As children and other users learn to write letter and numbers, it is important to teach the proper form of the letter or numbers, as well as proper stroke direction (i.e. directionality of letter and number formation). Moreover, users should learn continuity of letter and number formation which results in increased legibility and leads to an easier transition to cursive writing.
In one embodiment, the invention is a card set including a plurality of letter or number development cards. Each card includes opposed instruction and challenge sides. Each instruction side has instruction indicia relating to the writing of a particular letter or number associated with the card. Each challenge side has visual indicia which indirectly identifies the particular letter or number and cues the user to write the particular letter or number. The challenge side of the card lacks any indicia that directly identifies which particular letter or number is associated with the card.
The system of the present invention includes various flash cards having instructions and/or indicia to aid the user in writing skill development. A plurality of each type of flash cards, each having varying indicia, may be grouped and/or sold together to allow the user to develop skills through repetition and use of each type of cards. The cards may be index-card sized cards (i.e., 3″×5″, 4″×6″, 3¼″×5¼″ etc.), and thus the cards in the attached
Each card may include a sheet-like body 12. The cards/sheet-like material 12 can be made of from any of a wide variety of materials but in one case are made of, or coated with, a non-water absorbent material, such as plastic, polymers, polypropylene, etc. In this manner the cards can be written on with a marker or the like and be re-used in a write-on/wipe off manner. Alternately, the cards/sheet-like material may be made of a cellulose-based or pulp-based paper such that the cards are generally water absorbent and can be written upon by a wide variety of media (i.e. pens, pencils, markers, crayons, etc.). The cards may be relatively thin, and may have a thickness of about 0.5 mm or less.
The cards 10, 60 shown in
Each letter development card 10 may addressed to a single letter or number. For example, the card 10 shown in
Appropriate labelling text 22 (i.e. the word “clock”) is provided adjacent to the visual representation 20 so that the form and spelling of the associated word is also presented to the user. Moreover, the first letter of the labelling text 22 (in this case, the letter “c” of the word “clock”) may be provided in a different form, format, spacing, color, texture, etc., from the rest of the labelling text 22. In
A writing space 24 may be provided on the instruction side 14 of the card 10. In the illustrated embodiment, the writing space 24 includes a baseline 26 and an ascender line 28 positioned above the baseline, and a descender line 30 positioned below the baseline 26. An intermediate line 32 (which is a dotted line in the illustrated embodiment) may be positioned between the baseline 26 and the ascender line 28. The lines 26, 28, 30, 32 are provided to guide the user in his or her writing thereon.
The differing spaces defined by the baseline 26, ascender line 28, descender line 30 and intermediate line 32 may be colored or shaded to guide letter formation and alignment. In particular, the lower portion 34 of the writing space 24 (positioned between the baseline 26 and descender line 30) may be colored brown (representing dirt or earth). The middle portion 36 (positioned between the baseline 26 and the intermediate line 32) may be colored green (representing plants or vegetation, such as grass). Finally, the upper portion 38 (positioned between the intermediate line 32 and the ascender line 28) may be colored blue (representing sky).
In this manner, the colored portions 34, 36, 38 provide vertical orientation within each writing space 24 that is intuitive and universally understood since the sky is above vegetation, which is in turn above soil. The use of brown, green and blue colors also presents a brightly colored portions to attract and retain the attention of the user. The introductory letter 18 on the instruction side 14 can also be written on a writing space 24 using the same coloring scheme. Besides the use of colors, other visual indicia, such as clouds, airplanes, etc., leaves, grass, etc., and earthworms, roots, etc. may be provided in the associated colored portion 34, 36, 38 to further reinforce the presented concepts. The use of colors in the writing spaces and other features noted herein are described in more detail in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/853,988, entitled COLOR CODED LETTER GUIDE, filed on Sep. 12, 2007, the entire contents of which are have been incorporated by reference.
