Dysgraphia is a difficulty in handwriting and in the ability to produce a coherent piece of handwriting. Even though the handwriting of all dysgraphics is impaired, symptoms aren’t necessarily identical. Some perform copying tasks successfully, but their spelling is flawed, other express physical difficulties in writing letters indicated by the investment of exceptional efforts in accomplishing simple writing tasks. Still, other spread their texts in an unordered ways making it chaotic and illegible.
Scientists classified dysgraphia into the following three main types:
- Motor Dysgraphia
- Dyslexic Dysgraphia
- Spatial Dysgraphia
The causes of motor dysgraphia are poor dexterity, deficient motor skills or poor muscle tone. People with motor dysgraphia need very much time and a huge effort to form letters. The writing in this case is illegible or poor at its best, and drawing is difficult. The finger tapping of these people is below normal, and though the spelling is normal, many times the writing is slanted because of holding the pen incorrectly.
In the case of dyslexic dysgraphia, people’s spelling is poor and their spontaneous writing is illegible, but their copied work is pretty good. The normal finger tapping of the people with dyslexic dysgraphia indicates the deficit does not stem from cerebellar damage.
People with spatial dysgraphia have a problem understanding the space. Both their spontaneous work and copied work will be illegible in most cases, and their abilities to write suffer as well. This disability is not fine motor based as the finger tapping sped, and the spelling is normal in people with spatial dysgraphia.
These three analytical types serve as gross description of real life people. Many dysgraphics, though, exhibit mixed symptoms, a bit of motor dysgraphia mixed with a bit of dyslexic dysgraphia, etc.
Each of these pure types deserves a different approach, but since these distinctions in practice are not clear-cut, the outcomes are frequently disappointing.
The treatment of Motor Dysgraphia is a frustrating experience since affected individuals exhibit deficient fine motor skills or muscle issues vulnerabilities. For these people writing is a very difficult task, and it requires lots of time and efforts. For motor dysgraphics, dictation is helpful, and they can be assisted by using the excellent Siri on Mac/iOS, Google dictation on Android as well as fast improving Microsoft dictation available on Windows-10. The text after dictation should be further corrected to fix all confused words, possible homophones and punctuation errors.
Yet another option in certain cases of Motor Dysgraphia is to try Word-Prediction techniques. In general, Word-Prediction is supposed to decrease writing efforts and to make typing a more pleasant experience. However, standard tools fail to provide useful predictions on typing or spelling errors.
Proofreading of the written text, particularly with dual highlighting of the currently read phrase and the word, could make a real difference in the case of Dyslexic Dysgraphia and help to spot and fix the errors. But the best and most proven assistance could be a combination of proofreading with Text Correction.
And last, Spatial Dysgraphia. People with Spatial Dysgraphia, where keeping writing in lines and organizing text on a page are the major issues of handwriting, are normally spelling good and expressing well using computer keyboard. The remaining punctuation issues as well as splitting long phrases to short sentences require fixing.
In conclusion: Consider Ghotit Real Writer & Reader software and Ghotit Apps that provide full writing, reading and text correction support for all types of dysgraphia and dyslexia (see the video on Ghotit Home page).