Cursive Match-Up (Lowercase Pegboard Practice)

My 9-year-old's penmanship is not always legible. As a kid diagnosed with ADHD, the patience and fine motor required to print nicely, just aren't there. When his school teacher mentioned cursive on parent curriculum night, I cringed.

My options were watch him struggle or decide that it wasn't important. I wasn't comfortable with either. My son loves history and if he ever stands in front of the Declaration of Independence, I want him to be able to read it.

To begin working on cursive at home, I first wanted to test his familiarity with the lowercase letters. He was exposed to cursive last year, but I wondered what his recollection was. I made a set of four pages for our pegboard (find out how I made it here). Download the 4-page PDF here. This is the first of a series of activities I have planned for him.

The pages require him to match up lowercase manuscript letters with their cursive counterparts. The matches are indicated by stringing rubber bands on the nails from one to the other.

Can't be bothered to make a pegboard? Print my pages, slip them in plastic sheet protectors, and hand kids a fine-tip dry-erase marker to draw lines!

I've said it before, but what I love about these pegboard practice pages is that kids have options. It's like taking a multiple choice test. At first my son incorrectly matched the cursive r with the manuscript n, but later was able to see when the remaining letters didn't match, that he'd made an error.

We read the perfect book to pair with this activity, and for any kids who struggle with good penmanship. The message is truly outstanding - try your best, but in the end, it's what your words are saying that is more important than how beautifully they're written on the page.