handwriting without tears 1st grade screener

Handwriting Without Tears

Millions of students all over the world use Handwriting Without Tears. Our easy-to-teach, easy-to-learn curriculum makes handwriting mastery joyful for students and their teachers.

Research supports the active teaching of handwriting. recent findings demonstrate that writing by hand improves creative writing skills and fine motor skills. in fact, elementary students have been found to write more and faster by hand than when keyboarding., and with the adoption of the common core state standards, the emphasis and expectations placed on classroom note-taking and expository writing in grades k–5 is greater than ever., why it works, the handwriting without tears® curriculum draws from years of innovation and research to provide developmentally appropriate, multisensory tools and strategies for your classroom. the program follows research that demonstrates children learn more effectively by actively doing, with materials that address all styles of learning., we teach effectively with joy. we have figured out easier, happier ways for children to master handwriting. handwriting without tears is dedicated to developing excellent materials for children and training for teachers. as a result, millions of students have successfully used our program. the result truly is handwriting without tears .

Handwriting Without Tears Review – First Grade

(This post contains affiliate links, which means I receive a small commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase using the links. See my disclosure   for more information.)

Handwriting Without Tears is a handwriting curriculum that is part of the Learning Without Tears group of resources. It’s intended for use in a school setting, but it’s become popular in the homeschool community. I was drawn to the curriculum because it was created by occupational therapists and I had a student that was extremely resistant to adopting the correct pencil grip in pre-k. It worked so well for him that I continued using it with him in kindergarten and first grade.

Handwriting Without Tears Review for First Grade

Curriculum elements.

My Printing Book , the first-grade level workbook, reviews pencil skills, uppercase and lowercase letter formation, and number formation. There are a few drawing activities and opportunities to color on most pages to practice pencil skills. It also includes writing activities focusing on words, sentences, paragraphs, and some grammar (ex. abbreviations, capital usage). But I would say that the focus of the workbook is practicing letter formation, which is taught in developmental, rather than alphabetical, order.

The My Printing Book Teacher’s Guide includes ideas for multi-sensory activities. Reluctant writers or students that struggle with workbook work would benefit from these ideas. But if your student just needs practice, the workbook should be sufficient. The parent/instructor can simply sit with their student and talk through the letter/number formations as described on the page, then monitor the child’s work.

The version of the book we used had about 86 pages of student work. If using just the workbook, you can do handwriting three times a week and complete it in less than a school year. If using multi-sensory activities from the teacher’s guide, you may want to do handwriting more often.

What Should You Buy?

• My Printing Book – student workbook
• Crayons – the flip crayons sold by Learning Without Tears are helpful in encouraging the correct pencil grip for kids with smaller hands, but many first graders will do just fine with regular crayons.
• My Printing Book Teacher’s Guide – teacher’s manual
• The teacher’s guide may recommend other supplies for the multi-sensory activities
• Writing Journal B

Teacher Prep

If you plan to use the teacher’s guide, you’ll want to spend some time with it and plan out the activities you do in addition to the workbook. You will likely also have to make additional purchases.

But if you’re using just the workbook, it should be open and go.

Student Time

Most of the pages should take less than 15 minutes to complete, but some students may want to complete pages towards the back of the workbook over two days if still struggling with fine motor skills or experiencing frustration. Conversely, most of the review pages for lowercase letters go so quickly that some students may want to do more than one page at a time.

To whom would I recommend Handwriting Without Tears?

(Based on Learning Preferences and Three D’s I describe in earlier posts.)

Recommend for…

• Students that do well with the Written Word , Spoken Word , and Visual learning methods should do well with just the workbook. But students that need more Interactive or Physical methods of learning may need multi-sensory activities as described in the teacher’s guide.
• Like most early-learning curricula, Handwriting Without Tears requires One-on-One teaching.
• Children that enjoy coloring since there’s an opportunity to color most days.

I would NOT recommend for…

Children that are advanced writers since so much of the workbook is dedicated to letter (and number) formation.

My Best Tips for Using Handwriting Without Tears

• Watch all of your student’s workbook work. Since this level is dedicated to practicing letter formation, it’s important to correct your student if forming letters improperly before they create bad habits.
• Keep the lessons short, no more than 15 minutes.

Common Questions/FAQ About Handwriting Without Tears

Do I need the teacher’s manual/guide?

Yes, if your student needs multi-sensory activities as part of his/her handwriting curriculum.

