Assessing developmental aspects relating to handwriting in children

In order to attain an understanding of handwriting in children, both functional and dysfunctional, there are various types of measure that are used. The type of test that is most relevant to research into handwriting style assesses the graphomotor capability in the context of producing handwriting itself. Other types of test measure general visuomotor capabilities which are considered to be skills related to that of handwriting. These tests can assess various elements of the execution stage required for handwriting such as the ability to maintain control of the writing implement and other aspects of finger movement (Berninger et al., 1991). A third kind of test measures children’s relevant linguistic skills since cognitive readiness will probably have an effect on handwriting given the inter-connectedness of the two components of handwriting production. However, these latter two types of test will not be used in this research which, rather, will focus on the description and coding of the handwriting style rather than the speed or more general aspects relating to it.

A variety of tests aimed at assessing, describing or measuring handwriting have been proposed. The BHK (Beknopte beoordelingsmethode voor kinderhandschriften) test was devised as a means of assessing handwriting quality in dysgraphic children. The original paper is in Dutch, but the procedures are summarised elsewhere (for example, (Kaiser, Albaret, & Doudin, 2009)) and involve a handwriting task requiring the copying of a text in five minutes or the first five lines whichever is the greater amount, albeit

complex and at the same time each successive paragraph is reproduced in a smaller font. The child does this task without having had the opportunity to see the text and the handwriting is done on unlined paper. Scoring of the handwriting is based on a variety of features that assess deviations from the taught style according to thirteen criteria; letter size, left margin widening, poor word alignment, insufficient word spacing, acute turns in connecting letters or too long joining, irregularities in joining strokes, collision of letters, inconsistent letter size, incorrect relative height of letters, letter distortion, ambiguous letter forms, correction of letter forms, and unsteady writing trace. The assessment procedure is therefore involved but despite this it has a reported inter-rater reliability of 0.9.

The Test of Legible Handwriting (TOLH) is a set of graded handwriting samples that cover the spectrum from good to poor legibility which has been used by various researchers (for example (Graham, Struck, Santoro, & Berninger, 2006)) and which has a typical inter-rater reliability of 0.85. Samples of handwriting are compared visually against the graded samples with a view to matching the test sample to the best matching graded sample.

The Scale of Children’s Readiness In PrinTing (SCRIPT) has been developed and used (for example (Marr et al., 2001)) and is based on the writing of target letters copied by the participants. Scoring is carried out by assessing the appropriateness of the letterform produced. In its original form, this test was not always found to be reliably scored so Marr and colleagues refined it by providing clearer, and in some instances quantitative, scoring criteria for features such as letter completeness, the appropriate presence of parallel

strokes, curve shapes, angles and the an absence of irrelevant pen strokes. These closely defined criteria produced good inter-rater reliability of 0.95 which demonstrates that the more tightly the coding scheme is defined, the more objective it is (Marr et al., 2001).

Berninger et al. (1991) put forward a measure of handwriting fluency based on the number and accuracy of lower case alphabetic letters that can be written in order in one minute with a premium for those able to write it quickly. This was a skill that typically was mastered by most children by about Y2 and was found to correlate significantly with spelling capability. Whilst for most writers, attaining mastery of this task was complete at an early age, Berninger and colleagues found that many children that displayed handwriting problems and who had been referred for remedial help had not yet mastered this task, showing hesitancy and a re-touching of the handwriting indicative of an absence of automaticity.

The Evaluation Tool of Children’s Handwriting (ETCH) was developed by Amundson and has been used by a number of authors (for example (Koziatek & Powell, 2002)). The test consists of a number of handwriting tasks including writing the alphabet from memory in cursive upper- and lower-case, writing numerals 1 to 20 from memory, near point copying (five words with the source adjacent to the writer), far point copying (seven words with the source at a distance from the writer) together with several other similar tasks. The assessment of the handwriting is then based primarily on legibility, focussing on letter formation, size, alignment and spacing, although observation of biomechanical factors is also included. The

complexity of the scoring system and its subjective nature entail some operator training to ensure reasonable consistency of scoring.

Phelps, Stempel & Speck (1985) describe the Children’s Handwriting Evaluation Scale (CHES) in which the handwriting quality of a piece of copied handwriting containing 197 letters is assessed against five parameters which are letterform, slant consistency, rhythm, spacing and general appearance with each category being scored as 0 or 1, hence giving a maximum quality score of 5. This binary approach on just five criteria would not be sufficiently discriminating to be of value in assessing style development as required by this research.

