My mom was a very loved elementary school teacher. I cannot begin to count the times people have said to me, “Your mom was my favorite teacher.” She loved her students and took the job very seriously. As a third-grade teacher, she taught her students cursive, so there were many handwriting lessons. She noted that she had to help teach some of her students how to hold their pencils correctly. I also encountered this as a fourth-grade teacher. I found that a proper grip makes handwriting neater, and it also helps the hand not to have to work so hard. It is puzzling some of the ways I see people grip their pencils that must exhaust their hands, and their handwriting speaks for itself. I strongly recommend teaching your youngster how to properly hold a pencil as soon as they show an interest in coloring or writing. Start showing your children how to hold a pencil or crayon and correct them until it becomes a habit.
Is Handwriting Still Important? Yes! In the digital age, handwriting is still important. Writing a personal notecard requires handwriting. Writing on a sticky note to an employee or a boss requires handwriting. Filling out forms at the dentist or doctor’s office requires handwriting. You get the idea. Handwriting leaves an impression. Messy handwriting can reflect poorly on the person, and we, as parents, want to set our children up for success.
How to Properly Hold a Crayon/Pencil. I researched and found an occupational therapy article that explains in words how to hold a pencil (Occupational Therapy, 2025). The illustration above is what I recommend and is what the article describes. The article says, and I agree “The most efficient way to hold a pencil is the dynamic tripod grasp … where the pencil is positioned between the thumb and index finger with the pencil resting on the middle finger.”
Prepping Your Child for Holding a Pencil. We may not think about it as adults, but it takes hand and finger strength to hold a crayon or pencil. I know of a first-grade teacher who let her students keep a small play dough container at their desks. They were encouraged to get it out and squeeze it, roll it, etc., to help increase their hand strength, which helped their handwriting. There are other activities that can help your children increase hand strength.
●Activities to Strengthen Hand Strength:
- Have your children play with playdough.
- Stringing beads on a shoe string.
- Sewing cards are helpful.
- Using scissors.
- Playing with Legos can also help.
- Playing games, like checkers and connect four (Occupational Therapy, 2025).
Another Helpful Tip: With my own children, I also found buying wide pencils meant for younger children to be very helpful. They can be found at Mardel’s or other stores that carry educational supplies. Here is a link to the wide pencils my family used on Amazon. If you click the link on the pencils, Amazon will give me a small compensation for the same low price. Thank you for supporting the blog/research in this way.
Point Your Child in the Right Direction. As parents, it feels good to know there are ways we can help our children to succeed. By knowing how to strengthen our children’s hand muscles and how to teach them to hold a pencil/crayon correctly, we are helping point them in the right direction.
Blessings,
Jeanne
References.
Occupational Therapy (2025) Improving Your Child’s Pencil Grip. https://occupationaltherapy.com.au/improving-your-childs-pencil-grip/
