In Israel, and in Arabic countries, is it common for people to hook their hand when writing?

[conuly]

Or do they turn the paper sideways?

Comments

[leora.livejournal.com]

I don't know, but I don't see a reason to hook your hand just because you're writing from right to left. When I was writing Hebrew, I probably did hook my hand, but that is because I hooked my hand when writing anything until I learned not to by reading a book on how to do calligraphy. I started hooking my hand in Elementary School and I was writing left to right with my right hand. I can write with or without hooking in either direction with either hand.

Also, Hebrew (I don't know about Arabic) is not written at a slant like English is, at least, I was never told to write it at a slant like I was with English.

[conuly]

You hook you hand in order to avoid smudging the ink and getting it all over your palm. Lefties do it all the time.

However, the easier way to avoid getting ink on yourself - something lefties are rarely taught in school even though they should be - is to turn the page so you're writing close to straight up-and-down. It has nothing to do with getting a slant.

[leora.livejournal.com]

But no matter how I write I get ink on my hand; it's just a matter of degree. The only way to avoid it is to use a pencil... then I get graphite on my hand.

[conuly]

It also helps you to be able to see what you're writing.

At any rate, I've seen any number of lefties hook their hands when writing, but very few righties - and most righties who notice it are surprised and can't imagine anybody writing like that.

[leora.livejournal.com]

Well, when I was writing I was corrected to normal vision with glasses. I don't write much now that I'm blind.

I also may be a leftie, but as I was writing with my right hand for most of my childhood/most of my life, and have written with my right hand far more than my left, it counts more as being a righty for this purpose.

I think I just find it more comfortable to hold a pen/pencil that way, but it might just be that I started doing it and it feels more comfortable to me because I did it so much. When I first started writing, I was given basically no instructions and didn't have much reason to do things any particular way. The only reason I write with my right hand is I asked explicitly which hand should I use and was given the wrong answer (the right answer is try both and use whichever you're more comfortable with).

[conuly]

When I first started writing, I was given basically no instructions and didn't have much reason to do things any particular way.

That seems to be an endemic problem in the US, moreso for lefties than righties. Some of what I've been googling lately suggests that elementary school teachers aren't really taught how to teach penmanship, but that strikes me as absurd and I don't want to believe it.

And you did get the wrong answer. The VERY wrong answer. Ugh.

[leora.livejournal.com]

I know. I've been bitter about that for a long time, and it's part of why I started making myself write with my left hand. The problem with that is that I've put in years of practice with my right hand. When I first started with my right hand, I was terrible with it. But I had to write the letters of the alphabet and do other tedious penmanship practice every school day for at least four years. That degree of practice makes a huge difference, and I have trouble motivating myself to do something so tedious again with my left hand.

So, I write more slowly and slightly messier and with a lot more effort with my left hand. But I can write with my left hand. And it's not much messier if I write slowly and carefully, and I've practiced a lot less. I'm good enough lefty (or was when I was making myself practice more) that when I accidentally sat at a lefty desk in college one day, I decided to just take notes left-handed that day, and that worked fine.

I don't think I have a strong handedness. And I basically do consider myself ambisinistrous as more than just a joke. I probably have dysgraphia/handwriting dystonia. One of my brothers was diagnosed with that as a kid because he was having issues at school. They never tested me. But years later when I asked for details, I found out I have all the same symptoms. Not only that, our penmanship is incredibly similar. He also considers himself left-handed, but he writes with his right hand. In his case, I think the writing right-handed is by choice, but he does so much else as a lefty that he considers it his dominant hand.

I don't do a lot of things that I think of as handed. I had trouble with lefty scissors as a kid, and I could usually make righty ones work. But I hated scissors as a kid and had issues with all of them, which I later realized is because they give kids crappy scissors too dull to cut paper. I can only shoot pool as a lefty, but shooting pool requires both hands, and I feel like my right hand is doing the harder part, personally. I usually just say I don't know my handedness.

But I'd have liked the chance to have let it develop more naturally, rather than basically being assigned to being a righty. I might be more dexterous if I had tried to develop as a lefty. I was told I was a righty, so I acted like one. It reinforced itself a lot. And I'm a total klutz, and I wonder if maybe I'd only be a partial klutz as a lefty. Of course, now with the vision problems it's pretty much a loss cause. Being a natural klutz and then losing depth perception... well, it's a lifetime of klutziness for me.