The handwriting problems that occur in children suffering from a number of conditions can be assessed by the Minnesota handwriting test which was designed specifically with such requirements in mind (Reisman, 1991). It is intended for use in young children aged about seven or eight and it is sensitive to small changes in handwriting performance. Participants are asked to copy a selection of words within a specified time. Handwriting samples are assessed for the legibility of each individual letter in terms of form together with spacing between letters (measured), alignment and appropriate letter form. The test has been used by a number of authors, for example to assess handwriting in those suffering from cerebral palsy (Bumin & Kavak, 2008). They found that in about 60 paired children there was a significant correlation between handwriting performance and sensory and cognitive function. Whilst this method of assessing handwriting is applicable in some instances, it is not relevant to the current research which is aimed at

assessing the variation of letter form (style) in healthy children over a prolonged period of time capturing essentially all of their school years.

Stott and colleagues devised an assessment process known as the diagnosis and remediation of handwriting problems (Stott, 1977). The handwriting samples are produced by children prompted by pictorial cues. The assessment process considers a variety of factors including alignment and position of letters, consistency of letter size and pen control (tremor). Interestingly, this test also requires direct observation and assessment of the handwriting being executed with factors such as posture, pen grip and head position being recorded.

Karlsdottir (1996) describes a system of assessing handwriting that scores alignment, size, spacing and letter shape, for example, taking particular note of the internal consistency of the handwriting. Thus, if the baseline of the handwriting is even this is taken to indicate mastery of this dimension of handwriting production, but if there are instances where the baseline deviates markedly from the typical baseline of that same piece of handwriting then this is taken to indicate a lack of mastery. This test produced inter-rater reliability of 0.80.

The value of a tool that purports to assess handwriting quality can be measured along a number of dimensions. In particular, the test needs to be valid and it also needs to be reliable in its administration. In addition, where children are concerned, there are operational issues of timeliness and complexity that need to be borne in mind. Some writers have found tests of visuomotor capability to be helpful in the identification of functional and

useful (Doeringer, 1998; and Phelps et al., 1985). Karlsdottir (1996) instead suggests that there is, by contrast, a real benefit to the child to have a sound understanding of letterform (Graham & Weintraub, 1996); in other words, of the two components of the writing process, the cognitive component is of greater significance than the visuomotor component, albeit there is always likely to be some effect on handwriting in individuals that have poor motor control.

Once children get past the age at which the teaching of handwriting tends to decrease, the literature on dysfunctional writing also tends to fall off. However, both cognitive and motor constraints are likely to continue to play at least some part as handwriting develops in later years, determining handwriting ability and perhaps, in some individuals, affecting academic performance into secondary school and beyond (Longcamp, Anton, Roth, & Velay, 2003).

As noted previously, a variety of factors change in children’s handwriting as they develop including size, speed and legibility. Graham et al., (2006) used the various kinds of measure employed by the various assessment schemes of young children’s handwriting during the first two years in which it is taught, to try to dissect which elements were most related to legibility and quality in writing tasks that involved both copying and composing. Spacing between words, spacing between letters, alignment, letter height, letter slant, reversals (in which a letter is written as its mirror image), added strokes, missing strokes and missing letters were all scored. The authors found that, with the exception of slant, all other elements of the handwriting were correlated with good and poor handwriting. Letter placement and

spacing was more variable in poor writers. In addition, performance was affected by task. In both good and poor writers, the quality of the handwriting as measured by these parameters was poorer when the handwriting task was a composition task rather than a copying task. This is consistent with the view that composition is more demanding than copying (due to the increased cognitive and linguistic demands of the former) and this is reflected in the production of letters (in terms of size and slant but not in terms of their letterforms - style) and the spacing of the handwriting. These findings impact on this research inasmuch as they suggest that the parameters measured to assess handwriting quality are more variable in poor writers than in their more skilful colleagues and that the appearance and consistency of handwriting will vary depending upon whether it is a copying or composing task.

This survey of testing procedures targeted at children’s handwriting quality is not exhaustive but the kinds of category used in them keep recurring, focussing on descriptors of handwriting quality, such as appropriate form, size and consistency. Whilst the tests may be more or less useful in a variety of settings, particularly those requiring assessment for remediation purposes (Feder & Majnemer, 2003), none are concerned with the style of the handwriting in terms of its structure, proportions and symmetry and it is categories such as these that will be used in this research as described in Chapter 4. Nonetheless, the findings of Graham et al., (2006) show that in general poor writers may be less consistent in the general qualities of their handwriting and that different tasks impose different constraints on the

handwriting process. These factors will be considered when the style of handwriting is assessed in the following chapters.

In order to measure handwriting style the dimensions of letter formation that can vary will be discussed next followed by a review of the forensic literature on handwriting classification.