.

At the initial stage of learning to write, children must master the concept of letters - graphic signs (printed, written, uppercase and lowercase), learn to write all graphic elements correctly, clearly and quickly enough, maintaining correct posture, correct hand movement, correct trajectory of movements, etc. At the same time, it is necessary to correctly differentiate speech sounds, accurately recognize and correlate them with letters, since spelling skills are being formed in parallel with graphic skills. The purely technical implementation of the writing process itself is complicated by the fact that in children of six and seven years of age the small muscles of the hand are poorly developed, the ossification of the wrist and phalanges of the fingers is not complete, the nervous regulation of movements is imperfect, and the endurance of static loads (an indispensable component of writing) is low. In addition, many children have not developed the mechanisms of spatial perception and visual memory, visual-motor coordination and sound-letter analysis, which creates additional difficulties.

MM. Bezrukikh distinguishes three main stages in the formation of a skill:

The first stage is analytical, the main components of which are the isolation of individual elements of action and mastery of them, clarification of the goal, visual-motor image, and identification of the main criteria for controlling the execution of the movement.
The second stage is conventionally called synthetic. This stage of connecting individual elements into a holistic action.
The third stage is skill automation. This is the stage of formation of a skill as an action, which is characterized high degree assimilation and the lack of element-by-element conscious regulation and control. The characteristic features of skill automation are speed, smoothness, and ease. It is very important to know that speed should not be forced, it should become a natural result of improving movements. Smoothness (coherence) should also arise as a natural result of the formation of a skill.

In cases where the execution of movements is difficult for any reason (for example, in children with deviations in the development of motor functions, visual-spatial perception, hand-eye coordination, etc.), the duration of the movement and pause increases, and just This is typical for left-handed children.

Now at the initial stage of learning to write, a very fast pace of work is set, and the child is required to write at a high speed. In this regard, the natural and necessary mechanism for the high-quality implementation of action is violated. A sharp reduction in pause time reduces the quality of analysis and assessment, awareness of the next action; correction along the way becomes impossible, and, naturally, the quality of the writing itself is impaired. This creates the effect of disturbances in motor skills, visual-spatial perception, hand-eye coordination in the form of disturbances in configurations, relationships of elements, additional strokes, optical errors, etc.

Subsequently, a sharp increase in speed leads to distortions, rearrangements, and omissions of letters, which are already characteristic of disorders of auditory-linguistic functions. In fact, this is also associated with a sharp reduction in the pause necessary for sound-letter analysis (by the way, this is what negative effect continuous writing, which does not allow the child to divert attention from the actual writing to sound-letter analysis).

Thus, taking into account the peculiarities of the formation of movements in writing, it is advisable to start teaching not with whole letters, but with an explanation that each letter consists of elements and, in fact, it is possible to “construct” or assemble any letter from these elements. It is important that the same element is always executed in the same way.

E.I. Nikolaeva believes that such element-by-element analysis, which is worth spending extra time on, allows the child to creatively and consciously approach the construction of a letter, first using the example of a printed and then a written style. You can use a special lotto with elements of letters, in each cell of which there is a part of a letter (the letter can be divided into elements not only vertically, but also horizontally). The ability to understand and distinguish the elements of letters, the relationship of parts, their location on the line, combination and sequence is the first step in learning.

The next step is to explain how each movement is performed when writing the basic elements in letters.

Left-handed child needs special help in the initial stages of training:

It is necessary to specifically fix attention on the right- and left-hand orientation of the strokes, otherwise mirror writing is possible;
Particular attention should be paid to the direction of writing from left to right;
It is necessary to analyze in great detail and carefully the trajectory of movements when writing each element (letter);
Together with your child, review the instructions in great detail;
Perform the movement several times at a slow pace;
Ask the child to “dictate” the instructions to the teacher so that the child once again understands what and how to do;
Complete all tasks at a slow pace.

For left-handed children correct instructions is especially important because allows you to use the verbal component of assessment and control of activity.

According to M.I. Lobzyakova, the leading importance is to strengthen the element of awareness during training. Writing must and can only be formed as an independent conscious action. It is necessary to strengthen the element of awareness in performing movements, teach (and teach this specifically) to see the line, its middle, feel the distance, mentally select for each letter its “cell” and place the letter in it.