The Last Thing You Need to Know about Handwriting Without Tears

This is one of my favorite of all the curricula we’ve used because it shows parents that have never taught handwriting how to teach this subject in a logical, stepwise manner that truly helps her child. I’m grateful that I found it!

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The Curriculum Choice

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in Elementary · Handwriting · Language Arts · Preschool

Everything You Need To Know About Handwriting Without Tears

Are you looking for a way to teach handwriting to your little one? Maybe you are looking for a cursive writing curriculum? Either way, you should check out all that Handwriting Without Tears has to offer!

This is not only a guide to all things Handwriting Without Tears , but also several of our Curriculum Choice authors share their personal experiences using Handwriting Without Tears in their homeschools.

What is Handwriting Without Tears?

Handwriting Without Tears (HWT)is a handwriting program created by an occupational therapist. It is a 40 year program with proven success for thousands of students. From emergent writing in Pre-K to Cursive mastery in fifth grade, Handwriting Without Tears helps students develop fluent writing success through explicit handwriting instruction.

Levels of Handwriting Without Tears

There are seven levels available starting in the Pre-K/K level up to 5th grade.

1. Letters and Numbers is recommend for Kindergarten.

Letters and Numbers for Me is where Kindergarten students, or those working at that level, learn capitals, lowercase letters, numbers, words, and sentences. Activities form good handwriting habits and develop strong writers.

A Review of Letters And Numbers By Kyle

When we first began our Handwriting Without Tears journey I read a lot of the kindergarten manual. But after that I have never read or used a teacher’s manual with this curriculum. You may want to but I just haven’t found it to be necessary.

We have a lot of optional items that we use with this program (See the Hands-On Materials section down below) but you really only need the book and a pencil to do this. Keep in mind I’ve done this with five children, including one with special needs and one with learning disabilities.

How we use it in our home:

• First I demonstrate how to follow the instructions HWT provides for creating each letter.
• During the first semester I often had the children make the letters using either the wood pieces, roll a dough or stamp & see.
• After about 1/4 to 1/2 of a year they start being able to follow the instructions themselves. I then just hover to make sure they are writing the letter correctly and in the correct order. HWT tells them which lines or curves to draw and in which order.

HWT provides clear instructions for letter creation. So clear in fact that my five-year-old boy completes his handwriting independently and well. We run the gamut on the kind of learners that we have! HWT has served each of our unique children well. It is also very easy for the teacher to use. ~ Kyle

2. My Printing Book is recommended for 1st grade.

My Printing Book gives your students opportunities to review their printing abilities and reinforce other language skills such as grammar, writing paragraphs, and recognizing key word roots. The hands-on material is also suggested for this grade. There is the 4″x6″ slate chalkboard used to practice making letters. (See more about the chalkboard down below)

3. Printing Power is recommended for 2nd grade.

With Printing Power the student continues to master his printing skills with advanced paragraphs, poems, and language arts activities using single line practice pages. With Learn & Check, teachers and students can seamlessly review letter, word, and sentence skills. Combine your handwriting instruction with punctuation, paragraph, poem, and language arts.

4. Or you can choose Cursive Kickoff 2nd grade.

Cursive Kickoff is the first book that teaches cursive, it facilitates an easy transition from printing to cursive. Cursive Kickoff gives second grade students the option of beginning cursive instruction earlier. After a quick review of print, lessons progress to teaching cursive letters in developmental groups based on formation.

5. Cursive Handwriting is recommended for 3rd grade.

With Cursive Handwriting for 3rd graders they will easily transition from printing to cursive with fun, engaging warm-ups. Students cover cross-curricular lessons that focus on paragraphs, poems, and composition with incorporated letter review for words and sentences.

6. Cursive Success is recommended for 4th Grade

With Cursive Success students develop cursive fluency with lessons that feature advanced language arts and cross-curricular activities. Review & Mastery pages help your students practice their cursive handwriting while giving them opportunities to review letters and connections.

A Review of Cursive Success from Stephanie

The Cursive Success book focuses on making cursive letters connect and forming them into words and sentences. The publisher recommends these workbooks for 3rd and 4th grade but if you feel that your child is ready then I am sure they could be used in the earlier grades as well.

HWT Cursive Success workbook contains the following sections:

• An introduction.
• A warm up for basic letters and connection of  letters to make simple words.
• More difficult cursive letters, special letter connections (ex. o, w, v, b) and more complex words.
• Capital letters.
• Activity Pages which apply cursive to real writing of sentences and paragraphs.

The first fifty-five pages review and give instruction for the lower case letters. Then capital letters are covered. 

