Correcting dysgraphia: exercises for schoolchildren in grades 1-2

Children who begin to learn writing sometimes encounter manifestations of dysgraphia. It manifests itself already during the first attempts at writing in the form of gross errors. At first, parents assume that the problem is the child’s banal inattention, but experienced teachers will quickly distinguish a disorder called dysgraphia.

This is a deviation in the formation of certain mental functions, in which minor problems with the speech apparatus are also observed. The child writes words in reverse and makes a huge number of grammatical errors. The handwriting is illegible. The defect manifests itself more as problems during writing, but it is associated with disruption of the functioning of some parts of the brain responsible for speech.

General information

Dysgraphia is a writing disorder in the form of systematic phonetic errors and incorrect spelling of letters. Such errors are permanent and are not related to knowledge of the grammatical rules of the Russian language.

Dictations or presentations for children with this disorder are replete with errors, which reduces self-esteem and interferes with learning, developing, and communicating with classmates. This problem cannot be solved on its own and requires the intervention of specialists, including psychotherapists, neurologists and others.

According to studies, dysgraphia in various stages is detected in 53% of second grade students, 37% of middle school students. Based on these data, we can conclude that this disorder is stable. Depending on the problems and symptoms, various types of dysgraphia are distinguished, also classified by severity.

Pathogenesis and mechanism of occurrence

Writing is a multi-level mechanism, the implementation of which involves different systems:

• speech motor;
• auditory;
• visual;
• motor.

They successively transform articulemes into the form of phonemes, the phoneme turns into a grapheme, and those into a kineme. To develop writing, a child must have a good level of oral speech. It is now known that the pathogenesis of dysgraphia is associated with incorrect or untimely lateralization of brain functions. These processes end approximately by 6-7 years, that is, by the beginning of school.

If there is a delay in lateralization and the simultaneous presence of left-handedness, disturbances occur in the cortical region. With dysgraphia, a child experiences incomplete development of perception, thinking, and memory. The emotional-volitional sphere of the child, visual analysis and other aspects of the child may suffer.

Causes of dysgraphia in children

Before answering the question “dysgraphia—what is it,” you need to understand its causes. This can happen for a variety of reasons:

• birth injuries;
• infectious diseases;
• genetic predisposition;
• neglected child rearing.

Dysgraphia is often accompanied by a number of concomitant diseases that have already been diagnosed in the child. This disorder primarily manifests itself in the incorrect spelling of letters and syllables. Patients with this diagnosis are not able to write correctly, as they have hearing and visual impairments. The child cannot properly process the information received, synthesize it, and analyze it.

Causes of dysgraphia in adults

The reasons for the imperfection of written speech in adults can be provoked by external and internal factors. The main causes of dysgraphia in adults are:

• brain injuries or surgical operations;
• brain tumors;
• some infectious diseases, such as meningococcus;
• inflammatory processes;
• stroke;
• social conditions;
• lack of oxygen in the blood (asphyxia).

Social factors may include pedagogical neglect, incorrect speech of people around the child, little communication between the child and other children and adults, and bilingualism.

A person with dysgraphia makes systematic errors when writing. They are stable in nature, and the person knows all the grammatical rules well.

The most basic reasons for development are insufficient functioning of speech and hearing (analyzers). The child cannot independently analyze speech and synthesize it.

Mastering written speech is directly related to the development of all aspects of speech function, therefore, children with mental retardation, developmental disabilities, phonemic underdevelopment, and sound pronunciation disorders are at risk for dysgraphia. That is why it is extremely important to undergo an examination by a speech therapist by school age and correct existing problems.

Causes

To help a child successfully master writing, it is first necessary to determine the cause of acoustic dysgraphia. Writing impairment always appears as a consequence of one of the following reasons:

• chronic diseases of the mother, affecting the condition of the fetus;
• infections suffered by the mother during pregnancy and infection of the fetus;
• embryonic brain damage caused by asphyxia or hypoxia;
• birth injuries;
• severe infectious diseases suffered by a child in early childhood;
• traumatic brain injuries;
• long-term somatic diseases leading to delayed development of areas of the brain responsible for writing and reading;
• sociopsychological factors (parents’ inattention to the child’s speech, living in a conflict environment, distorted speech in the child’s immediate environment, lack of verbal communication, bilingualism, pedagogical neglect).

