DYSGRAPHIA

According to Understood.org:

Dysgraphia is a term that refers to trouble with writing. Many experts view dysgraphia as challenges with a set of skills known as transcription. These skills — handwriting, typing, and spelling — allow us to produce writing.

Dysgraphia is a neurological disorder that often presents as difficulty forming letters, staying within lines, writing legibly, or organising and expressing ideas on paper. While it may often be confused with dyslexia in the early stages, dysgraphia does not usually, by itself, impact an individual’s ability to read – having more to do with fine motor skills, particularly writing.

"Dysgraphia is NOT linked to ability, many highly capable individuals have dysgraphia. You can have dysgraphia and have many strengths in other areas. Dysgraphia can be exceedingly frustrating in a school and academic environment where the written word becomes the way you are continually assessed for what you know". Australian Dyslexia Association Advisory Team

Children may exhibit:

poor handwriting (legibility and endurance)
difficulty with body awareness or feedback in the hands
difficulties writing in a straight line or staying within margins
difficulties with holding and controlling a writing tool
reversal of letters
difficulty recalling how letters are formed
trouble knowing when to use lower or upper case letters
difficulty copying words.

Adults may exhibit:

highly illegible handwriting
difficulty cutting food, doing puzzles, or manipulating small objects by hand
a strange or awkward hand grip
a delay in processing the rules of games, or following sequential directions
difficulty reading maps
difficulty drawing, tracing or painting
spelling errors in simple notes.

Teenagers may:

have difficulty constructing sentences with correct grammar and sentence structure when writing, but not when speaking
omit words from sentences
incorrectly order words in sentences
use verbs and pronouns incorrectly
have difficulty organising or articulating thoughts on paper
write with a mix of cursive and print letters
write with inappropriate or inconsistent sizing and spacing of letters
have difficulty visualising words before writing them.