And one more conclusion needs to be made based on the features of the first stage of developing the writing skill: you cannot force the pace and speed of writing, or require the child to write faster than he can. Research has shown that with the instruction “write faster,” throughout the entire first year of training, the speed of the movement itself did not increase, but only the micropause time shortened, i.e. the time that is necessary to understand the movement, consolidate it and actually form the skill. In seven-year-old children, the time for performing the movement itself “accelerates” only from the second half of the year, which means that during the entire alphabetic period, the entire first stage of learning, at excessive speed, the pause between movements is also shortened. The child does not have time to consolidate The right way execution of the letter, and as a result, the “doodles” are fixed. It is very difficult and in most cases almost impossible to redo a bad graphic skill.

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Features of teaching left-handed children

Left-handedness has been and remains a fascinating mystery for centuries. Indeed, most of humanity is right-handed and only 5-12% are left-handed. Foreign scientists note that the number of left-handed people is increasing. Of course, left-handed people are in the minority and left-handedness does not disappear, but simply the aggressiveness of right-handed people in the environment forces left-handed people, sometimes with great difficulty, to adapt, relearn, and become like everyone else. According to neurophysiologist A.A. Airapetyants, among schoolchildren aged seven to nine years old, left-handed children were identified: 13.3% were boys, 10% were girls. At the age of fourteen, they were already 4.4% among boys, and 4.1% among girls. Thus, in high school There remains a negligible number of children who have defended their right to be left-handed. IN primary school In recent years, left-handed children have become increasingly common. For a long time, scientists believed that the brain is the first organ, like the lungs and kidneys, and the function of one hemisphere is completely consistent with the functions of the other. Indeed, the left hemisphere is responsible for the movement of the right limbs and for the sensitivity of the right half of the body, and the right hemisphere is responsible for the movement of the left limbs and all types of sensitivity on the left. For normal brain function, a close relationship between both hemispheres is necessary. As a result of a violation of the specialization of higher mental functions, including speech, there is a decrease in human intellectual and cognitive activity. All right-handed people who did not have at different ages brain injury or damage, language and speech are controlled by the left hemisphere. Most left-handed people also have speech areas in the left hemisphere. Therefore, the “specialization” of the hemispheres is not an innate phenomenon, but a developed one. That's why I chose this particular topic. It is not sufficiently covered in the scientific and methodological literature. There was a need to systematize the material collected over several years of work. Now I am expanding the volume of material on this issue.

Determining the dominant hand requires a certain amount of competence. Firstly, because the picture may be blurred by previous relearning, and secondly, because it is not always the case that a left-handed child will perform everyday and graphic movements only with his left hand, that is, the leading hand can be determined at the age of six. There are several options for determining the leading hand: questionnaires, tests, samples, drawing. Training is based on the conscious formation of the image of a letter, fixed attention to the spatial arrangement of letter elements, their relationships, the direction of strokes and the trajectory of hand movements. An important element The technique is a holistic perception of letters by highlighting its individual elements. When starting to teach a left-handed child, we must remember that in the first stages of learning he needs special help: it is necessary to teach him to sit correctly, position a notebook, hold a pen, and only after that can he start learning letters. When working with left-handed children, one cannot ignore an important aspect – retraining. Most often, the dilemma of “retraining” or “not” arises in primary school or long before school. Many parents believe that by retraining their child, they thereby help him to live “calmly” later in a right-handed world. Special studies and work experience have shown that retrained left-handers retain finer coordination of their left hand throughout their lives. Very often, retrained left-handers write only with their right hand (and their handwriting, as a rule, is far from perfect), and still perform all other everyday and professional actions with their left hand. From practice, I can say with full responsibility that overeducated children experience neurotic symptoms. You should not expect that this will go away on its own, but you should not self-medicate, listen to “knowledgeable” people, it is better to seek advice from a neuropsychiatrist or pediatrician. However, without the help of parents and teachers, without their joint and coordinated work, it will not be possible to change the situation. But only right choice Tactics of joint assistance to the child will determine the success of all activities.

In our country, a left-handed child is taught the same way as a right-handed child, and that is why there are problems. Difficulties for all children are different and manifest in different ways during the learning process. The process of adaptation to school for left-handed children is special in each case, there are uniform recommendations for correction school problems No. However, there are general patterns of children’s adaptation to school; there are also the most difficult (critical) points in the first, second, and third years of study.

Working with left-handed children, I came to the conclusion that the trouble is not only in the difficulties themselves, which do not allow the child to study well, but also in the constant conflicts that accompany them between teacher and student, child and parent. These conflicts create in the child a feeling of inferiority, dissatisfaction, and lack of self-confidence and self-confidence. The dissatisfaction of the teacher and parents, failures, and lack of constructive help pushes him away from adults, and he finally loses faith in himself. Even for an adult it is difficult to really evaluate oneself if everyone around is unhappy, but for a child this is a completely impossible task.