Acoustic dysgraphia resulting from hereditary disorders is less commonly diagnosed. But many experts suggest that it is a genetic predisposition, in which delayed development of mental functions and maturation of certain areas of the brain are detected, that is the main cause of acoustic dysgraphia. In adulthood, the problem may appear as a result of neurosurgical operations, tumor or vascular diseases of the brain.

Types of dysgraphia

There are different types of dysgraphia:

• Articulatory-acoustic. The child pronounces some sounds incorrectly, pronouncing them silently; he makes grammatical errors when writing them. When correcting this type, it is necessary to work on the pronunciation of sounds, words, and phrases.
• Acoustic. Sounds are pronounced correctly, but can be confused with similar ones, for example, replacing voiced sounds with unvoiced ones - b-p, d-t, z-s; s-sh, z-zh. The degree of softness of sounds may be confused.
• Optical. The child has difficulty writing letters, adds additional elements to them - dashes, dots, sticks, or skips the letter entirely.
• Dysgraphia with imperfect analysis and synthesis. The child skips or repeats words, can swap letters, syllables, write together or separately, but incorrectly.
• Ungrammatical. Usually detected in primary school. During this period, the child begins to write phrases and simple sentences, making mistakes in endings, suffixes, and confusing declensions, cases, and genders.

All speech disorders are characterized by problems with the sequence of spelling words. Writing is a process of operation of a variety of analyzers and systems, the interaction of which is responsible for the child’s skills and ability to write correctly.

Acoustic

In another way, this type of disorder is called phoneme recognition dysgraphia. With it, the child cannot distinguish sounds correctly. This phenomenon manifests itself especially often when teaching writing. Acoustic dysgraphia has the following characteristic symptoms:

• replacing sounds that are similar to each other (ringing, hissing, whistling, hard, soft);
• errors in the softness of sounds;
• transmission of individual sounds;
• substitution in one word;
• combining several words into one without spaces.

The most common mistakes are the words “ball - ball”, “perch - perch”.

Optical

The following mistakes are most often made in writing:

• incomplete spelling;
• mirror writing of letters;
• presence of unnecessary elements;
• confuses letters that differ in one element (p-t, sh-shch)
• inability to distinguish letters of similar spelling.

This type develops on the basis of visual-spatial impairments and their incomplete formation. The child can change letters in places.

Ungrammatical

Manifestations of dysgraphia are caused by a general underdevelopment of grammatical structure. There are problems in the morphological and syntactic components. Symptoms of this disorder are:

• difficulties in logical connections between sentences;
• violations of the semantic component in the written text;
• omission of sentences or parts thereof;
• problems in the logical sequence of writing;
• the child does not distinguish between singular and plural numbers;
• replacing endings;
• incorrect word formation, consistency of words with each other;

The agrammatical type of dysgraphia is characterized by incorrect use of cases, genders, incorrect construction of constructions, manifested in the omission or replacement of prepositions and other elements of sentences. The appearance of such dysgraphia is facilitated by speech disorders (alalia, dysarthria).

Articulatory acoustic

The articulatory-acoustic type of dysgraphia in children is manifested by mixing letters, omitting them, and substitutions that are similar in sound. Symptoms may include:

• inability to pronounce sounds and perceive them;
• phonetically similar sounds are replaced;
• there is the addition of extra letters and syllables in a word;
• improper softness when writing;
• incorrect spelling of individual letters.

These errors are practically not corrected, appearing again every time. At the same time, the comments of a teacher or parent do not bring any results. It is necessary to focus correction work on auditory differentiation, especially on voiced-voiceless, soft-hard sounds and correctly pronounce them.

Dysgraphia due to underdevelopment of language analysis and synthesis

This phenomenon is the result of a violation of the analysis and synthesis of speech, the division of one sentence into separate, constituent words. There are violations in phonetic analysis. In general, this type of dysgraphia has the following symptoms:

• the child misses the letters (rain - rain, boy-boy);
• extra letters and syllables are rearranged or added;
• fused writing of individual words as one whole;

Experts distinguish between specific and nonspecific writing disorders, which are associated with educational, social, and psychological factors. The child has difficulty with the sequence of writing speech.

Mixed forms of dysgraphia

This type is one of the most common of all dysgraphias. This happens when several parts of the child’s written language are insufficiently formed. This phenomenon complicates and prolongs correctional work with such a patient. The characteristic features of this disorder are the combination of several speech disorders. Moreover, this happens several times more often in boys than in girls.

“Dysgraphia: concept, types, causes, exercises for correction” material (grade 4)

“Dysgraphia: concept, types, causes, exercises for correction”

Teacher-speech therapist Oganesyan S.G.

