I found that the students with poor fine motor skills have really low self-confidence regardless of what age. Maybe they see their peers writing, drawings, and colorings or maybe they keep hearing how poor their handwriting is. In 16 years, I can’t remember one student of mine that didn’t at least attempt to draw when guided. What I like about drawing is how subjective it is. I actually like the “imperfections.” I tell my students that drawing is just a bunch of straight and curvy lines (similar to writing). As they go through the process of a directive drawing activity, I would provide verbal prompts such as “does that look the same” or “what shape or letter does that look like”. With students, that have visual spatial difficulties, before they draw their next line I will say, “where do you think you should start? Above, below, to the right, or left?”. Same thing with size “does that circle look bigger or small than this one?” My strength as an OT is building confidence. Once the student sees the finished product, even though they may have only done a little line at a time, you can see how proud they are. Then I incorporate the writing. Maybe it’s just a title, name, copying sentences or generating sentences. Oh and it helps, when the teacher provides positive feedback also. So here is a quick drawing. If the student doesn’t know who Pikachu is, they can always just make up a story.
DrawOT 