And in addition to all this, the last 20 pages incorporates grammar concepts such as: compound words, synonyms and antonyms, homonyms, use of contractions and apostrophes, poems, similes, use of quotations, acronyms, dictionary definitions, and more.

This really impressed me because the curriculum doesn’t just go through the letters and random sentences to copy but applies cursive to real writing skills. This is so important because the objective of handwriting skills is to help children write proficiently enough to aid them in all their studies.  All the while, it never loses the feel of a handwriting text so you never find yourself somehow teaching grammar instead of doing a handwriting lesson.

What Sets Handwriting Without Tears Apart From Others Is It’s Vertical Style Approach

What I believe sets this curriculum apart form all others is its ease of use. It truly does take the tears out of handwriting.  It uses a vertical style approach and most children develop a vertical stroke first when learning to print, so it is much easier for a child to transition from print to this form of cursive. ~ Stephanie

7. Can-Do Cursive is recommended for 5th grade.

Practice makes perfect when it comes to cursive writing. Can-Do Cursive is perfect for the child who needs another year to master their cursive writing skills. Designed for fifth grade students and above, Can-Do Cursive gives your students opportunities to review their handwriting abilities and reinforce other language skills such as grammar, writing paragraphs.

Real Life Example Of Using Handwriting Without Tears (Daughter Is a Lefty!)

We started using Handwriting Without Tears right from the beginning of when we started homeschooling. It has proven to be an excellent program in our home. The beauty of the curriculum is how simple it is for the child to learn! We started using the program at the 1st grade level. My daughter is a lefty and I knew I wanted a handwriting program that would help her to write beautifully.

What is a typical lesson like? It is a simple program to implement. My children do 1-2 pages for each lesson. Each new skill is clearly taught in the child’s book. HWT uses simple explanations for each new skill. In the lower grades, HWT uses “magic bunny” to show how to make new letters.

In the older grades, HWT continues to use simple explanations and drawings that the child can easily understand. The lessons are short and can be done in 15 minutes or less! The teacher guides provides tips and activities for each lesson.

About HWT Unique Writing Paper

Their unique writing paper is unlike any other handwriting program. The writing paper does not have the typical three lines with the middle line being a dotted line. HWT believes typical handwriting paper causes line confusion for many students. 

HWT created writing paper with only 2 lines.

• The bottom line keeps the child’s writing straight.
• The second line called the mid-line controls the size of the letters.

HWT believes by having only 2 lines will cause less confusion for the child.

3 Different Paper Levels:

• wide double line
• regular double line
• narrow double line

Handwriting With Tears Hands-on Materials

The Handwriting Without Tears Hands-on materials are multi-sensory materials designed for children who are getting ready to learn to write and for those who are developing their handwriting skills.

Shannon says, “ I have used these with my children starting at age three, and even my oldest at age seven still enjoyed and benefited from using them.”

Capital Letter Wood Pieces

These are used to teach formation of the capital letters.

For example, students learn to take a “big line”, put it on the left, then add a “big curve” on the right to make the letter “D”.

The wood pieces are also used to teach children how to make “Mat Man”, a simple stick figure person.

Children also learn positional concepts such as top, middle, bottom, left, and right as you use the pieces with them. This vocabulary, as well as “big line”, “little line”, “big curve” , “little curve”, is used in teaching letter formation with all of the HWT products.

Stamp-and-See-Screen

Shannon says, “My children have enjoyed all of these HWT materials over the years, but the Stamp-and-See is probably their absolute favorite.”

This is a 4″ x 6″ magnetic screen that comes with a set of four magnetic wood pieces (big line, little line, big curve, little curve), and a chalk-sized magnetic writing tool.

You use the laminated cards that come with the roll-a-dough set, place one on the magnetic screen, and then use the magnetic wood pieces to stamp the letter on top of the card. When you remove the card, voila – you have made the letter!

After working with the magnetic stamps, you can then use the writing tool to trace over the letter card. Once again, when you remove the card, you can see the letter that you’ve made. I want to mention that the writing tool is the size of a small piece of chalk. Handwriting Without Tears encourages using short pencils and pieces of chalk to help children achieve a correct pencil grip as they are learning to write. This approach has worked wonders with my own children’s pencil grips.

Roll-A-Dough Letters

This product includes a 4″ x 6″ plastic tray, a set of 18 double-sided, laminated capital letter and number cards, and a container of dough.

A letter or number card is placed in the plastic tray, and then the child forms the dough into the shapes needed to make the letter and places them over the letter card.