The instruction side 14 of each letter development card 10 may include a traceable version 42 of the letter on the writing space 24. The traceable version 42 may be presented as a relatively thin or light line, a shaded line, a non-black line and/or an incomplete line which is printed in dotted or dashed format. The traceable version 42 may be formatted in this manner so that a user can write over the traceable version 42 and easily distinguish which portions of the traceable version 42 are pre-printed, and which portions have been written by the user. Each letter development card 10 may also include guide arrows or other directional cues 44, and associated numerical cues 46 (which together or separately constitute a writing stroke or starting cue), on the writing space 24. The directional cues 44 and numerical cues 46 may be superimposed on the traceable version 42, or could be placed adjacent to the traceable version 42.
As best shown in, for example,
For example, in
In this embodiment, in the traceable version 42 of the letter each differing stroke is presented in a different color. Thus a user knows that when there is a change in color, a new writing stroke is presented and the user should pick up his or her writing instrument to start the next writing stroke. Conversely, when there is no change in color, the user is cued to keep their writing instrument on the sheet/card, thereby reinforcing writing continuity.
The instruction indicia 40 may include narrative text 48 that reinforces the directional cues. For example, the narrative text associated with step 1 on
The instruction indicia 40 may also refer to the color scheme inherent in the color of the writing spaces 24 to cue letter placement/alignment. For example, the narrative text 48 in
The challenge side 16 of each letter development card 10 (examples of which are shown in
The user is cued to write the desired letter cued by the challenge indicia 54 on the writing space 24 on the challenge side 16 of the card 10. In the illustrated embodiment, the writing spaces 24 on the challenge side 16 of the card 10 include directional cues 44 and numerical cues 46 to prompt the user to begin letter/number writing at the appropriate location on the writing space 24. However, the challenge side 16 of the card 10 may lack the instruction indicia 40 for actual letter formation to further challenge the user. In the illustrated embodiment, only the initial directional cue 44 and numerical cue 46 are provided such that only the start of the first writing stroke is cued. In this case the user must recall the rest of the first writing stroke, and subsequent writing strokes (if any), which even further challenges the user. However, the placement and direction of the directional 44 and numerical cues 46 provide some cues to the user who is attempting to identify the letter cued by the challenge indicia 54. For example, in the card 10 of
The challenge side 16 of each card 10 may also include a challenge/question 58 relating to use of the color coding for letter alignment/placement in the writing spaces 24. In particular, each card 10 may question the user whether the letter associated with that card 10 is a “grass, sky and/or dirt” letter; i.e. whether any portions of the letter are placed into the green 36, blue 38 and/or brown 34 portions of the writing space 24. This challenge 58 therefore reinforces the vertical alignment and relative positioning concepts presented in using the color coded writing spaces 24. The answer 61 to the challenge relating to whether a letter is a “grass, sky and/or dirt” letter may be provided on the instruction side 14 of the card 10. The challenge 58 thus reinforces to the user the importance of letter alignment.
In order to use the cards, in one case a user may begin with the challenge side 16 of the card 10, which challenges the user to identify the appropriate letter. Since the letter the user is cued to write is not directly presented to the user, the user must recall the shape of the letter and the writing strokes on their own (although some minimal cues are provided as to where the letters starts in the form of the directional 44 and numerical 46 cues). The user can then review the instruction side 14 of the card 10 to check their answers. The user can then return to the challenge side 16 of the card 10 to continue practice writing the letter multiple times. Moreover, the grass/sky/dirt challenge 58 provides an additional check on the user's vertical alignment of the letters. In this manner the card 10 provides a multisensory approach to letter writing and increases visual memory skills, visual motor integration, and visual and motor sequential memory skills. This is in contrast to many existing systems in which the user is cued to learn letter writing skills through simple modeling and repetition.