My experience shows that I work very actively with left-handed children before school, and the learning requirements do not always correspond to the child’s capabilities, and therefore children come to school hyperexcitable, with difficulty concentrating, and behavioral disorders. And not always at school a teacher can understand a child, objectively assess his difficulties, and provide effective help.

About 10% of people are left-handed, and, according to estimates of foreign and domestic experts, the proportion of left-handed people tends to increase. In almost every elementary school class you can find 1-2 (and sometimes more) children who actively prefer their left hand to their right when writing, drawing and performing other activities.

Left-handedness- this is not a pathology or a lack of development. This is a very important individual characteristic of the child, which must be taken into account in the process of training and education.

Hand asymmetry, i.e. dominance of the right or left hand, or an unexpressed preference for one of the hands (ambidexterity), is due to the characteristics of functional asymmetry cerebral hemispheres.

Until recently, left-handedness represented a serious pedagogical problem. It was considered necessary to systematically retrain left-handed children. When retraining, they sometimes used the most stringent measures, regardless of the individual characteristics and capabilities of the child and sacrificing his health.

There is numerous data showing that in left-handed children, neurotic conditions and neuroses are much more common than in right-handed children. One of the main reasons for the development of neuroses in left-handed people is considered to be forced learning to use the right hand in the first years of life or in the first year of school.

In recent years, the school has abandoned the practice of retraining left-handed children so that they write with a hand that is comfortable for them.

However, this does not eliminate the problem of left-handedness for schools, since children with hidden left-handedness remain. It's about about those cases when a natural left-hander is retrained in preschool childhood. Such retraining can be purposeful in nature, when parents, noticing the child’s tendency to prefer the left hand, strive to correct this “shortcoming” and prevent the possible difficulties that await the child in the future.

IN preschool age non-violent retraining is also possible. In early preschool age, parents and educators do not always pay special attention to which hand is the child’s dominant, especially since the direction of handedness is clearly established only by the age of 3-5. Meanwhile, when learning new actions, children try to do as the adult says: take a spoon in their right hand, hold a pencil with their right hand, etc. And left-handed child, fulfilling the demands of an adult, does as he is told, even if this action is not very convenient for him. As a result of such non-violent retraining, many parents may not even suspect that their child is left-handed.

When mastering everyday skills hidden left-handedness a child, as a rule, does not affect the success of performing actions, however, when starting systematic learning at school, especially when mastering writing and reading, such children may encounter unexpected difficulties.

Therefore it is important to determine hand direction child before starting education: in kindergarten or upon admission to school.

To diagnose the type of dominant hand in children starting With 5-6 years it is possible to use various functional tests: finger interlace test, clapping test, cross-arms-on-chest test or Napoleon pose and etc.

In the practice of working with children, the method of assessing the participation of hands in the process of performing various actions is widely used. These can be symbolic actions when the child is asked to show how he, for example, waters flowers, cuts bread, holds a toothbrush, scissors, etc. Actions can also be real, performed in specially selected tasks that require manipulation.

The test battery of such tasks includes the following game tasks: drawing with the right and left hands, opening a box, cutting along the outline of a picture with scissors, stringing beads, tying knots, etc. (Bezrukikh M. M., Knyazeva M. G., 1994).

In each task, the degree of activity of the right and left hands is assessed. Based on this, a conclusion is made about the child’s dominant hand, and appropriate recommendations are given regarding which hand is appropriate to teach him to write.

Certain difficulties arise when choosing a leading hand in ambidextrous, that is, those children who demonstrated equally good command of both their left and right hands. In this case, the following are possible options:

1. Pronounced everyday left-handers, but graphic ambidextrous, i.e., equally good at writing and drawing with their right and left hands. As a rule, these children are left-handed, but at home or in kindergarten they were retrained with early childhood, when drawing, they encouraged working with the right hand. For these children, the process of learning to write goes easier if they write with your left hand, although the quality of writing may not be satisfactory (poor handwriting, writes “like a chicken with its paw”).

2. They are clearly right-handed in everyday life, but they write and draw with their left hand or equally with their right and left hands. In practice, the reason for using the left hand rather than the right hand when writing and drawing may be a previous injury to the right hand, a violation her motor functions. In this case, it is advisable to teach the child write with your right hand.

Determining the child's dominant hand is necessary in order to make fuller use of his natural characteristics. And to reduce the likelihood of complications that arise in left-handed children during the transition to systematic schooling.

