The Spaz with Pizazz

WRITING SURPRISE!
(I'll update this page regularly, so anyone interested in Robbie's writing and drawing progress, please visit this page again)

Robbie's full of surprises. When I first encouraged him to draw nearly 20 years ago he said he couldn't so I just left him to his key board. And he didn't want to draw as he didn't want his drawings looking like a three year old's and making him feel less confident than he already was. He also had a terrible time battling with his left hand trying to stop what his right was doing and needed the left hand to grasp the edge of his tray which was very tiring and a barrier to activities such as eating easily so drawing was not going to be relaxing. So I left him alone. But these past few months I've suggested he try to write with a pen due to his "X" signature improving. Told him it would be handy and might help his fine motor skills and perhaps give him a feeling of accomplishment. But he didn't give it a go till today.

So I drag out the paper and a marker pen all geared up to do the "trace the A" thing and basics. Robbie didn't want to trace as he said he knew what letters looked like. So left him to do freehand. After doing four A's he was pleased with his attempt. Having got that out of his system I encouraged him to trace over the A's I'd pencilled before hand. He did a brilliant tracing job as seen in the video above. The last A became a bit crooked as he was no longer central.

He wanted to trace some more A's so I drew three more.

Having done an excellent job tracing the extra three A's and at a rapid pace he decided to do some more freehand A's.

After the freehand neatness his confidence blossomed and he said he was going to write his name. I couldn't believe it. I'm pleased I videoed all this. The only writing tried while with me came to nothing or he scribed with great difficulty the X signature he's required by law to do sometimes on forms. He said he could write his name at the age of six but it was decided by the school teachers at his special school that he'd be better off with a key board as he was too slow (and they were obviously too impatient). He thinks he was about thirteen the last time he wrote his name by hand. So the above video  captures the first time in 27 years that he's written his name.

Yes, we're going to frame this and hang it up. I was so impressed with the B's!

Robbie was so accurate with his tracing.

Pictures taken from the videos. Note that Robbie only did this writing exercise for about half an hour. So he started with the four freehand A's then traced my pencilled A's below them.  

He then wanted to trace more A's. After the tracing he again did five free hand A's. I am astounded at the difference between the first freehand A's and the second attempt within half an hour. There's obviously a good activation of the right side of Robbie's brain. Now he's keen to do some drawing. I can't wait!! I'm so proud of him. I'll have to introduce him to, "Drawing on the right side of the brain" by Betty Edwards. AND his left hand behaved and was relaxed!!!

14/05/2013

WRITING 'B'

As with the A's, Robbie first freehands the B's.

Followed by tracing over pencilled B's.

Finally, doing freehand B's. Again the improvement within 15 minutes is remarkable.

After doing the B's he now draws his first Bee. He didn't want to look at photos of bees first. Nor does he for is next attempt. He so far is only wanting to draw what is in his head and not be influenced by pictures.

First freehand of B's as shown in videos.

Traced B's

Then the second attempt at freehand B's after tracing.

Robbie's first Bee drawing.

Saturday, May 18th, 2013 

Video 1 (2:24 minutes) Robbie using lined white board sheet. 

Video 2 (2:12 minutes) Attempting the alphabet on blank white board sheet.

Video 3 (50 seconds) Writing his name. It wasn't till a couple hours later that we both realized why he was having such a problem with this session of writing. He'd never written on a white board before so he was slipping all over the place. On top of that he was getting a bit nervous about me standing too long with my bad back while filming. Thus he also ended up with a severe attack of nervous giggles. So I put the camera away and left him to do what he wanted.

So, although still scribbling on the slippery surface, but free of the giggles, ended up with the smiley bee above.

Picture from video 1

Picture from video 2

Picture from video 3

Using paper as a medium is preferable to the white board surface but Robbie enjoyed being able to erase anything he didn't like by himself and he hates wasting paper. But he also realizes that getting familiar with different materials while writing and drawing will make him more versatile and give him more options and open doors to his creativity.

 

 

Over the past couple of days Robbie has been determined to conquer writing 'a's. So this moring he with great enthusiasm took marker to paper. Not having much success he tried to trace over some 'a's I'd pencilled. He just could not do it. Probably because it was rather cold this morning making his hands stiff. And also getting over the tail end of a bad cold didn't help his concentration. So I suggested he not worry about the 'a's and just see how he'd go writing his name a few times to warm up.

 

Warmed up the 'Robbies' looked rather good and similar.