In another form of use, a user may first review the instruction side 14 of each card 10 and review the instruction indicia 40 to become familiar with the proper writing strokes for that number/letter, and practice writing the associated number/letter. The user may then flip to the challenge side 16 of the card 10 to continue practicing writing the letter/number with less cuing. This form of use emphasized learning letter formation through direct instruction without a self-check feature, and may be of benefit to a user who has not yet received basic writing instruction. The cards 10 may be reviewed by a user individually, or with other users in a group, or with an instructor/parent. For example, the stories/narratives and other instructions 40 may be read to the user by a parent, teacher, or the like, which allows a user to auditorily receive letter or number formation instruction, along with pictorial cues which increases retention. In one case, the teacher/instructor may show the user the challenge side 16 of a card 10, and quiz the user to identify and write the associated letter. If the user is unable to identify the letter, a teacher/instructor may read the information on the instruction side 14 of the card 10, or show the instruction side 14 to the user. The user may then practice writing the letter on the instruction side 14 of the card, and then try completing the challenge side 16, thereby increasing the likelihood of success and building the user's confidence.
The letter development cards/letters may be grouped into groupings having common characteristics. For example,
The grouping card 60 may also describe common attributes of the letters in that grouping. For example, as noted in
A total of five letter groupings may be utilized. Besides the two groupings described above, the third grouping may be termed the “roly poly” letters and consists of the letters a, d, g and q (as shown by the card on
The “roly poly” and “bouncy ball” groupings contain letters that are often incorrectly formed by users in a segmented manner (i.e. lifting the writing instrument during letter formation). Writing the letters in a segmented manner decreases efficiency, legibility, and proper directionality of the letters. Thus, the cuing used on the cards 10 for the letters in these groups helps a user to avoid these problems by teaching continuity of letter formation.
Finally, the fifth grouping of letters may be termed the “oddball” letters and consist of the letters f, e, u and y (as shown by the card 60 in
The cards 10/60 may be arranged, and/or a user may be instructed, to work through each grouping in the order presented above. The groupings may be arranged in this order to present progressively more challenging groupings to a user, and to allow a user to develop basic writing skills before adding more sophisticated writing skills to the skills required by the previous grouping. Alternately, the cards 10/60 can be worked in various other patterns to provide more of a challenge to the user and test the generalization of letter formation skills without the guidance provided by grouping letters of similar motor patterns together.
A letter development card 10 for each lower case letter in the alphabet may be provided. Each card 10 may present challenges and skill development activities relating to the writing of lower case letters and may be packaged and/or sold together. In addition, letter development cards 70 and letter grouping cards 72 that relate to the writing of upper case letters may be packaged and/or sold separately from the lower case letter cards 10, 60, (although, if desired, the upper and lower case cards may be packaged and sold together). Each of the upper case cards 70, 72 may be made of the same materials (such as the sheet-like body 12) and have other properties as the cards 10/60 described above.
Each upper case card 70, 72 may be double-sided, with text and/or indicia on each side thereof. For example,
As shown in
A writing space or box 78 is provided on the instruction side 14 of the card 70. Each writing space 78 may be defined by a box having a color, shading or pattern that is different from the background color of the associated card, and/or may be a box may be defined by lines or the like. In the capital letter cards 70, the writing spaces 78 may lack the lines and coloring of the writing spaces 24 of the lower case letter development cards 10 since capital letters generally lack the x-height portions, ascenders and descenders used in writing lower case letters. Instead, in the capital letter development cards 70, the writing spaces 78 may simply be blocks of space which can be white, yellow, or other colors. The use of yellow on the writing spaces 78 attracts the user's attention, and provides less glare than white paper which decreases visual fatigue. This can be particularly useful for children who are not used to visually focusing on close work (i.e. paper and pencil tasks) for long periods of time. However, various other fill colors besides yellow, such as rose, light blue or the like may be utilized. Spacers 80 may be provided between the writing spaces to teach a user proper spacing of the written letters/numbers.
A traceable version of the letter 42, with associated directional 44 and numerical 46 cues, may be provided on one of the writing spaces/boxes 78. Starting cues 44, 46 may also be provided in the “blank” (but perhaps colored, patterned, etc.) writing spaces 78. These cues 44, 46 are positioned to avoid letter reversals in that the placement of the cues 44, 46 forces the user to write the letter in the proper direction. Writing a letter in the reversed direction, when following the starting cues 44, 46, would cause the letter to stray beyond the vertical borders or other defined area of the writing space 78.
