MOVEMENT IN HANDWRITING

A. KINDS OF MOVEMENT
1. Finger Movement - the thumb, the first, second and slightly the third fingers are in actual
motion. Most usually employed by children and illiterates.
2. Hand Movement - produced by the movement or action of the whole hand with the wrist
as the center of attraction.
3. Forearm Movement - the movement of the shoulder, hand and arm with the support of the
table.
4. Whole Forearm Movement - action of the entire arm without resting. i.e., blackboard
writing.
B. QUALITY OF MOVEMENT
1. Clumsy, illiterate and halting
2. Hesitating and painful due to weakness and illness
3. Strong, heavy and forceful
4. Nervous and irregular
5. Smooth, flowing and rapid
C. SPEED - Slow and drawn; Deliberate; average; and rapid
D. DIFFERENT MOVEMENTS EMPLOYED AFFECT WRITING IN – Smoothness;
Directness; Uniformity; Continuity of strokes; and Connecting or curves between letters

MOTOR COORDINATION - The special way in which the various muscles used in writing work
together to produced written forms.

A. CHARACTERISTICS OF MOTOR COORDINATION:

1. Free, smelt rounded curves
2. Gradual changes of directions
3. Pressure is always in a state of change, moving from light to heavy or from heavy to
light.
4. Speed
5. The shading impulse is distributed over a considerable length of the line whereas in
writing produced with a slow motion as in the finger movement, the shading often has a
"bunchy" appearance, in which the maximum width of the shaded line is attained
abruptly.
B. FAULTY COORDINATION IS CHARACTERIZED BY THE FOLLOWING:
1. Wavering and very irregular line or strokes with uncertain and unsteady progress. There
is no freedom of movement along the strokes of the letter-forms. The writing is obviously
very slow and is typical of the writing of a young child or for any one who painstakingly
draws a picture of an unfamiliar form.
2. Angular Line - a very common fault of coordination. Curves, large and small are not
smoothly rounded and there is no gradual change of direction. On the contrary, and angle
marks almost every change are direction in the line.  Investigation has disclosed that
angles are accompanied by a lessening of writing speed.