Left-handedness MM


Left-handed not left behind!


Why should it matter which hand your child prefers to use? And at what stage can you distinguish their preference? MM takes a look….


As your child approaches their third birthday, you should start to notice that they favour one hand more than the other. This does not simply apply to drawing or attempting to write, but in lifting or touching objects and in other aspects of movement. (Writing isn’t actually a good indicator of


‘handedness’ as it might seem, since many people who write with their right hand use their left hand for everything else!) But what makes one child left-handed,


while the majority are right-handed? Well, the most commonly-accepted


theory of handedness is that since both speaking and handiwork require fine motor skills, then having one hemisphere of the brain do both is more efficient than having it divided up. Consequently, since in most people the


left side of the brain controls speaking, then right-handedness tends to prevail in the majority of people. Nevertheless, approximately ten to


thirteen per cent of the population is left- handed, with males three times more likely to be left-handed than females. Statistically, one twin of a pair has a 20 per cent chance of being left-handed. Even when both parents are left-handed, there is still only a 26 per cent chance of their child being left-handed, so it’s clear


that genetics are not the only cause of this occurrence.


Negative associations Up until the last generation, left-handed children were forced to use their right hand at school; often having their left hand tied behind their back, or their knuckles rapped if they picked up a pen in their left hand! In addition to the obvious feelings of inadequacy and insecurity which such actions produced, left-handed children, who were forced to use their right hand, often experienced bed-wetting and developed speech impediments! But where did this negativity


surrounding left-handedness come from? Well, throughout history, being left-


handed was considered as ‘negative’ since the Latin word ‘sinister’ meant ‘left’. For that reason, many negative connotations have grown up around the words ‘left- handed’, such as clumsy, awkward, unlucky, insincere, malicious etc. Equally, throughout history, however,


there have been many famous people, who were also left-handed, such as David Bowie and Leonardo Da Vinci. In fact, the associated right-brain hemisphere that is said to be more active in left-handed people has been found, in some circumstances, to be associated with


genius and also has associations with artistic and visual skill.


How can you tell if your


child is left-handed? It’s really only by the time that your child turns three that you can truly know whether they are right or left-handed. Prior to that, babies will use both hands for different tasks – often at random! A preference will, however, be noticeable by around eight months and will be clearly apparent by 18 months. Two basic differences between left- handed and right-handed children


• A right-handed child will draw a line of writing that starts near the body and moves outwards, becoming gradually less cramped towards the end of the line. In left-handed children, however, a line of writing starts away from the body and moves inwards, becoming gradually more cramped towards the end of the line


• In right-handed children, the writing hand cannot smudge the new writing, as it is always moving away from the point of writing. In left-handed children, the writing hand always follows the point of writing across the page, and, in doing so, smudges, or at best, covers the work.


Modernmum 41


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