The dough is terrific for strengthening finger and hand muscles, as children roll, push, and shape the dough into “snakes” to form their capital letters. The tray can also be used for letter practice with rice, shaving cream, or sand.

(Shannon says, “Occasionally I am brave enough to do the “messy” stuff because my children are such tactile learners and really do enjoy it. I just make sure there is a plastic tablecloth underneath the work surface for easy clean-up.)

Slate Chalkboard

This is another favorite in Shannon’s home. It’s a 4″ x 6″ slate in a wood frame with a smiley face in the top left-hand corner. The smiley reinforces top, bottom, left, and right, and also reminds children to start their letters at the top.

The chalkboard is used in combination with a method called “Wet, Dry, Try” to teach letter formation.

First the teacher writes the letter with the chalk, the child uses a wet sponge and makes the letter strokes to erase the letter, and then uses his finger to trace over the wet strokes. Then the child uses a paper towel to dry the wet strokes. Finally, the child gets to use the chalk to write the letter. The child has practiced writing the letter four times using four different methods and typically has had fun doing it!

Hands-on Materials: The Bottom Line

Shannon says, “Using this tactile approach with all the handwriting Without Tears Hands-on Materials to teach letter formation has helped my children to gain confidence in their handwriting skills while having fun at the same time.”

Purchasing Handwriting Without Tears

Handwriting Without Tears is a no-fuss program that is simple to use and very affordable. You can purchase everything you need right from their website.

The Student Books are $12.45 a piece.

Teacher Guides are $24.99 each. The teacher guides are simple but do provide plenty of instructions, tips, activities, and lesson plans. Korey says, “ As homeschool moms we often ask “Do I even need the teacher’s guide?” I do recommend using the TG to get the full benefit of the program. There are manipulatives available for all the grade levels. As the parent you can chose to incorporate the manipulatives or not. The manipulatives are wonderful for a tactile learner.”

Bundles – Plus they offer a variety of money saving bundles.

More Handwriting Options For Your Homeschool

20 Top Handwriting Resources for Your Homeschool – Even in this digital age, being able to clearly handwrite and read handwriting is an important skill. Most public schools no longer teach cursive. So how will kids learn to sign their name? How will they read things like their grandparents letters, old documents, etc.? This collection of Homeschool Handwriting Resources is designed to help you teach your children to legibly write in print or cursive.

Heidi Ciravola is mom to three kids who were all homeschooled. Two have graduated college and one is finishing homeschooling high school. She spends much of her time navigating the high school waters (from electives to college prep) and reviewing homeschool curriculum for all ages. You can find her writing about these things as well as her love of books and homeschool life in general over at Starts At Eight .

Reader Interactions

July 15, 2009 at 9:43 am

LOVED this review!

July 15, 2009 at 1:03 pm

I’ve been wondering about this program. Thanks for the review.

July 15, 2009 at 1:08 pm

HWT is by far the best handwriting curriculum that we have ever used–and we have tried many! I am just sorry I didn’t know about it 15 years ago when we started our homeschooling journey.

September 5, 2009 at 2:40 pm

I will say that the one drawback of the program is that I found it difficult to find my way around in it at first. There is so much information to absorb. I would have preferred a format that had Lesson 1 and suggest game/activity/practice for each day instead of pages and pages for me to read and try to absorb as a teacher. Philosophy notes could be inserted throughout the text with an TOC for that, too. I taught handwriting in the public school for years but just found this program while homeschooling my daughter. I’m on week 2 of using the K version and I do think it is the best and already purchased the PK to use with little brother.

October 25, 2009 at 10:08 pm

Unfortunately I do not agree with the majority of reviews of this program. I find absolutely no reason to not integrate the learning of letter formation with the knowledge of letter names and sounds. The heirarchy of learning submits that first, children learn to listen as infants, later begin to speak, they they begin to apply that knowledge of speaking and sounds to the abstract symbols of letters. Following this extremely challenging process, is the ability to put those sounds together within text along with understanding that text’s meaning. Once this begins, the children are able to begin to write their letters with meaning. It is absolutely beyond me as to why this program initiates teaching the children upper case letters first when all of written print for the children to read consists of a majority of lower case letters. If the reason is merely because, “it’s easier,” a new reason needs to be found.

May 6, 2011 at 10:53 pm

I too thought that kids should learn the lowercase letters first since the vast majority of what they read and write will be lowercase. Then I began teaching my daughter to print her letters. After over a year, I finally realized my stubbornmess on this issue was a stumbing block on HER path to learning to print.