In elementary school, some parents are surprised to learn that their child has a specific problem - dysgraphia: the child cannot write almost a single word without errors, while it would seem that he is fully developed and there are no problems with intellectual development. What is dysgraphia and how to treat it?

As a rule, parents and teachers learn that a child has problems with writing (dysgraphia) only when teaching writing, that is, in elementary school. Dysgraphia is a specific writing disorder when a child writes words with phonetic errors or errors in recording sounds. Instead of “p” he writes “b”, instead of “t” - “d”, forms syllables incorrectly, adds extra letters, omits necessary ones, writes several words together.

Dysgraphia can be mistakenly mistaken for simply ignorance of grammatical rules, but the problem lies deeper.

Dysgraphia is a violation of the writing process, manifested in repeated, persistent errors that are caused by unformed higher mental activity involved in the writing process. This violation is an obstacle to students’ mastery of literacy and language grammar.

Moreover, the handwriting of such children is often illegible and uneven. When writing, the child shows a lot of effort, but writes very slowly. If such a child studies in a class with ordinary children, he may experience serious worries because of his mistakes, slowness, and the teacher’s dissatisfaction. In speech, a child with dysgraphia often cannot construct long sentences and prefers to remain silent or speak briefly. Because of this, the dysgraphic person does not have full communication with his peers, and it seems to him that his classmates are opposed to him.

Unfortunately, this is a rather serious problem that “does not go alone”: most often dysgraphia manifests itself together with dyslexia, a reading problem, and the child may also have problems with speech and disorders of other physical functions.

Types of dysgraphia

Articulatory-acoustic. It is due to the fact that the child pronounces sounds incorrectly, which means that when he pronounces them to himself, he writes them down incorrectly. To treat this type of dysgraphia, you need to work on the correct pronunciation of sounds.

Acoustic. In this case, the child correctly pronounces sounds, but confuses them with similar sounds (voiceless-voiced: b-p, d-t, z-s; hissing: s-sh, z-zh; and also does not distinguish the softness of individual sounds) .

Optical. A child with optical dysgraphia has difficulty writing and distinguishing letters: he adds extra elements (sticks, dashes, circles), skips the necessary ones, even writes in a mirror image in the opposite direction).

Dysgraphia due to problems of language analysis and synthesis. A child with this problem in writing may skip or repeat entire words, rearrange syllables and letters, write different words together (they confuse prefixes and prepositions on nouns - write together or separately, attach part of the next word to one word, etc.)

Agrammatic dysgraphia. As a rule, it is detected after grades 1-2, as it requires greater knowledge of the rules of writing words (“good cat”, “beautiful sun”, etc.). That is, this problem is due to the fact that the child cannot correctly inflect words by gender and case, and cannot agree on an adjective and a noun. This problem can be observed in bilingual (bilingual) families, as well as when a child is taught in a non-native language

Signs of dysgraphia

Errors in dysgraphia have the following features:

-Errors associated with a violation of the formation of mental functions that take part in the writing process. For example, the ability to distinguish phonemes by ear and pronunciation, the ability to analyze a sentence into words, the ability to understand the lexical and grammatical structure of speech. -There are also errors that occur when basic functions are violated. But they do not lead to dysgraphia.

-Errors with dysgraphia are similar to physiological errors, but with dysgraphia there are more of them, they are repeated and persist for a long time. Errors in children can occur due to pedagogical neglect, when attention and control are impaired. At the same time, errors are in no way connected with a violation of the formation of higher mental functions, which does not lead to the occurrence of dysgraphia.

-With dysgraphia, errors are observed in a strong phonetic position. Children write “korofa” instead of “cow”, “dm” instead of “smoke”. Common spelling errors are observed only in weak position (“rostok” instead of “sprout”).

-Dysgraphic errors are typical only for schoolchildren (for preschoolers they are still physiological).

-Dysgraphia is not considered an independent disorder. It often accompanies various neurological dysfunctions and disorders, pathologies of the auditory, motor, speech, and visual analyzers.

Eliminating such a problem cannot be done alone: ​​parents, teachers and doctors must unite and agree on their actions. Prescribe treatment, perform certain exercises. Perhaps the child should be transferred to another school (specialized) or hired a tutor who can professionally perform exercises with the child at home.

