Advice for a Lefty Child

What helped my son since he is a lefty are those little rubber pieces that they can slide onto the end of the pencil where you hold it. It shows them where to position their fingers. Sorry I don't know the name but they look like a litte eraser

Since you are right handed and she is left handed, if you sit across a table from her, it will be like a mirror image. She will be able to copy how you hold a pencil.

I am a lefty =)

Have her try and mirror what you do. It doesn't need to be perfect. I kind of taught myself to hold the pencil from looking at my mom's hands, and I STILL do something funky with one of my fingers =)

You will do fine!

My lefty figured it out on his own.

I have one son (4) that is a lefty and he figured it out on his own. In fact, he was the only kid in his preschool class last year that knew how to write his name without any help.

She will figure it out! I did.. She is still really young. Although my dd kindergarten teacher recommended the pencil that are made for beginners.. They are a fatter shape and they are a brand Ticondia. I had a hard time finding them but I found them at Fred Myer a kroger brand store and I had to ask the sale people where they were.
L.

yes, it'll be easy for her to figure it out. The important thing is for you not to show stress/unease over her initial use of writing tools.

My niece/nephew are both left-handed. I have ordered online lefty gear, including scissors & notebooks. They love them!

I'm a lefty and so is my 7 year old daughter. She holds her pencil correctly...always has really. But I do think that was one of the things they focused on at her preschool...how to properly hold a pencil.

I have the opposite problem. My husband & I are lefty & my 2 boys write with their right hand. With my 1st son he got it on his own & he is a great drawer. Neither one of us taught him. My second son...well he needs help. I get frustrated not being able to help him. He went to preschool & I was told not to worry that he will get it on his own. If you want to help her maybe dot the letters or whatever you are teaching her & have her trace. Even if she holds the pencil wrong she will soon figure it out. Or you can start by strengthening her fingers by cutting things.
Good luck

Updated

I have the opposite problem. My husband & I are lefty & my 2 boys write with their right hand. With my 1st son he got it on his own & he is a great drawer. Neither one of us taught him. My second son...well he needs help. I get frustrated not being able to help him. He went to preschool & I was told not to worry that he will get it on his own. If you want to help her maybe dot the letters or whatever you are teaching her & have her trace. Even if she holds the pencil wrong she will soon figure it out. Or you can start by strengthening her fingers by cutting things.
Good luck

It's like teaching in a mirror. She sits opposite you and does what you do, just the mirror image. My mom taught me to write, cut, tie knots and knit that way. I have to do the same with my son (he is right handed). Also - her teachers will be used to teaching lefties.

She's still very young...most children at her age (even right-handed kids) can't hold a pencil the "correct" way. In my kindergarten class, most kids can't hold their pencil correctly. She'll learn as she gets older. But if you REALLY want to help her, use the mirror strategy, as others have said. I'm a lefty, and nobody else in my family is. I don't remember anyone teaching me how to use it. I'm pretty sure I just figured it out on my own.

I have a lefty too that figured it out!

I have a lefty too and she had no problem learning it on her own. She'll figure it out.

Whatever you do please please help her to write "like" a right hander - I am left handed and I write like a right handed person meaning...I write with my hand and wrist down - not bent over like so many left handers. Also, my mom found me all sorts of left handed things when I was in school and it was so appreciated. Left handed notebooks, left handed scissors, etc. It was a life saver. My hubby and I are both left handed and my son isn't but my daughter is leaning that way. My mother is right handed but refused to teach my how to tie my shoes - she just couldn't do it so my lefty aunt had to. But, 3-1/2 is pretty young - like the other moms said...sit across from her - that will help as well. I had nobody to learn from and I figured it out (with my mom forcing my to write correctly that is).

I have 2 leftys...they had to figure it out...and did! no worries.

I am a lefty, my kids are righty's. I never showed them how to hold a pencil. I guess they figured it out on their own.:)

She'll probably figure it out on her own, but try googling - you never know what you can find. Good luck!

