How it works
- Add names. Type one name, or paste your class list with one name per line.
- Choose the handwriting your school teaches: print or cursive.
- Pick a size and rows. The sheet on the right updates as you go.
- Download and print. Every name is its own page in one A4 PDF.
Print first, then cursive
In South African schools children learn unjoined print letters first and move on to cursive in the Foundation Phase. Choose print for Grade R and Grade 1, and cursive when your class starts joining.
Teaching a child to write their name
Capital first, then lower case
Children see their name with a capital letter and lower-case letters on their bag and their books. Type the name exactly as you want it practised, or set Capital letters to “Capital first”.
Little and often
A few rows a day works better than a whole page at once. Slip the sheet into a plastic sleeve and use a whiteboard marker to practise again.
CAPS links
- Grade RTraces simple outlines of pictures, patterns and their own name, where start points and direction arrows are shown on the letters.
- Grade 1Holds a pencil correctly, and copies and writes their own name, short words and sentences.
The start dots and arrows on these sheets do what the Grade R CAPS describes almost word for word: tracing their own name with the starting point and writing direction marked on every letter. CAPS places this in the second term of Grade R, after a first term of fine motor play.
Before the sheet, CAPS has Grade R children “write” in sand trays, form letters with finger paint and make letters with their whole body. A name traced in the sand first, then on paper, sticks better.
Summarised in our own words from the DBE’s CAPS for English Home Language, Foundation Phase Grades R–3 (2011).
