Legible Handwriting: It’s more than the ABC’s

Writing is communication We write in order to: Remind ourselves of something we want to remember Tell another person what we know Let a person know what we want

Writing needs to be legible “Legible” means that our writing is easy to read We need to be able to read what we write Others need to be able to read what we write But how do we know if it is legible?

Legible handwriting follows 6 simple rules All letters are anchored on the foot line. Tall letters are tall. Short letters are short. Tail letters go below the foot line. There are spaces between words. Letters within words should be close together

Rule number 1 All letters are anchored on the foot line. Picture of Aladdin’s Genie

Even when there isn’t a foot line, Pictures slide in: Cereal box Car logo you can still imagine one is there.

Sometimes the foot line is not straight.

Rule 2: Tall letters are tall. ALL CAPITAL LETTERS & NUMBERS FIT THIS RULE Lower case letters that fit between the head line and the foot line. Here they are: b, d, f, h, k, l, & t ADD deal teeth TEN head line Samples of what happens when rules are not followed. foot line

Let’s take a look. Genie again Here’s the rule with capital letters. See how using this rule makes all the letters the same size.

Here is a first grade friend’s writing. Notice the tall letters touch the top and bottom lines, or the head and foot lines.

Rule 3 - Short letters are short. These are lowercase letters that fit between the belt line and the foot line. mom cow is run as belt line foot line

Here is another friend’s writing. Notice that he is keeping the short letters in the short letter space.

g j p q y Rule number 4 Tail letters go below the foot line. There are only 5 of these, and they are g j p q y

Here’s an example of where they go. foot line

Here’s a friend who remembered the rule about “tail” letters. She made sure the “tail” letters went below the foot line as she was writing.

Rule number 5 There are spaces between words. Sometimes we use our finger to help us remember to put in the spaces. Sometimes more than one!

Rule number 6: Letters within words should be close together. See how she writes the letters within each word close together.

I’ll bet you are getting pretty good at finding when the rule is followed. This person is pretty good at rule 5. Can you find the spots where he forgot?

So, here it is again…our 6 rules. All letters touch the foot line. Tall letters are tall. Short letters are short. Tail letters go below the foot line. There are spaces between words. Letters within words should be close together.

Happy writing!