How to Teach Prewriting Activities to Preschoolers
Before children can learn to write, they must learn prewriting skills. These include the alphabet, basic hand-eye coordination, fine motor skills and how to control a pen or pencil. Since preschool children often already enjoy scribbling and coloring, you can take these basic skills and turn them into prewriting activities.
Instructions
Introduce the alphabet to students who are not yet familiar with letters. Preschoolers must grasp the concept of letters before they will be interested in recreating them on paper. Teaching a student how to spell his name is one way to introduce words. Write his name out and teach him the letters until he can verbally spell his name. If you have a student who already knows how to spell his name, teach him another word that will interest him (such as cat, dog, train, ball, doll, etc.). Allow students to experiment with their fine-motor skills before diving into writing. Scribbling with crayons, chalk, colored pencils and markers always helps fine-motor skills, but so do other non-writing activities. Encourage students to create projects with their hands that use small pieces. For example, ask students to string macaroni on yarn to create necklaces or use large plastic "needles" to sew. Creating letters with play dough and painting shapes also develops little hands. Teach preschoolers prewriting by beginning with a basic activity that introduces them to hold a pencil properly. Demonstrate how to hold a pencil and encourage the child to hold it in a way that is comfortable. Once the child is at ease with this instrument, have him practice drawing lines and circles or other shapes before you get to letters. Ask students to trace letters by giving them activity worksheets. Worksheets usually ask the student to follow dots to create a letter, so it is a bit like connect-the-dots and can be viewed as a game. If students get frustrated with not being able to draw a straight line, mix it up a bit. Allow students to use paintbrushes or big markers and try to recreate letters on easels. You can always go back to properly drawing lines and circles if toddlers are more comfortable with that. Introduce activities that involve play writing. Create a big mailbox and let students pretend to write letters and mail them. Students don't need to actually write anything -- they can scribble on paper and envelopes -- but it will get them excited about writing. You can also ask students to create signs for the classroom or invitations to a party.