Truly, “it’s easier” is the only reason needed to teach uppercase first. Kids develop fine motor skills at vastly different rates. The uppercase letters are simply easier to write and mastering them gives kids a confidence boost, encourging them to continue learning to write. Forcing kids with average or even lagging fine motor skills to try to master lowercase letters first is almost cruel.

Now, why should learning to form the letters be separate from learning the letter sounds? Same reason – kids gain the necessary fine motor skills at vastly different rates that are not related to their developmental abiltiy to learn to read. My daughter could recognize all of the alphabet and knew her letter sounds at 2.5 years. She was sounding out words by the time she turned 3.5 and is reading at an early first grade level now at 4.5 years. But she only just developed the fine motor skills necessary to draw decent lines and curves. Should I have held off on teaching her to read? Of course not. And if she HAD been ready to learn to write as she was learning her letters, then I could have easily integrated the two lessons myself.

May 27, 2010 at 3:50 am

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Handwriting Without Tears

Does learning to write leave your kindergartners in tears? Use these easy and memorable strategies to guide their pencils in the right direction. With cute illustrations and simple instructions, your learners will be writing paragraphs in no time.

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Instructional ideas.

• Laminate and have kids trace over the letters with dry erase marker
• Prompt kids to hold a sheet of tracing paper over the worksheet to practice making the letters
• Display in your classroom for easy reference
• Create a packet for kids to view whenever they need a handwriting pointer

Classroom Considerations

• Does not include capital cursive letters
• Provides both printing and cursive tips, including more extensive tips for trickier letters
• Great for reading intervention classes or fine motor skill practice

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Handwriting without tears, from emergent writing in pre-k to cursive mastery in fifth grade, handwriting without tears helps students develop a fluency for writing success, no matter where they learn., building the foundation of literacy.

Handwriting Without Tears helps students build essential skills for emergent writing and handwriting success.

Children who master handwriting are more likely to succeed in school, writing with speed and ease in all subjects. But without a strong foundation, bad habits take root. Our unparalleled curriculum nurtures writing automaticity through direct, explicit instruction along with guided and independent practice.

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Direct Instruction Builds Handwriting Automaticity

Handwriting Without Tears' pedagogy guides students to success with:

• Developmentally appropriate sequence of instruction
• Consistent guided practice to develop automaticity and fluency
• Multisensory components engage visual, audio, and kinesthetic learners
• Hands-on manipulatives for developing fine motor and phonics skills
• Simple, student-friendly, step-by-step language for letter formations on student practice pages AND teacher's guides

"Automatic letter writing is the single best predictor of length and quality of written composition in younger students." (Dinehart, 2013)

An Integrated Print and Digital Solution for K–5 Handwriting

Get the expert-backed and research-proven resources you need—in the classroom and online—to ensure student success. Our integrated and print and digital handwriting solution builds confident communicators by getting to the heart of every letter with developmentally appropriate, multisensory strategies.

Effective Handwriting Instruction for K–5

Our handwriting curriculum builds confident communicators by getting to the heart of every letter through developmentally appropriate, multisensory strategies and digital experiences for teachers and students.

Interactive Digital Teaching Tool

Our digital teaching tool supports teachers online with dozens of pre-loaded lesson plans, an assignment tracker, and resources like video, music, and animations to engage your classroom instruction.

Emergent Writing for Pre-K

Ease young learners into their communication journeys with this intentionally designed curriculum. Students build pre-writing and emergent writing skills developmentally through engaging, hands-on, play-based activities.

Emergent Writing Solution for Pre-K

Lessons address general readiness, pre-writing, alphabet knowledge, letter and number recognition, capital and lowercase letter formation, counting, drawing, shapes, and colors.

Pre-K Interactive Teaching Tool

Experience a new digital platform to help you bring Pre-K lessons to life with videos, animations, and songs—all in a friendly voice that connects with children. 

Why It Works Easy to learn & teach!

The Handwriting Without Tears® curriculum draws from years of innovation and research to provide developmentally appropriate, multisensory strategies for early writing. The program follows research of how children learn best and includes materials that address all styles of learning.

Multisensory Teaching Strategies

Multisensory activities and manipulatives appeal to all learning styles and provide a hands-on approach to handwriting.

Cross-Curricular Connections

Teach handwriting alongside other subjects! Fun letter lessons and writing activities connect handwriting to math, social studies, ELA, and science.

Unique Letter Order and Style

Innovative letter order and style are developmentally appropriate and promote easy learning for every letter—print and cursive.

