Left handed?

Frith

My Dad is left handed and my Grandma used to say she would have been if it wasn't for being punished for it at school.

My brother is right handed but has a dominant left eye so does lots of things left handed. Holds a shotgun right handed but looks down the sights with his left eye, which is very unusual. He has dyspraxia which is connected.

My oldest son is right handed and my youngest son used both hands equally until he was 5. He then started to write using his right hand. He does everything else left handed except bowling. Although he bowls left handed on the Wii!

I deal cards left handed which I must have learned from my dad.

L

Mrs_Ryan

I'm left handed, but my mouse is on my right hand side - that's about the only thing I do right-handed as I lost virtually all grip in my right hand in an accident when I was a teenager.
I do however tend to hold the Wii remote in my right hand probably because OH is right handed and I copy him - however most of OH's family are lefties so he's patient with me! I agree though scissors can be difficult and i cant use a conventional tin opener - I've always had an electric one.

Buttonmoons

Why was it such a big fuss if you were left handed? I'm a bit :eek: at some of the things on here. They tied someones dads hand to a chair!! Jesus!

DD is left handed (pretty sure!) but she is 3, so it could change. But when drawing/colouring/cutting it's always left hand she uses, though if she gets tired of leaning on one hand, she will swap to the other and she actually is neater with her right.

Never actually noticed what foot she kicks with, know she picks her bogeys with either hand though :rotfl:

NEH

Buttonmoons wrote: »

Why was it such a big fuss if you were left handed? I'm a bit :eek: at some of the things on here. They tied someones dads hand to a chair!! Jesus!

DD is left handed (pretty sure!) but she is 3, so it could change. But when drawing/colouring/cutting it's always left hand she uses, though if she gets tired of leaning on one hand, she will swap to the other and she actually is neater with her right.

Never actually noticed what foot she kicks with, know she picks her bogeys with either hand though :rotfl:

Left handness wasn't accepted in schools many moons ago, i think even in my day 25 years ago it was the norm to teach to write with the right...

I think it also had some moral or religious side to it as well but i may be wrong....Something about being a witch or the devil or something...

lisawood78

I can't butter bread with either hand, I thought it was just me!

Miss_Imaginative

WestonDave,

On first impressions it sounds like your son is very fortunate in being able to use both hands for different skills, i.e. his left for writing and his right for more practical activities! A very lucky boy, I say! (My Nan only developed this skill after breaking her arm when she was little and was forced to learn to write with her other hand in order to not fall behind at school, and can now write perfectly with both hands but does more practical skills with her left).

At present I'm not aware of any Local Authority Services for assessing handwriting, although it may differ in each Local Authority. I'd discuss it with your son's class teacher, they may have had similar thoughts and may be able to advise you with services/programs on offer in your LEA. Plus they may see different things your son does throughout the school day - it's always useful to 'compare notes' from both school and home to get the full picture.

Your son's school will now be teaching/practising handwriting on a daily basis (where possible) and so if they have any major concerns about your son they will flag them up. They may just provide him with some extra handwriting practice to help him with his writing with his left hand. I do this with pupils in my class as my left-handed pupils struggle to get the basics of letter formation and it's just a matter of extra practice to reinforce the letter formation.

Your son writing with his left and colouring with his right... It may just be a matter of your son experimenting, as they so frequently do at this age. He'll be writing all his letters backwards soon enough if he's not doing it already! Like I said, have a chat with your son's class teacher (or teaching assistant), they will be completely understanding about your concerns in not wanting your son to struggle in later life because he didn't get a bit of extra support now!

Let us know how it goes, WestonDave.

Miss_I

Indie_Kid

Mrs_Ryan wrote: »

i cant use a conventional tin opener - I've always had an electric one.

I can't even use an electric one.:o I gave up trying to use one and was given a mannual one that you just twist.

WestonDave

Thanks for all the feedback - we also had a chat to someone who runs one of the left handed support type websites, and it appears that a "mix" is perfectly normal. School are not concerned as his writing is developing well, and they did give us some sheets to practice both left and right handed letter formation with him as a test - he was far better left handed.

I guess it was just the anomaly that he seemed so right handed other than his writing, but we now understand that is normal. We don't really want to cause him stress forcing him to do something which is against his natural instincts - which was really the concern in the first place that somehow he'd got trapped into using his "wrong" hand and felt too far gone to start again with the other hand.

We'll keep an eye on it and discuss it with his teachers when we next talk about his progress, but it seems from what everyone is saying that its just one of those indivdual things that makes us all different and not something we need to stress over.

Wouldn't life be simpler as parents if kids came with a proper instruction manual!

flybynight

i kinda view it as a spectrum from left to right with ambidextrus in the middle......... so very right handed at one end can't use left for anything...... and some of us are close enough to the middle to swap sides occasionally.

Buttonmoons

NEH wrote: »

Left handness wasn't accepted in schools many moons ago, i think even in my day 25 years ago it was the norm to teach to write with the right...

I think it also had some moral or religious side to it as well but i may be wrong....Something about being a witch or the devil or something...

I'll have to tell DD she is a witch then, she'll love it :cool: (I mean seriously she would love the idea lol)

I am right handed, my left hand writing slopes all over the place and the words turn out in various sizes. Though I always eat with my fork in my right hand and knife in the left (which I'm told is the left handed way of eating?) I always pick things up left handed, do my hair left handed.

Just a shame I'm not artistic, as I heard that left handed people tend to be more creative?

No big deal either way what DD is, if she wants to play guitar we will just have to restring the err strings?!