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Handwriting is a determining factor for academic success and autonomy for all children. Making knowledge accessible to all is a challenge in the context of inclusive education. Given the neurodevelopmental diversity within a classroom of children, ensuring that the handwriting of all pupils progresses is very demanding for education professionals. The development of tools that can take into account the variability of the profiles and learning abilities of children with handwriting difficulties offers a new potential for the development of specific and adapted remediation strategies. This narrative review aims to present and discuss the challenges of handwriting learning and the opportunities offered by new technologies involving AI for school and health professionals to successfully improve the handwriting skills of all children.

What constitutes effective teaching of letter learning in early school years is still uncertain. We assessed the impact of a teacher-implemented visuomotor intervention program to teach 5-year-olds' cursive letter knowledge. We compared a program in which letters were explored with the arm and whole body, with a typical visual training program. Children were tested before and after the intervention with different measures of letter knowledge. We showed a greater improvement in letter recognition following the visuomotor intervention, compared with the visual intervention. Results were mixed for letter handwriting for which we found higher scores on stroke direction and overall quality, but lower scores on fluency following whole body visuomotor teaching. We discuss our results in terms of the link between action and perception, the interaction between the different components of letter knowledge, and the link between fine and gross motor development and handwriting.

This research focuses on the ability of the young child to detect and identify the continuity or discontinuity of a cursive handwriting movement. The evolution of this ability has been studied by comparing the performance of nonscripters (kindergarten) pupils and students scripters (2nd and 5th years of primary school). Results showed that the perception of information relating to the continuity of writing movement is antecedent to the formal learning of cursive handwriting. Analysis of the justifications produced by the youngest participants suggests that early knowledge of handwriting movement is not explicitable.