We must not forget that “dysgraphics” are very often acutely aware of their problem and are afraid to manifest it again: they miss lessons, lose notebooks in the Russian language, and communicate little. The task of adults, in addition to treatment, is to provide psychological support to the child: do not scold, show interest in success, help.

E.V. Mazanova in her book “Correction of Optical Dysgraphia” for the treatment of the disease suggests carrying out correctional and speech therapy work in these main areas: Expanding the volume of the child’s visual memory; Mastering graphic symbolization; Development of visual perception, analysis and synthesis; Development of auditory analysis and synthesis; Development of visual gnosis (recognition of color, size and shape); Formation of temporal and spatial representations; Formation of graphomotor skills; Differentiation of letters that have kinetic and optical similarities. Correction of optical dysgraphia includes many different exercises that contribute to the above areas. For example, to develop visual gnosis, experts recommend naming contour, crossed out and superimposed images of objects, as well as completing their drawings. To improve color perception, exercises such as naming colors in pictures, grouping them by color background or shades, and painting various geometric shapes in specific colors according to instructions are practiced. Correction of dysgraphia, according to Mazanova, also includes letter recognition exercises. So, you can ask the child to find a certain letter among a number of others, identify letters that are located incorrectly, identify letters superimposed on each other, etc. The next stage is the development of visual memory and spatial perception. In this case, when correcting dysgraphia, according to Mazanova, exercises such as memorizing pictures or objects, their location and reproduction after a certain time are carried out. Spatial orientation requires several types of orientation: In one’s own body (including differentiation of left and right parts); In the surrounding world; On a piece of paper.

To correct dysgraphia, Mazanova also recommends paying great attention to the differentiation of letters, which includes writing them in isolation:

-In syllables;

-In words;

-In phrases;

- In sentences;

- In the text.

Correction of dysgraphia and dyslexia is usually divided into 4 main stages:

-Diagnostic;

— Preparatory;

— Corrective;

-Evaluative.

The first stage of correction of dysgraphia and dyslexia involves identifying these disorders in children using dictations, examining the state of the lexical and grammatical aspects of speech and analyzing its results. The second stage is aimed at the general development of manual motor skills, spatial-temporal concepts, memory and thinking. The third stage of correction of dysgraphia and dyslexia is characterized by overcoming dysgraphic disorders. The work in this case is carried out mainly at the syntactic, lexical and phonetic levels and is often aimed at eliminating problems with coherent speech, reading and sound pronunciation. The last stage of the methodology is designed to evaluate the results of correction of dysgraphia and dyslexia, so it usually involves re-testing writing and reading skills, as well as analyzing all kinds of children’s written work.

Exercises to develop phonemic processes

1. Differentiation of oppositional sounds (voiced and voiceless consonants).

Goal: development of phonemic awareness; inclusion in the work of the auditory, visual, tactile, motor, speech motor analyzer.

When differentiating consonants, it is better to work in this order:

heard, pronounced, distinguished, written down.

When pronouncing syllables, hand movement is involved: voiced sounds are at the top, and voiceless sounds are at the bottom. At first, it is very difficult for a child to repeat correctly by ear the teacher. However, the coordinated work of speech with hand movement gives amazing results.

2. Find the word by sound.

After the child understands the difference in the pronunciation of voiced and voiceless sounds, we prepare two cards. On one we draw the sign “+”, respectively, this card denoting a ringing sound; on the second card we draw the sign “-“, which means a dull sound. We pronounce words with initial voiced and voiceless consonants and invite the child to pick up a card with a plus or a minus.

After oral work, offer to write down the words that you remember in the left column with unvoiced sounds, and in the right column words with voiced sounds.

3. Name a word that is different from the rest.

Goal: to distinguish oppositional sounds by ear; pronounce strings of words correctly.

FISHING FISHING FISHING FISHING FISHING FISHING FISHING FISHING ROD; DACHKA - CAR - CAR - CAR

4. Ball games.

Ball games are aimed not only at the development of phonemic processes, but also: at the development of general and fine motor skills; for orientation in space; to regulate the strength and accuracy of movements; to develop the eye and dexterity; to activate involuntary attention; to normalize the emotional sphere.

4.1. "I know five words."

Goal: develop coordination of movements; Expand words knowledge; find the right words.

Progress of the game: the child pronounces a series of words, simultaneously hitting the ball on the floor with each word.

4.2.Curious.

Goal: development of phonemic awareness and imagination, development of sentence structuring skills.

Progress of the game: the teacher explains the essence of the game and shows a sample. Select the sound with which words in the sentence will begin. The teacher asks a question and throws the ball to the child. Students must answer so that the words of the answer begin with the given sound.

