Copywork for Teens

“Mom, I need some copywork!”

I thought my son was kidding when he approached me this morning. After all, he is taking college classes, and doing quite a lot of writing. I thought he’d finished with copywork years ago! As soon as he explained why he wanted it, though, I knew he was right. He did need copywork! He was finding that as he took quick notes in class, his handwriting was getting less and less legible. He needed to practice writing both quickly and neatly, and copywork is the perfect tool for that.

To make his copywork, I copied the first eight verses of Psalm 119 onto college-ruled paper, skipping every other line. That way, he could write directly under my letters, which would remind him to watch his spacing and letterforms. As we did when he was younger, we each used a different color pen, so the finished page looked interesting.

Copywork is an excellent tool for teens who need to improve their handwriting for the essay portion of the SAT or ACT. I’ve read a number of articles that indicate that test evaluators are having serious problems reading some of the handwriting on these exams. Needless to say, if they can’t read it, they can’t evaluate it! Read more

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