At what point do you discourage sloppy coloring?

[rgrindle]

I want to start working on my 5-year-old son's handwriting. Coloring uses the same fine motor skills, but he always rushes through coloring books without trying to control his work unless I remind him constantly. Can I accept his abysmal coloring pages while working for neat handwriting? How to I encourage neater artwork without discouraging him?

[Tree House Academy]

At 4, I didn't care. At 6, I started seeing him naturally trend toward doing a better job. Now, he takes pride in his coloring and does it well. I would give your ds a little more time, but let him know that you expect his BEST work...even if it takes a little longer to do it.

[cirons]

I have a 7 year old who hates colouring in! I don't insist he does it at all because when he does want to do it, he does an ok job....but if something can be circled or underlined instead of colouring, I just let him do that because school would be very painful if I insisted on colouring in everything! He loves drawing, just not colouring....

[inHistiming]

Maybe you could encourage him to do a better job coloring by telling him you're going to send it to someone...an aunt or uncle, best friend, etc. Possibly that would case him to want to do a better job?

[my3sons]

I agree I'd focus on the handwriting and hold off saying much about the coloring. My oldest ds didn't like to color. In fact, he colored everything black at first. Here's the sad thing - I was GLAD anyway - at that point, I didn't care it was black because I was just so glad he was coloring. Now, he's almost 11 yo and his coloring is beautiful, though still not his favorite thing to do. I'd give it time. I do think it comes along eventually. One thing that helped all of our dc with coloring was to outline a section with a thick marker to be colored (whatever color it should be colored), and then have them color in just that section. I did this for awhile when my oldest was writing well, but not coloring well. I did one section, and then he did, and so on. Eventually, you could do something like that. I like inHistiming's idea of sending it to an aunt, etc. too.

In Christ,
Julie

[Mommamo]

I honestly have never loved coloring. My coloring wasn't great as a child and I just didn't do it often. My handwriting was okay though.

My oldest has not liked coloring until this year. Now she enjoys it. She colors really well (she just turned 7). She has been coloring well for about 2 months. But until then it was messy and sloppy and fast. I never really concerned myself a whole lot with it and it's been a skill that has developed completely on its own.

Now my 2 yo colors super well, probably better than my 4 yo. The 4 yo is messy with it and does not take any time at all. I just think that it is one of those things that will develop in time. I think as long as they are using their fine motor skills and are practicing them, then they are probably okay.