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Article Left or Right? How do I know which hand?

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How do I know if my child is left or right handed?  When should I know?

Before a child can develop a “dominant” hand that is skilled for holding a pencil or scissors, they need to be able to use both hands together.

The ability to use both hands together (and both sides of the body at the same time) in a coordinated way is called bilateral coordination.

Both sides of the body may be doing the same action (eg. clapping, using a rolling pin or jumping) or alternating movements (eg. crawling or skipping).

As this develops, children learn to reach across their body to the space of other side to reach for toys (crossing the midline).

If this hasn’t developed you may see your child switch their crayon from their left hand to the right hand as they draw across a page.

As a child develops bilateral coordination, they develop a stronger (dominant) side that works at something whilst the other (non dominant side) assists and helps with stability.

This is seen in hopping, writing, cutting, threading and lots of two handed activities.

The dominant side is often called the “worker hand” and the non dominant side is called the “helper hand”.

This generally emerges consistently when a child is 3 or 4 years and becoming skilled at playing with their hands and should be established when they begin school (at about 5 years).

Whilst some people are ambidextrous (use both hands skilfully), this is quite rare.  Choosing a dominant hand will help your child to develop accuracy and speed for fine motor activities.

How can you help?

  • Place objects in the midline (in the middle) so your child can choose their dominant side.
  • As preschoolers get ready for school, they should spend lots of time doing activities that encourage bilateral coordination (such as play dough, threading, folding and ripping paper, block play, cutting, painting, drawing, stamping, ball play, hammering, climbing, playing musical instruments, etc).
  • Little hands may also tire easily if they have not developed fine motor skills.  Encourage lots of activities (this list above is a good start) that will help to develop fine motor skills and may reduce switching hands.
  • In the months before school, help your child to develop a “worker” hand and “helper” hand. Usually a child will have chosen a hand by using it most of the time with the occasion switch to the other hand to do the “work”.

Has your child developed hand dominance?

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Comments

  • all three of my children are right handed, not that it would bother me. I don’t think it is a big deal these days

    • It becomes an issue if a child has difficulty with handwriting or other activities. Thanks for your comment.

    Reply

  • What a handy article (pardon the pun)

    Reply

  • Love the idea of placing an object in the middle so the child gets to choose naturally. Thanks for all the info.

    Reply

  • Fantastic article. I completely agree about fine motor skills development; play dough & throwing/catching balls is imperative.

    Reply

  • Thats an interesting blog 🙂

    Reply

  • An interesting read – thank you!

    Reply

  • I’m ambidextrous, although my right hand is ever-so-slightly more dominant. My children are the same as me.

    • I’m sure there are genetics involved too in handedness.

    Reply

  • My little man is still a baby. I am a lefty, so too is my partner. Will be interesting to see what develops…

    Reply

  • Love the terms worker and helper hands.

    Reply

  • My Dad was left handed. He said he struggled at school because they forced him to write with his right hand and if he was caught using his left hand he would get a wrack over the knuckles with a wooden ruler.

    Reply

  • Some useful tips thanks for sharing

    Reply

  • Right from the very beginning with both my daughter and my grandson I offered things to the middle to enable them to choose their own preference of dominant hand etc. Both right from the start were strongly left handed. Both my husband and I are generally right handed, but we both do a number of things left handed. I was never able to play things like tennis or cricket because I still can’t work out which hand to play with! In table tennis I have always served right handed, but played left handed – I’m not sure how legal that actually is. At least nowadays we don’t force children to be right handed as they did in the bad old days, tying a child’s left hand to the chair to prevent them using it to write!

    • I’m not sure why there was a perception that “right” was better than “left” in earlier times?!

    Reply

  • My hubby is right handed but plays golf and bats at cricket left handed.

    Reply

  • yes, my kids developed them quite early

    • There is a wide age range of development in the “normal” range.

    Reply

  • An interesting article which I’m sure will help clear up concerns & give a better understanding of what is normal in a childs hand development. My son is 4.5yrs & I’d say 95% of time he uses his right hand

    • Yes there is a wide range of “normal” but educators and OTs like a child to “pick” a hand so that when they are at school that hand can become skilled.

    Reply

  • My son found himself in a special motor skills class in Prep. On a day that the parents were invited to attend the class, I observed my son struggling to complete activities with his left hand. I advised the teacher he was right handed and they thought his leaning was left. What a difference it made when they worked with his right!! He did spend a lot of time with his Nan who is left handed though, before attending school, and I think he had a tendency to try both.

    Reply

  • This is interesting. I’ve watched all my kids with great interest to see if they’ll be left-handed, but so far they all ended up right-handed. Although one prefers to kick a ball with his left foot while writing with his right hand.

    Reply

  • Great little tips, thanks!

    Reply

  • My son not quite 3 I believe he’s ambidextrous though he mainly uses his left hand

    • It may be too soon to the make the “call”. Just keep watching.

    Reply

  • My son has autism and doesn’t like crossing the midline. He writes right handed by will do lots of things left and right handed depending on which side things are on. We’re working on fixing this with the help of his OT.

    • Being unable to cross the midline definitely affects handedness. Great that you have access to an OT to help you.

    Reply
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