However, along with this, there are many cases of successful retraining of left-handed children without negative consequences.

Thus, the issue of retraining a left-handed child in each specific case should be decided strictly individually, taking into account individual physiological and psychological characteristics, the adaptive capabilities of the body and the child’s personal attitudes. In this case, one should take into account the diagnostic results of all lateral signs accompanying left-handedness: dominance of the eye, ear, lower limb (Krylov D.K., Kulakova T.P., 1988).

As already mentioned, left-handed children have a certain specificity of cognitive activity. This applies to both true left-handers and overeducated ones, whose cerebral hemispheres perform functions unusual for them. In the activities of a left-handed child, the peculiarities of its organization cognitive sphere may have the following manifestations:

1. Reduced ability of visual-motor coordination: children cope poorly with tasks of drawing graphic images, especially their sequence; have difficulty holding a line when writing or reading; usually have bad handwriting.

2. Disadvantages of spatial perception and visual memory, difficulties in analyzing spatial relationships: left-handed people often experience distortion of the shape and proportion of figures when depicting graphically; mirroring of the letter; skipping and rearranging letters when writing; optical errors, confusion in writing of letters with similar configurations (t-p, m-l, n-k, i-n); errors when determining the right and left sides, when determining the location of objects in space (under-above, on-behind, etc.).

3. A special strategy for processing information, an analytical style of cognition: left-handers are characterized by element-by-element work with the material, putting it “on shelves”; on the basis of such a detailed analysis, a holistic idea of the object of activity is built. This largely explains the slowness of left-handed children, since in order to fully perceive or understand they need a longer, step-by-step processing of the material (Mikadze Yu. V., Korsakova N. K., 1994).

3. Weakness of attention, difficulty switching and concentrating.

4. Speech disorders: errors in sound-letter analysis.

The listed features most directly affect the success of mastering academic skills, primarily writing (to a lesser extent, reading), which left-handed children have the greatest difficulty mastering.

One of the most important features left-handed children is their emotional sensitivity, increased vulnerability, anxiety, touchiness, irritability, as well as decreased performance and increased fatigue. This is a consequence not only of the specifics of interhemispheric asymmetry, but also of attempts at relearning, which many left-handed children could not avoid (dextrastress).

In addition, the fact that approximately 20% of left-handed children have a history of complications during pregnancy and childbirth, birth injuries (according to some data, birth trauma can be one of the causes of left-handedness, when the functions of the damaged left hemisphere, more susceptible to influence unfavorable conditions, partially taken over by the right hemisphere).

The increased emotionality of left-handed children is a factor that significantly complicates adaptation to school. For left-handers, the transition to school life is much slower and more painful than for most peers.

A child's left-handedness can be identified by a psychologist during the child's enrollment in school.

During the first grade (and possibly for a longer time), left-handed students may need to carry out a complex special classes, aimed at development:

Hand-eye coordination;

Accuracy of spatial perception;

Visual memory;

Visual-figurative thinking;

Ability to holistically process information;

Motor skills;

Phonemic hearing;

When organizing developmental work, a psychologist may need to involve in cooperation speech therapist and child psychoneurologist. When working with left-handed children, one should take into account certain features of developing their learning skills, first of all writing skills.

For left-handed people, it is recommended to turn the notebook to the right and write straight (not slanted). (Bezrukikh M. M., Knyazeva M. G., 1994). In this case, the way of holding the pen can be different: usual, as in right-handed people, or inverted, when the hand is located above the line and bent in the form of a hook.

When mastering writing, a left-handed child must choose for himself the option of writing letters that is convenient for him. It is contraindicated to require a left-handed person to write continuously. In a class of left-handed children, it is recommended to sit by the window, on the left side
that one. In this position, the child does not interfere with the neighbor, and he
the workplace has sufficient lighting.

Account should be taken into account leading eye when choosing a student’s workplace. The child's desk should be placed in such a way that the information field is aligned with the dominant eye. So, if the left eye is dominant, then the blackboard and teacher’s workplace should be in the student’s left visual field (Mikadze Yu. V., Korsakova N. K., 1994).

The last of these requirements may, however, be incompatible with the first, since the usual left-handed location of the workplace on the left in a row near the window is advisable with the dominant right eye. However, considering the dominant eye when placing students in the classroom is important not only for left-handed children, but also for all other children.

Not all children are left-handed, especially if in preschool childhood attention was paid to their full mental development, will have serious complications when mastering educational activities.