The instruction indicia 40 includes ordered steps and associated narrative text 48. The narrative text 48 for the card 70 shown in
The narrative text 48 may describe the creation of a non-letter (and non-number) object, or may describe activity that generally corresponds to the letter or number. For example, in the embodiment of
Once the user has written/traced the letter or number on the traceable version 42 as guided by the instruction indicia 40, the user can utilize the blank writing space 78 provided adjacent to the traceable version 42 to write the letter. Directional cues 44 and associated numbers 46 may be provided on the “blank” writing space 78. Finally, the instruction side 14 of each card 70 may include encouragement indicia 52 to encourage the user to try writing the letter on the opposite side 16 of the card 70.
The challenge side 16 of each card 70 may include question/challenge indicia 54 relating to the identification of the letter/number in the same or similar manner as with the lower case letter development cards 10 described above. The challenge side 16 of each card 70 also includes a plurality of writing spaces 78 upon which the user is cued to write the appropriate letter. In the illustrated embodiment, the writing spaces 78 on the challenge side 16 of the card 70 include directional 44 and numerical 46 cues (or at least the initial cues 44, 46), but lack the instruction indicia 40 or any traceable version 42 or other identification of the associated letter. Thus, cards 70 presenting all of the capital letters of the alphabet can be presented and reviewed in the same manner as the lower case letter development cards 10 as outlined above.
The upper case letter guide cards/letters may be grouped into groupings having common characteristics or written using similar motor patterns. For example,
A total of eight groupings may be utilized. The first grouping, as described above, consists of letters (L, F, E and H) made up of vertical and horizontal lines. The second grouping consists of the letters T, I and J (shown in
The third grouping consists of the letters D, P and B (
The sixth grouping (
The cards 70/72 may be arranged, and/or a user may be instructed, to work through each grouping in the order presented above. The groupings may be arranged in this order to present progressively more challenging groupings to a user, and to allow a user to develop basic writing skills before adding more sophisticated writing skills to the skills required by the previous grouping. Alternately, the cards 70/72 and/or groupings may be worked through in varying orders to provide a challenged to the user. The cards 70/72 (and other cards described and shown herein) may be packaged for sale along with a set of instructions that instruct a user (or a user's parents, teachers, etc.) to use the cards 70/72 in the manner described herein.
Various cards, having the features described above, may also be used to teach writing skills for numbers. For example, the instruction indicia 40 may relate to the writing strokes for writing a number. In this case, a user may be cued, by the challenge side of the card, to write the appropriate number by indirect indicia (i.e. asking a user to count items, complete a simple match problem, etc.)
Proper writing habits includes making vertical and diagonal lines from top-to-bottom, making circles from the top and counterclockwise toward the left, and making horizontal lines from left-to-right. Teaching a user to develop these habits prepares a child for proper letter writing. Moreover, learning to follow a visual sequence is important in learning to follow multi-step directions. In addition learning a particular sequence in shape and letter writing can increase legibility and writing fluency (speed and accuracy). Finally, learning to use various lines and curves to construct an object, especially learning to use continuous strokes (rather than unnecessarily lifting the writing instrument) further aides the user in the development of the underlying skills needed for proper letter and number formation. Since the user is cued to the starting point of the letter, it is difficult for a user to reverse the letter orientation. The cards test, reinforce and teach (if necessary) these skills, and also teach the ability to write within boundaries and the directionality of letter formation.
Having described the invention in detail and by reference to the various embodiments, it should be understood that modifications and variations thereof are possible without departing from the scope of the invention.
This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/853,988, entitled COLOR CODED LETTER GUIDE, filed on Sep. 12, 2007, the entire contents of which are incorporated by reference, and is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/853,411, entitled LETTER GUIDE SHEET, filed on Sep. 11, 2007, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference. The present invention is directed to a system for developing a user's writing skills, and more particularly, to a system for developing a user's letter and/or number writing skills.
Number | Date | Country | |
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Parent | 11853988 | Sep 2007 | US |
Child | 12205295 | US | |
Parent | 11853411 | Sep 2007 | US |
Child | 11853988 | US |