The strokes inside every letter
Every printed letter is made of a few strokes: a line down, a line across, a slant, a curve. Children who can draw those strokes smoothly find letters much easier to learn. Tracing lines lets them practise the strokes on their own, before letters ask them to remember shapes as well.
A good order
- Straight lines, across and then up and down.
- Slanted lines and zigzags, for letters like v, w and z.
- Waves and bumps, the curves in letters like n, m and s.
- Loops, a first taste of joined handwriting.
- Shapes, closing a line back where it started.
Next steps
When lines feel easy, move on to alphabet tracing with start dots and stroke arrows, and toname tracing for each child’s own name. Easy mazes practise the same pencil control.
CAPS links
- Grade RDevelops fine motor control and directionality, left to right and top to bottom, and crosses the midline.
- Grade R (T1)Traces simple outlines of pictures and patterns, and copies patterns onto pegboards.
- Grade 1Draws patterns and traces to build hand-eye coordination before formal handwriting.
CAPS starts Grade R handwriting with the body, not the pencil: rolling playdough, screwing nuts onto bolts, cutting with scissors, and reaching the right hand across to the left shoulder. Tracing lines comes after that groundwork, in the first term.
CAPS also names the order of learning for Grade R: with the body first, then with real objects, then on paper. Before a zigzag sheet, walk the zigzag on the floor or draw it in a sand tray.
Summarised in our own words from the DBE’s CAPS for English Home Language and for Mathematics, Foundation Phase (2011).
