Jemima in most schools the teacher will stand at the front of the lesson teaching. When writing on the board, doing maths or writing skills, he or she will turn his back to write on the board. A teaching assistant will sit beside the child to help (if they have a teachers assistant).

A left-handed child is thus trying to do what is being done in front of them backwards, because they lead with their thumb when writing, not their little finger. To teach a left-handed child a motor skill (like shoe-lace tying or writing), if you yourself are right-handed, it's best to sit opposite them, make yourself their mirror, and they won't have any trouble. But people don't. They tend to cater to the majority and try to teach the same way. Left handed people i know ALL had problems with skills like tie-tying, lace-tying, drawing, any fine motor control basically. They ALL caught up eventually. Some studies suggest that the fact that motor control in left-handed people is in both hemisphered makes them less-apt at such things, but i truthfully think it's down to how these things are taught that makes a difference.

Life is set up for right-handed people. It's not just little things like tools - if you go to hospital for an operation it's VERY unlikely you'll have a surgeon who operates with his left hand, even if he IS left-handed because ALL of the tool, implements, medical machines, beds and operating theatres are set up for right-handed people.

In addition left-handed people's brains ARE concretely different to right-handed people. They tend to be highly creative rather than analytical, and do well with verbal skills and maths, perhaps because their right hemisphere, where such tasks are dealt with, is more active because of their motor centres being in that part too(?), BUT they frequently have problems with written expression (for the reasons above) and some studies have suggested that the teaching styles in mainsteam teaching are less useful for left-handers than right. Again, it's not insurmountable, it's just irritating for them to have to deal with.

There have been studies which found left-handed people are over-represented in both high IQ and autistic/developmental delay groups. Because the left-handed brain is less hemispecific than the right-handed brain it could be that SOME left handedness is BECAUSE of brain damage, whereas other left-handedness is not. If that makes sense.

Left-handed people are also in SOME studies, over-represented in dyslexia, but i do wonder to what extent that is poor teaching style which doesn't work well for the left-handed child. Prematurity and difficult births are associated with a slight increase in the likelihood of left-handedness, it's hard to know if a difficult birth causes the left-handedness or if the left-handed brain approaches birth differently.

Basically, to re-iterate, if DD or any of my kids turned out to be left-handed, that's totally fine by me, but i was ambidextrous as a kid (very handy when i broke my right wrist at 11) and for all the reasons above if DD is the same i will teach her to favour the right. It will make her life easier, that's all.

Bx