The links between handwriting and composing for Y6 children

Although handwriting is often considered a matter of presentation, a substantial body of international research suggests that the role of handwriting in children’s composing has been neglected. Automaticity in handwriting is now seen as of key importance in composing but this proposition is relatively untested in the UK and the assumption has been made that by Y6, handwriting is a matter of presentation, unrelated to composition processes. This article reports the results of a study into the handwriting speed and orthographic motor integration of 198 Y6 children in relation to their composition and relates it to findings from an earlier paper about 179 Y2 children. The study suggests that handwriting is an important factor in the composition of Y6 children and that a proportion of children suffer from low levels of handwriting automaticity, which may be interfering with their composition