Well, I am a righty, but I have held my pencil wrong all my life. It is very difficult to teach my (also righty) DD how to hold her pencil.
The only reason I have given it any thought was because our ped. said something while DD was drawing at a visit.

Apparently, DD (almost 6) has figured it out well enough-she draws some amazing pictures. :)

I think she'll figure it out on her own. My son did. And I recall when I was in grade school wayyyyyyyyy back in the 60s, the teachers showed us the direction of the paper when we were learning cursive writing. But who knows what they do in schools anymore.

Hey! She just has a different set of connectors than righties. She'll be unique. My one son is the only leftie among 2 brothers, a wife, me the mom, and his late dad, all of whom are/were righties. But some of these catalogs have t shirts of famous people who were lefties and you can even get your child's name included. Custom made!!!! LOL. I think that was Catalog Favorites. But office supply stores should have lefty stuff like scissors for creativity.
Here's a story for some levity. When I was growing up, my sisters and I took piano lessons. Our teacher was a lovely lady. Her husband was a rightie, but broke his arm once. So he taught himself to use his left and became rather good at it until he ultimately was ambidextrous. Used to drive my teacher nuts! "Sheldon! Will you stop it!!!?????" They were such funny people! Sheldon used to call me Giggles.

My son is a lefty and my husband and his grandparents are all righties.(great aunt and greatgranparents are lefties). My son had it figured out in preschool before that he used both but when they started writing their names he used only his left. I never worried about it but I tend to not worry about the same things other mothers do,they never even occur to me and some things probably should....

I probably shouldn't answer this question. I am the mom of a lefty. He is now 17 years old and I still have never remembered to buy him a leftie pair of scissors for the house, lol! Seriously though, she will figure it all out on her own.

She should be able to figure it out on her own for the most part. As a teacher, I taught cursive writing when I taught 3rd and 4th grade. I am a lefty and I was always reminding kids to turn their paper at an angle (if you are left handed, angle the paper to the right and for right handed kids, angle it toward the left.) This ensures her arm rests comfortably along the paper, so she doesn't learn to write with that horrible crook in her hand like many left-handers do because they angled the paper the way a right-hander would. Also when it comes to scissors let her experiment with left-handed ones and right-handed ones. I finally had to teach myself how to use right-handed scissors because those lefty scissors with the green rubber handles were awful! I never understood the reason for them! Hope this helps!
A.

We are all lefties but all but my youngest learned to do everything right handed. She, well ya know, we were busy, she just started writing. It is kinda the opposite of right handed, it is scissors that are strange. Anyway, put the pencil in your left hand and try to write, ya I know you can't, but it is the same position.

The most important thing for her to learn is the write way to put the PAPER....don't tilt it in the way that you would tilt it for yourself...it tilts the opposite way. I hope that she can find a lefty to model after she starts learning to write. I am a lefty...my 2nd grade teacher was ambidexterous...she would write with whichever hand the student she was working with used. I think that is the main reason that I hold my pens and pencils in the "right" manner and don't twist my hand all around like you see a lot of lefties doing. I trying think that they twist those wrists around as they try to duplicate the way they see the pencil coming in to write those letters when a right handed person is showing them how to make a letter.
So turn that paper the right way (upper end of the paper tilted the right) for her and let her "Mirror" you as you show her how to hold the pencil. You will run into the same issues with other things like tying shoes...sit across from her and show her the mirror image of what you want her to do. also find some leftie scissors for her...and when she starts cooking....a left handed or 'either handed' manual can opener is GREAT for we lefties!!

I suggest the "Handwriting Without Tears" program...it's absolutely wonderful, and is specially made to not exclude lefties. If you do buy it (and it's not that expensive...well worth it...check out their website) I would suggest buying the "teacher's manual" with it, at least for the first year, because they have a ton of helpful suggestions for teaching lefties to write.