Sammanfattning
Background: Handwriting difficulties may have pervasive effects on a child’s school performance.
I Can! is a remedial handwriting program with a focus on self-regulated learning and
applying motor learning principles combined with a behavioural approach. It is developed for
typically developing children with handwriting problems.
Objective: The study aim was to evaluate the program’s effectiveness.
Materials and methods: Thirty-one children aged 7–8 year participated in a cross-over study.
Handwriting quality and speed were repeatedly assessed by means of the Systematic Screening
of Handwriting Difficulties test. Difficulties addressed were fluency in letter formation, fluency in
letter connections, letter height, regularity of letter height, space between words, and line path.
Results: Mixed model analysis revealed improved quality of writing and speed for all children
but significantly more improvement in handwriting quality for the children participating in the
program. Although writing speed improved over time, no additional effects of the program
occurred.
Conclusions and significance: ‘I Can!’ is found to be an effective instructive program to ameliorate
handwriting quality in typically developing children with handwriting difficulties. The program’s
success was by a therapy burst of only 7 weeks focusing on the child’s self-regulated
learning capacities, within an individualized education plan according to their needs and goals.