4.3. Be careful.

Goal: - development of the ability to determine the number of sounds in a word.

Progress of the game: the teacher, throwing the ball, pronounces the word. The child who catches the ball determines the number of sounds in the word.

At the initial stages, name words consisting of no more than 4 sounds. Such a game in a fun way allows children to quickly develop the ability to imagine the graphic expression of a word, and the switching mechanism is practiced.

5. Games with words.

Practice shows that one of the favorite activities of children is exercises with letters and words. Similar tasks with words and letters are productive in the prevention of dysgraphia. Children actively compose and guess words. This is work and play, from which they get pleasure and emotional charge.

Goal: to activate all analyzers involved in written speech; consolidate sound-letter analysis of words; distinguish between vowels and consonants.

Work on the development of the speech apparatus and voice

Insufficient articulatory mobility of the speech apparatus (slurred, slurred speech) and improper breathing can lead to learning problems. Work on the development of the speech apparatus includes articulation and proper breathing. We must remember that constant breathing through the mouth can impair hearing.

Developing proper breathing optimizes gas exchange and blood circulation and promotes overall health. Proper breathing calms you and promotes concentration. The rhythm of breathing is the only one of all bodily rhythms that is subject to spontaneous, conscious and active regulation on the part of a person. “Breathing through your mouth is the same as eating through your nose” (eastern wisdom).

Breathing exercises can be done at the beginning of a lesson, during a physical education minute, or at the end of a lesson. To concentrate the child’s attention on completing a particular task, you can use a breathing exercise: the hand goes up - inhale through the nose, the hand drops to the level of the diaphragm - exhale through the mouth (repeat 3-5 times).

Whistling, playing wind instruments, “talking” through holes in paper, through the fringe of a paper mustache, imitation sucking, and yawning are useful for developing proper breathing. The child can retain air in the mouth by puffing out the cheeks, pinching the nostrils, and alternately releasing air from the mouth and nose.

1. Breathing exercises.

Goal: to develop correct nasal breathing.

1.1. Stroking the nose from the tip up - inhale, when exhaling, pat your nostrils with your fingers with the sound MMM.

1.2.Wide your nostrils - inhale, relax - exhale.

1.3. Open your mouth wide and breathe through your nose.

1.4. Four-phase breathing exercise. Inhale - hold - exhale - hold.

(Exercises for breathing exercises are given in the methodological literature).

2. Silently say A - E - O, turning your head.

Goal: to activate the work of the soft palate and pharynx.

3. Reproduction of a syllabic sequence with a change in the stressed syllable.

Goal: practicing breathing, rhythm of speech, strengthening the muscles of the lips and tongue.

4. Spelling reading aloud.

Orthographic reading refers to reading a word as it is spelled. This is simply necessary, because children help themselves by pronouncing, correctly articulating words when reading exactly as they are written, Not a ship, not a ship, but a SHIP.

5. Reading pure sayings

Goal: to practice clear articulation; develop a sense of rhythm and rhyme; develop children's creativity (inventing pure sayings)

6. Tongue twisters.

A very important stage in working on the speech apparatus is working with tongue twisters, by working with which the teacher solves many problems:

develops phonemic hearing of each child; clarifies the articulation of sounds, improves the clarity of articulation; develops memory; helps relieve fear of pronouncing difficult words; works on memory; provides a favorable emotional mood to the student; develops proper breathing; helps to feel the melody, rhythm, tempo of speech; helps to increase the speed of not only speaking, but also reading.

Tongue twister is an intellectual and articulation game. The rules of tongue twister require strict, accurate reproduction of what was said. Before you can quickly speak a tongue twister, you need to learn it. Each tongue twister has its own play of sounds and words. The secret of learning them is that each one solves a new problem: linguistic, articulatory, semantic, offers its own pattern in the rearrangement of sounds and consonances, presents its own melody and ri, “Polya went to weed the field,” “Mom washed Mila with soap, Mila didn’t love soap”, “They don’t scare a parrot, they don’t bathe a parrot, they buy a parrot”, “Skinny, weak Kashchei, dragging a box of vegetables”, “Vlad has a brother, Vlad is glad to have his brother.”

