Hampton Roads first grader wins national handwriting award
Ever since he could hold a pencil, 6-year-old Ethan Fabery has loved leaving little Christmas notes for his family. And he loves writing and sending letters to friends.
His mom, Jessenia Mercado, said she tries to have a pack of dollar-store stationery at home so he can write notes whenever he wants.
It turns out that passion for note-writing wasn’t just a cute hobby. All the practice may have helped him win national recognition for his handwriting.
Last month, Ethan was named a regional winner of the Zaner-Bloser National Handwriting Contest, beating out thousands of contestants. The contest names seven winners in four regions, one for every grade K-6. Ethan is the first-grade winner for the Southeast region.
Ethan’s parents said they weren’t even aware that his son’s school — Portsmouth Christian Academy — had entered him into the contest, so the news was a nice surprise.
“We are very proud of him,” Mercado said.
Ethan’s father, Ramon Fabery, said he doesn’t have good handwriting, which makes him appreciate good penmanship even more. He has videos of Ethan from last year, sitting in their kitchen copying cursive writing from a page, even though the skill isn’t taught until higher grades. Perhaps he was inspired by his 12-year-old brother, whom Ethan said has the best handwriting in the family.
Fabery said Ethan enjoys a challenge and likes trying new things. He’s also persistent and keeps trying until he gets things right.
With the increasing use of technology in the classroom, handwriting has become a lost art; many schools nationwide have even dropped cursive from the curriculum, before a recent push to bring it back.
Amanda Stedke, vice president of product at Zaner-Bloser, said her company has always championed the importance of handwriting. Zaner-Bloser, which develops literacy and math curricula for preschool to sixth grade, was founded 130 years ago as a school for penmanship.
Stedke said writing by hand has been shown to improve academic outcomes and play a role in teaching kids spelling and reading.
“Handwriting instruction helps to actually improve their cognitive development, and their hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills,” she said.
Occupational therapists sometimes use handwriting when working on these skills with clients.
All participants in the Zaner-Bloser contest write the same sentence: “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” The sentence includes the entire alphabet and judges select winners based on the company’s “four keys to legibility”— the shape, size, spacing and slant of letters. Students in kindergarten through second grade send in a print entry. Third through sixth graders submit their entries in cursive.
Ethan said he wrote his submission three or four times before he was ready to turn it in.
“I took my time.”
Nour Habib, nour.habib@virginiamedia.com
