Handwriting Development By Age?

[chud]

[Paddler]

I began writing in a journal when I was 11 years old (1957). My writing is still the same as it was then. Even when I try to write with my off hand, it is still recognizable.

[Fullangr]

Generally children develop a recognisable style by about six if they're taught effectively, but whether that style survives to adulthood depends on all sorts of factors. Some teachers are of the (ridiculous IMO) opinion that handwriting should be uniform, with as little variation across individuals as possible - I speak from experience when I say a year with a teacher like that can completely change your writing, and not always for the better. Also, some people have more adaptable handwriting than others. Mine is very easily influenced by choosing or having to write differently, such as when teaching children cursive, and it's not always easy to get back to something that feels like 'mine'. In fact, I teach cursive so much now I'm teaching that I've resorted to keeping samples of my 'natural'(ish) hand, to refer to when I get stuck in school cursive mode. Which is really annoying, because I write with thick italic nibs, and certain letters are unreadable in school cursive with a thick nib

 

That said, it's perfectly possible for a style that emerges as early as five or six to be recognisable when the child reaches adulthood. Really just depends on how much influence is exerted on the child's handwriting, and if anyone actively tries to change it. The teachers who tried to change my handwriting were fixated on my non-standard pen grip and refusal to join all my letters (I still prefer printing some letters now) and while I can see their point now I'm a teacher myself, it's also left me without a really natural, default writing style and struggling to hold onto what I think of as 'my' handwriting, which I'm really not sure I'd like to do a child.

 

 

It does have some advantages though. I get used to new calligraphic alphabets very quickly, and I can usually date old examples of my written work based purely on how I was writing at the time. Such as being able to spot my Year Six work, because the teacher I had that year wouldn't stop going on about my 'a's, so I started using the continental 7 with a stroke through it, just to irritate her (she couldn't say anything because I had Maths with someone else, who used that 7). I was a very strange child.