Working on fine motor skills

1. Flourish.

Fine motor skills play a certain role in the development of a child, which are directly related to the development of speech and are formed by the age of 7-8. When working with a stroke, the following conditions must be observed: the tempo of speech when pronouncing a verse must match the tempo of the hand. Each hand movement has its own syllable or word. At the same time, the child must control himself: does the movement of his hand coincide with what he says. First, the child follows the teacher and repeats these movements in the air, teaching the hand to move smoothly, and then transfers these movements to paper. The stroke allows you to solve the following problems: development of fine motor skills; synchronization of the visual, motor, speech analyzer.

2.Finger gymnastics

2.1. Games - nursery rhymes with fingers.

A) The fingers went out for a walk, and the other ones went out to catch up (two fingers). Fingers move on the table.

The third fingers are walking (three fingers), and the fourth fingers are running (four fingers).

The fifth finger jumped and fell at the end of the path (thumb).

B) The thumb alternately touches with pressure the index, middle, ring, and little fingers.

2.2 Magic wand.

Roll a magic wand out of a sheet of paper (you can change the instructions: whoever is thinner, longer, neater, will make a magic wand faster). Make a letter from this stick (O, P, B, V, R, Z)

2.3. Massage.

Take a pen or pencil, preferably one with ribbed edges, place it between your palms and roll along the entire length of your palm.

3. Hatching. Hatch any geometric shapes with thin lines from left to right, from top to bottom.

Working on visual perception

1. To develop visual attention, when writing letters in mirrors, proofreading tests are a good exercise

2. "Fly". This exercise helps children develop orientation in space, on themselves and on a piece of paper, and distinguish between a letter and its mirror double.

The report always starts from the center of the square. First, children must move the piece (handle) around the square, then mentally imagine its movement. At the next stage, children with their eyes closed must determine the path of the fly and answer where it stopped.

In the future, drawing of letters is proposed. 5 cells - down, 1 - to the right, 4 - up, 2 to the right, 1 - up, 3 - left. You should get the letter “G”, which can be shaded.

3. “Inverted text”. Plain text page rotates 90,180, 270 degrees. The student must move his eyes from right to left to read the text.

4. "Reading words by half letter." Reading lines with the bottom half of the line covered (with the top half of the line covered).

Goal: forming a visual representation of the letter. Forming the ability to quickly grasp one or even several words.

5. “Warped text.” Goal: to develop the ability to see words written in different fonts.

The children have fallen and are going to school for the first time in the fluffy snow. The guys walked out onto the street with their briefcases in their hands.

Work algorithm: Read the sentence. Find out what the sentence says. Note the features of the text read. Read what is written in print and then in italics. Copy sentences written in printed font. Read the text.

So, these exercises are aimed not only at correcting written speech, but also at developing higher mental functions: memory, attention, perception, thinking, speech, developing fine motor skills, and normalizing the emotional sphere. Didactic exercises expand the arsenal of pedagogical tools. In a playful way, children develop the necessary prerequisites for the successful development of written speech, improving their speech culture, expanding their vocabulary, and developing their linguistic sense.

Literature.

1. Anufriev, A.F., Kostromina, S.N. How to overcome difficulties in teaching children. Psychodiagnostic tables. Corrective exercises.[Text]/ A.F. Anufriev, S.N. Kostromina, 3rd ed., revised. and additional - M.: Publishing house "Os-89", 2001.

2. Kozlyanikova, I.P., Chareli, E.M. Secrets of our voice. Ekaterinburg, 1992.

3. Repina, Z. A. Writing impairment in schoolchildren with rhinolalia. [Text]/Z.A. Repina. — Ekaterinburg, 1999.

Symptoms and manifestations of dysgraphia

It is difficult to establish an accurate diagnosis of dysgraphia without a specialist. Usually, its presence becomes known at school age, when the child writes letters incorrectly. This is often confused with the fact that the child simply does not understand the grammar of the language, for which teachers reduce grades, therefore, the performance of such a child worsens.

Errors due to dysgraphia have nothing to do with mastering the rules of the Russian language. The errors themselves are the same, but numerous. Most often, the child makes mistakes when writing combined/separate words; syllables or letters are omitted. Such symptoms should cause concern for parents and teachers at school. Dysgraphia in schoolchildren requires special correctional work from specialists; the sooner such work is started, the faster the child gets rid of it.

Dysgraphia in schoolchildren can also cause poor handwriting that is incomprehensible to adults. Children with this disorder have slow writing speed and severe unevenness. The height and width of letters are constantly changing, even in one word.

