Just had this in an email from Keith H – exactly the sort of result we are trying to help create and it makes all the work we put into these things worthwhile…
I recently informed you that I had passed on the left handers survey to my son-in-law a Deputy Head Teacher at a primary school and that he was bringing it to the attention of staff. He has been amazed at the number of teachers who could not identify any left handers in their class – something which has now been rectified. One child was difficult†and had great problems copying tables of words. Having been advised that he was left handed my son-in law simply restructured the tables so that the space for copying was to the left of the word, rather than the right ( the norm) and suddenly he had no further problems with the task.
Brilliant! If anyone else has great stories like this, please share as comments on this post or contact us.
Hi just thought I would make a comment. My daughter has just qualified as a Primary teacher by doing her Post Grad course in Scotland. My youngest son is left handed and I mentioned to her about how much training and information she got at University about being left handed, how to help and support a child and she replied that it was a topic that was barely mentioned at University.
I could not believe that in this day and age they would not have a section of the course in helping and supporting children in the early years of their schooling, not easy being left handed and learning the skills in primary 1 when learning to write, cutting out etc. Our son was lucky his primary teacher in Primary 1 had been an Occupational Therapist before changing to teaching so was a brilliant help even though at 13 he still struggles and finds writing difficult.
Love your site and thanks for your wonderful newsletters
Susan
As a Leftie, I used to print on the left pages of my Binder to avoid the metal clamps. This was not accepted because all my notes where considered backwards. So what I did was take out the paper and Print on the accepted side and then put the paper back in the Binder. I’m curious as to why we can’t print/write on the left side of the Binder? Anyways that can help teaching Southpaws with Binder Problems. Also, my hand writing and printing is horrible! I truely do think it was because no one showed me how to write with my Left. I copied alot of letters putting my paper over the letters (helped alot). Every thing from Math Equations to English has us lefties covering up the question with our Left hands. We are constantly moving are left hand to look at the question. Having the question on the right side would be great! Also, another trick I learned is when you are sitting down to eat always take the far Left side of the table. Saves your Left elbow if you know what I mean 😉
I am a left-handed teaching assistant in a primary school and handed the survey to every teacher in my school. Sadly I only received 4 responses (out of 14) and most of the teachers had very poor understanding of the problems constantly endured by left-handers. I really feel this problem needs to be addressed during teacher training.
Our Year 1/2 children are given handwriting sheets with the letters printed down the left margin – meaning that left handers cover up the letters they are supposed to be copying. Why aren’t the letters printed down each side of the page . . . seems obvious to me.
This definitely needs to be taught at teacher training. At school they do not teach the children how to position their paper and was recently told by a teacher that they just let them hold their pens and paper the way they find comfortable. And I was also given a letter formation sheet for child to practice but this was right handed and the teacher said “there isn’t any difference”! If the teachers do not take the time to teach the children how to position their paper and form words correctly what hope is there for the children improving their handwriting.
Another thing that annoys me is when they do write, hide and look sheets. The words are always on the left hand side so that when the child tries to write the word they are holding down the paper with their right hand and trying to lean over with their left hand to write the word – fairly impossible and frustrating for a leftie as they can’t put their hand down flat to write. Simple solution is for the teachers to do a few sheets with the words on the right hand side – have mentioned it in each year but they seem incapable so I am always having to cut and paste especially if it is in the homework book but I don’t suppose that will happen in the classroom so the left handers will have to struggle. Plus quite often teachers put the homework on the right hand side so it is very difficult for a left hander to reach across the whole left page to do the homework.