Student Edition Design

Clean, simple, and intuitive approach to student editions invites personalization and fosters handwriting success. Lefty-friendly with large step-by-step models.

Line Success

Double lines and line generalization activities promote legible writing. When children know how to place letters, they can write well on any style of lined paper.

Assessments and Tailored Instructional Plans

Easy-to-use assessments track handwriting progress in the classroom and support your instruction for year-round handwriting success.

Proven Teaching Strategies

More than 3 million students benefit from the Handwriting Without Tears® program each year.

High end-of-year test scores show students using Handwriting Without Tears are prepared for the handwriting demands of school.

Grants and Funding Resources

You've got options! We'll help you find the best use of your COVID relief and stimulus funds by showing you how Learning Without Tears' proven, effective products qualify.

Hands-On, Multisensory Products

Browse multisensory products and student workbooks that make printing and cursive easy to teach and easy to learn. 

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Handwriting Without Tears: Learn to Write Your Numbers With Me! 1 Week Camp

Class Experience

• Students will learn to write their numbers properly using the Handwriting Without Tears method.
• Write numbers 0 to 10. Represent a number of objects with a written numeral 0-10 (with 0 represent a count of no objects).
• Understand the relationship between numbers and quantities connect counting to cardinality.
• When counting objects say the number names in the standard order pairing each object with one and only one number name and each number name with one and only one object.
• Understand that the last number name said tells the number of objects counted. The number of objects is the same regardless of their arrangement or the order in which they were counted.
• Understand that each successive number name refers to a quantity that is one larger.

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Preschool Assessments and Tests

Free, universal, and easy-to-administer screeners for identifying what children know and can do. Available in both English and Spanish!

In just 10–15 minutes, these developmentally appropriate assessments for children aged 4–5 check student progress as they build important foundation skills.

We recommend that students are assessed three times a year (beginning, middle, and end of the Pre-K school year).

Pre-K Assessments

Readiness & writing check readiness.

The Readiness & Writing 1:1 Assessment can be used to assess Pre-K children as they develop their skills. You will assess naming colors, shapes, crayon grip, letter naming and writing. Keep track of a child’s response on the Assessment. As you watch children play and participate in activities use our Observation Checklist to note additional skills.

Download includes assessment, directions and observation checklist pages.

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Language & Literacy Check Literacy

The Language & Literacy 1:1 Assessment can be used to assess Pre-K children as their skills develop. You will assess letter naming, describing and comparing, rhyming, and words/word parts. As you watch children play and participate in activities use our Observation Checklist to note other skills. Keeping track of a child’s response is made easy with our new 1:1 Assessment Record.

Numbers & Math Check Math

Numbers & Math Use the Numbers & Math 1:1 Assessment to assess skills as they develop. You will assess naming numbers, counting and comparing, positions, ordinal numbers, and AB patterns. As children play and participate in math activities use the Observation Checklist to note their development with other skills. Keep track of a child’s response with our new 1:1 Assessment Record.

Keeping track of a Pre-K child’s progress is easier using our new Portfolios handout. Use our Portfolios handout to learn more about their purpose and how they can be used in your Pre-K classroom/center. We offer suggestions for how and when to create portfolios and what types of work samples to include. Tips are provided for how portfolios can be shared with families or colleagues.

Portfolios Information

Traditional paper and pencil forms of assessment are not appropriate for Pre-K children. Our developmentally appropriate assessments address young children’s growth in Language & Literacy, Numbers & Math, and Readiness & Writing skills.

They will help you to: 1.    Identify the different learning experiences of all children in your class 2.    Plan meaningful learning experiences 3.    Measure children’s academic progress 4.    Gather information to share with families, specialists, educators, and administrators 5.    Identify children who might benefit from special services

Assessing young children should be observational and holistic, impacting your hands-on instructional time as little as possible. We recommend using the assessments with each child three times a year: at the beginning, middle and end of their Pre-K year.

Each assessment takes just 10-15 minutes.

Look at each assessment as a snapshot in time. Looking at those snapshots over weeks and months shows the path of a child’s development and learning. Use these assessment tools along with your daily experiences and professional judgment. Do not make decisions about a child’s long-term grouping or placement based on a single assessment.

Pre-K teachers, therapists and parents can use these assessments. They are universal and developmentally appropriate for children ages 4-5.

Some people you might want to consider include fellow Pre-K teachers, parents, therapists, administrators, and kindergarten teachers. This will provide all of those involved a clearer understanding of the child’s progress.