Diagnostic methods

Dysgraphia in primary schoolchildren is diagnosed by studying oral and written speech. Only after this can an appropriate correction be prescribed. It is also necessary to consult a neurologist, ophthalmologist, or ENT specialist. The degree of formation is determined by a speech therapist.

The examination of a child consists of several stages. First, the child’s vision and hearing and the state of the central nervous system are assessed. Next, an analysis of motor skills and articulation is carried out. It is important to consider whether you are left-handed or right-handed. It is important to analyze the phonetic mechanism, sound pronunciation, the child’s vocabulary, and literacy level. After this, a study of the patient's letter is carried out.

A child with dysgraphia rewrites written and printed letters, words, takes dictation, performs exercises using deformed sentences and other tasks. After this, taking into account all the information received, a speech therapist’s conclusion is issued with recommendations for correction.

Diagnostics

Teaching writing should be under the control of not only the teacher, but also the child’s parents. They are the ones who can help you see the mistakes that a junior student makes and turn to a specialist for help in time. To exclude possible medical pathologies, consultation with an ophthalmologist, otorhinolaryngologist, or neurologist is required.

The speech therapist evaluates sound pronunciation, the ability to distinguish sounds in a stream of speech. Determines the ability to conduct phonemic analysis and synthesis of a word, its syllabic composition. Based on the analysis of written works offered to the child, the state of speech is diagnosed and the level of its development is determined. Tests are conducted in which tasks are often used:

• with quasi-homonyms (the pictures depict realities denoted by quasi-homonyms - Mouse and Bear, Goat and Kosa, Suk - Beetle - the child is asked to match the word with the picture and write it down, pronouncing each sound);
• to isolate identical syllables from a syllable chain (dotodo, pabapa, zhashazha, sususu).

It is also suggested to write a short dictation and rewrite a fragment of the text. After analyzing the nature of repeated errors, the specialist makes a conclusion and draws up a detailed plan for corrective training.

Dysgraphia correction

Correction of dysgraphia in younger schoolchildren depends on the severity, neglect and other individual characteristics. With the right approach and the support of teachers, it is quite possible to completely overcome this disorder, but you should be patient, as this process is slow, complex, and painstaking. It is most difficult to carry out correctional work with children of senior school age. In this case, there may be other associated speech and writing disorders. The rehabilitation period in this case may take a long period and may not disappear completely. Correction depends on the type of disorder, the age of the child, and his physiological characteristics.

It is impossible to fix this problem on your own. It will be necessary to involve narrow specialists in this work, such as neuropsychologists, psychologists and others. Speech school will have better results in working with writing disorders.

The bulk of the work falls on the speech therapist. He draws up a rehabilitation program, determines exercises on sound pronunciation, the formation of lexical and grammatical structure, phonemic speech recognition, motor skills, psychology and other factors of correctional work.

The most effective correction methods are:

• written exercises for recognizing similar letters (for a diagnosis of optical dysgraphia);
• tasks for memory, development of thinking and perception;
• exercises for the development of sound analysis in the form of games (puzzles, riddles);
• work on the formation of lexical and grammatical structure;
• tasks for the correct understanding of letters, sounds, words;
• production of sounds, automation of speech.

If a child has organic reasons for the development of dysgraphia, drug treatment may be included. Massage, exercise therapy, and physiotherapy may be prescribed. Such measures influence these reasons, leveling their significance on the ability to write.

Speech therapy correction

The child must have clear, correct auditory differentiation of sounds. If this requirement is not achieved, further correction makes no sense. The duration of work is individual for each child. Classes with a speech therapist can be conducted both in groups and with each child individually.

During classes, children perform various tasks:

• verbal tasks;
• visual lessons;
• practical lessons.

Stories, fairy tales, communication with the child, and descriptions of the qualities and properties of individual objects are used as verbal tasks. Visual methods involve observing and analyzing individual sounds and letters. In practical classes, acquired skills, knowledge and abilities are consolidated. There are also combined classes and methods.

A speech therapy session has its own structure, depending on the stage. At the first stage, there is a need to interest the child and create a certain level of motivation for further correction. The second stage is providing the student with the opportunity to gain new knowledge and information and synchronize it with what is already available. The third stage is characterized by understanding the information received and using it.

Correction for younger schoolchildren depends on the age of the child and is selected based on the severity of the violations and its degree.

Drug treatment

Drug treatment should be prescribed exclusively by a specialist. Self-medication of these disorders can be dangerous to the health and life of the child.

