Hallie’s Horrible Handwriting

• Things with Wings
• A Pupa Project
• Flutter By, Butterflies!
• Dear Parents

Things with Wings

Sunshine dances through the windows in Miss Sparks’ classroom. Miss Sparks holds up Hallie’s drawing to show all her students. They all “Ooohh” and “Aaahh.” Hallie explains she drew fairies and butterflies because she thinks things with wings are pretty.

Hallie loves her new teacher, and it’s only the second day of school. Miss Sparks reminds Hallie of a good fairy. And the classroom, painted green like grass on the walls and blue with clouds on the ceiling, with a big tree in the corner and a rainbow of counting beads below the chalkboard, remind her of something out of a fairytale, too. Hallie’s sure this must be the nicest classroom in Hopscotch Hill School, and Miss Sparks must be the nicest teacher.

Miss Sparks’ rules are clear:

1. We take turns.
2. We listen when others talk.
3. We raise our hands when we have something to say.

Hallie sees her friend, Logan, raise her hand. Logan points out the rabbit’s cage is empty. Miss Sparks smiles and explains the rabbit, Razzi, doesn’t like to stay in his hutch, so he could be anywhere around the room. Spencer, another student, says he’ll act like a carrot so he finds Razzi. But Hallie decides she wants to be the one to find Razzi. So she will be very quiet. She’ll do her best work so she’ll please Miss Sparks.

Miss Sparks hands back everyone’s drawings and tells them to fold them. She tells the students to write their names on the back of the paper, and it’ll become a name card for their desk.

Oh, no! Hallie knows how to spell her name, but she doesn’t like writing. She slowly starts to write an H. It looks caved in like it has a stomach ache. She erases it and looks around. Some children were already done writing. Skylar was already helping Logan.

Hallie feels an ache in her middle, just her H. She tries again, but this time, the two lines touch at the top like an A. She puts an H in front of her A.

Miss Sparks stops her, and asks her to use lowercase letters, too. Hallie responds by erasing the A. Hallie hears all the other students showing their names off to everyone. She feels immense pressure to finish writing in a hurry. Finally, she finishes. Her name looks horrible! When it’s her turn to share, she holds her name card down low so nobody can see it.

But Skylar can see it. “How come your e is so squashed?” asks Skylar. Hallie blushes, and she feels too ashamed to speak. Miss Sparks responds that everybody’s letters look a little different, and dismisses Hallie back to her seat. Hallie feels she’s disappointed Miss Sparks very much.

A Pupa Project

Except for the handwriting, Hallie loves her school more every single day. Except for her horrible name card, she loves everything in the classroom. She loves everything about her school, except those things, just like she loves wearing a pair of dress-up butterfly wings and sitting in the bathtub reading.

One morning, Miss Sparks says they’re going to begin a pupa project. Hallie smiles, and says a pupa turns into a butterfly. Miss Sparks nods her head, and says that everybody will be given a pupa to take care of. But, caring for pupas is a big job. They’ll each have to write in their journal about the pupa.

Hallie’s heart sinks. More writing. Hallie lifts her journal to copy Miss Spark’s words from the chalkboard: “pupa” and “butterfly.” But oh, no! Her letters are all wrong. Some too tall, and some too short. Some too fat, and some too skinny. Miss Sparks is always nice about her horrible handwriting, but Hallie hates it. She never wants to practice.

Each day Miss Sparks writes words on the board for the students to copy, and every day, Hallie’s journal is a mess, and she’s constantly having to erase parts and rewrite, meaning she’s always in a rush.

One day, Miss Sparks writes a whole sentence on the board. Hallie’s trying to copy it, but she ends up having to erase it, and she rubs the pages so hard they tear. Suddenly, something inside Hallie tears, too! She slams her pencil down onto her desk and rips the page out of her journal. She wads it up into a ball and throws it as hard as she can. Hallie jumps to her feet and screams “I hate handwriting! It’s too hard! I can’t do it!” Then Hallie bursts into tears.

All the other students feel terrible to see her upset, and the other students begin to cry, too. Miss Sparks comes over to comfort Hallie. She says everything will be all right. But Hallie doesn’t believe her; things will NOT be all right ever again, and all because of her horrible handwriting!

Flutter By, Butterflies!

The next day, Hallie feels very sad. She’s sure she disappointed Miss Sparks. But when she walks through the doors, Miss Sparks is smiling. Hallie looks at her desk, and she sees there’s a butterfly sitting there. Miss Sparks shrugs, and says she doesn’t know where it came from.

Hallie steps closer. It isn’t a real butterfly, it’s made of paper. It’s attached to a pencil. When Hallie lifts the pencil, the butterfly’s wings open up. Interested to give the pencil a shot, she begins to write her name: Hallie.

Well, her name doesn’t look so bad. As the day goes on, she learns she doesn’t mind handwriting so much. She still has to erase a lot, but she doesn’t mind that either. She likes the way the wings flutter when she erases.

The next day, Hallie finds two sheets of paper on her desk. One has a butterfly border. The other has a ladybug border and it says “Keep trying, Hallie!”

The day after, Hallie finds a note in her pocket that says “Your letters will get better.” She loves the secret surprises. They’re like gifts good fairies might leave, and it cheers her up to have such kind friends in her class.

Then, she notices the writing on the notes isn’t perfect, so maybe she isn’t the only one struggling with their handwriting. She decides she’ll take the paper and pencil home so she can practice writing her name even more.

A few weeks later, the children are preparing for the butterflies to emerge. They need to make a goodbye card to sign for when they set the butterflies free. Maybe Hallie should make the card. Hallie’s surprised when the whole class agrees Hallie is the right person for the job. However, she says she’ll do it.

Hallie has to work very hard on the card. She has to erase and start over again many times. Even so, the letters aren’t perfect. But then she has an idea. When a letter droops below the line, she draws a little butterfly on it, as if the butterfly is weighing it down. When a letter rises above the line, she draws a butterfly on top, as if it’s lifting it up.

Soon, her card is ready, and the butterflies are ready to be set free. Hallie even wore her butterfly wings special for the release, so she’ll be ready, too. Everybody signs the back of Hallie’s card. When Miss Sparks opens the box, the butterflies fly up into the air. All the children watch in awe as the butterflies look like fairies dancing across the sky.

Miss Sparks points out how the butterflies don’t fly in a straight line, and some of them fall a little and have to pull themselves up again. It may take them a while, but eventually, they’ll all get to where they want to be. Hallie’s handwriting will get there, too. She looks back at her goodbye card. She likes the way the message looks, looping and swooping, just like the free butterflies.

Dear Parents

Discusses how most children have trouble with at least one new skill. They may feel frustrated or rushed. There are ways to help them work through their frustrations. Topics include:

• Letting your child trace letters with their finger
• Finger-paint letters
• Make 3D letters with play-doh
• Using a stick to make letters in sand
• Writing with water on the pavement
• Make a school day collage to help them visualize each phase of schooltime
• Use an egg timer to teach children about stop times
• Use words like “Time’s up!” or “It’s time to…” to indicate to children when it’s time to move to a different activity
• Make two posters which show what they do well on one, and what they’re learning to do on the other
• Praise children and remind them that things may be hard now, but they’ll get easier
• Don’t hide the adults’ mistakes (talking and laughing about them normalize them)
• Talk about how different people have different talents