However, what modern school programs, focused primarily on the development of logical-sign, i.e., left-hemisphere, components of thinking, do not provide the opportunity to realize the potential of a left-handed child who has a right-hemisphere orientation. Meanwhile, special studies indicate a relatively higher creative potential of left-handers, which is revealed during problem-based learning and introduction to artistic creativity (RotenbergA S., Bondarenko S. M., 1989).

What are the features of teaching writing?left-handed children?

Statistics show that every year the number of left-handed people on the globe is increasing. According to various authors, the proportion of left-handers ranges from 2 to 8%. There are such children in almost every elementary school class.

Modern scientists and practicing teachers are developing methods for teaching left-handed people to write, taking into account their psychophysiological characteristics. In particular, methodologists suggest that such children should not be taught writing before school, since in this case they may encounter issues that reduce their level of self-esteem.

In the first grade, given the increased emotionality and great impressionability of these students, writing should be taught in a friendly atmosphere, be sensitive to the problems of left-handers, and celebrate even their most modest successes. If, while performing graphic exercises, such children show aggressive stubbornness, then it is better to switch their attention to another type of work, for example, didactic game, rather than requiring mandatory completion of a written assignment.

Requires special attention to the development of left-handed children and technical writing skills. For example, lighting while writing should be right side. Such children place their notebook on the table tilted to the right, at an angle of 25°. While holding the handle, left-handers should unfold back side palms up and to the right so that what is written is visible.

Let us recall that forcibly retraining left-handed children to write with their right hand leads to increased irritation, incontinence, worse sleep in children, and in some cases even stuttering. In writing, left-handed people who undergo “retraining” never achieve the perfection that they achieve when writing with their dominant left hand.

The teacher must be sure that the child is left-handed. If the student acts equally with both hands, then it is better to direct him to write with his right hand.

Special attention requires formation in left-handed childrentechnical skillletters. For example, in a classroom, these children should sit closer to the window so that a lighter shadow falls on the notebook from their hand. If two children are sitting at a desk, then the elbow of the hand with which a left-handed person writes should be located at the edge of the table, and not in the middle. This way, students will not interfere with each other’s writing. If there are several left-handed children in the class, it is advisable to seat them in pairs.

At the desk, left-handed children sit in the same way as right-handed children, that is, straight, without touching it with their chest, keeping their head straight. The arms are also positioned the same as for right-handed people: the elbows are slightly hanging from the desk, only the left hand moves freely in the line, and the right hand holds the notebook.

Schoolchildren writing with their left hand hold the pen likeand right-handed, three fingers. However, to conveniently control the process of writing in a line of a notebook, students can place their hand on the page in two ways.

First way.The brush with handle is locatedunderline in which the student writes. The support for this is the nail phalanx of the little finger and the base of the palm. This is the most comfortable hand position. The pen in this position is held at a distance of 2.5-3 cm from the ball (end of the pen), while in right-handed children this distance is 2-2.5 cm (the width of a finger)

The notebook lies at an angleto the right.Her right bottom corner directed towards the middle of the chest. While writing, the child directs the main elements of the letters vertically towards bottom edge desks. Therefore, the image of the letters will be slightly slantedto the left.This is a natural slant for this type of writing.

When writing the second waythe brush with handle is locatedabove the lineand turns the back of the hand to the right so that what is written can be better seen. The support of the hand falls mainly on the first and second phalanges (on the nail side) of the little finger and ring finger. End of the handlewithoutThe ball does not look at the left shoulder, but turns towards the top of the notebook.

The notebook is positioned at an angle close to right-handed writing, i.e., slanted to the left. The letter itself is tilted to the right. With this method, the student sees the sample and what he writes.

Left-handers are more likely to have disorders of motor development, coordination of movements of the arm, hand, fingers, as well as insufficient development of visuospatial perception, visual memory and hand-eye coordination. This leads to difficulties in the processcceformation of graphic skills of schoolchildren. Thus, left-handed first-graders do not perceive and remember letters of complex configurations well and do not represent the visual image of letters as a whole. This leads to a violation of the ratio of elements, “mirror” writing of letters. The child confuses letters that are similar in image, writes unnecessary elements or does not complete themtheir. Left-handed students have unstable handwriting: uneven strokes, large, stretched letters of different angles.U Such children have a very slow writing pace.

When teaching left-handed first graders to write, it is important to constantly reinforce correct execution praise each graphic task and, conversely, do not focus on incorrect spelling. In this case, the child will have more incentives to achieve results.

Formation of writing skills, taking into account the indicated developmental features of left-handed students, will make it possible to prevent their difficulties and the development of dysgraphia at further stages of education.