Home exercises with parents

It is impossible to solve the problem of dysgraphia exclusively at home. Self-study exercises can be an additional solution, but not the main one. Correction for schoolchildren differs in its activities depending on the age of the child. The exercises themselves are prescribed by speech therapists, and they are carried out at home under the control and with the help of the parents themselves. There are several simple but effective exercises that you can do on your own:

1. Exercise labyrinth. The child must draw a line on the paper without allowing any breaks in it. The child moves only his arm and changes the position of his fingers and hand, but not the sheet itself.
2. Finding certain objects or pictures. The child must sketch or shade them.
3. Exercises to develop attention when detecting optical-spatial problems. For this, there are tasks in the form of constructing letters, symbols, and signs. You can search for letters in pictures or objects, insert missing words into a sentence.
4. Exercises to develop clear articulation of problematic sounds. The parent and the child look for words with these sounds, learn rhymes, songs, tongue twisters and other tasks. Games for the development of the lexical and grammatical component of speech. This could be “Say the opposite”, “Find the whole”.
5. Logorhythmic gymnastics (logorhythmics) classes.

Systematic implementation of exercises on a daily basis will shorten the rehabilitation period and give the first positive changes faster.

Signs and symptoms

Acoustic dysgraphia is based on impaired identification of nearby sounds. Phonemic awareness helps to recognize the sounds that make up a word, calculate the number of syllables, and determine the place and meaning of each individual phoneme. Phonemes isolated from the stream of speech are distorted, but hearing as a physiological ability of the body remains unchanged, the pronunciation of sounds is normal.

The areas located in the temporal zones of the brain are responsible for accurately determining the sound image of a word and differentiating it from other words. In these areas, an acoustic signal coming from outside is encoded and then sent to Wernicke's speech area, where the analysis and synthesis of perceived information occurs.

After this, the encoded electrical vibrations are sent to Broca's area, affecting the muscles of the speech apparatus. The information then moves to the angular gyrus and visual imagery areas. Changes in these areas lead to distorted sound understanding.

The imperfection of the function of the visual, speech and auditory analyzers, diagnosed with acoustic dysgraphia, is expressed in the manifestation of various signs. Written errors appear due to impaired phonemic hearing. The student does not distinguish between phonemes that are similar in sound and, as a result, mixes up letters denoting paired sounds:

• deaf and voiced (f – v: “wavli”, “fyuga”; s – z: “your hand”, “koslik”);
• hissing and whistling (w – z: “saza”; w – s: “susa”);
• affricates and their constituent components (C and S: “ulisa”, “kurisa”; C and T: “ptsitsy”, “Katya”; H and T: “draws”, “utitel”; Ch and Shch: “rocha”, "shaynik")

Also mixed are the sonorant consonants R and L (“luka”, “radon”) and labialized vowels (O and U: “golob”, “rochey”; Yo and Yu: “dull”, “klekva”).

The defect sometimes manifests itself in the omission or rearrangement of sounds that are similar in articulation and sound. Acoustic dysgraphia is often expressed in the form of an incorrect designation of the softness of consonants (“kolit”, “vosmoy”, lubit).

This variant of the defect is considered the simplest and easiest to correct. But at the same time, this violation often manifests itself in writing even after disappearing in oral speech. The manifestations of pathology may be different. This depends on the degree of change in the temporal areas of the brain. In some cases that are difficult to correct, a person may be diagnosed with several types of dysgraphia at the same time.

Consequences in the absence of correction

Ignoring problems with dysgraphia can cause serious problems, such as:

• inability to fully master the school curriculum, especially the subjects “Russian language” and “literature”;
• difficulties with written surveys;
• intellectual retardation due to failure to master school knowledge;
• anxiety;
• suspiciousness;
• communication problems with peers and classmates;
• low self-esteem;
• deviance of behavior.

The need to write something will cause discomfort and fear in the child. There may be problems with mathematical terms and others.

Prevention of writing disorders in children

Experts are confident that it is impossible to prevent dysgraphia, since its exact causes have not been fully studied. However, risk groups have been identified whose representatives suffer from it more often than others:

• delayed psychological development;
• left-handers retrained to be right-handed;
• children with articulation problems;
• bilingual children;
• learning from rude or insufficiently competent teachers;
• hyperactive children;
• children who started school early.

Prevention consists of certain skills - attentiveness, perception of the surrounding space, memory, insufficient vocabulary. If parents or a teacher notice that the child is making the same mistakes, it is necessary to seek help from a speech therapist or neurologist in order to begin corrective work on time.