# Left handers!



## am64 (Aug 19, 2010)

RachelT said:


> Slightly off topic but could you find some way of teaching them to write properly and legibly as well please?



slightly off topic but when my son moved to the local primary school and was upset because they declared he was special needs cos he was left handed i took him to see my GP who is also a left handed. My GP explained to him that it really isn't a problem with his hand writing and it was other folk who just couldnt read itwhen it was perfectly legible to him and he had managed to become a GP... he then proceeded to write my sons asthma prescription out with his hand virtually upside down on the page !!! i love my GP !!!

just want to explain this came from another thread re educating the professionals and post about GPs handwriting ....


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## Northerner (Aug 19, 2010)

am64 said:


> slightly off topic but when my son moved to the local primary school and was upset because they declared he was special needs cos he was left handed i took him to see my GP who is also a left handed. My GP explained to him that it really isn't a problem with his hand writing and it was other folk who just couldnt read itwhen it was perfectly legible to him and he had managed to become a GP... he then proceeded to write my sons asthma prescription out with his hand virtually upside down on the page !!! i love my GP !!!



A lot of left handers use the 'hook hand' technique to avoid smearing the ink, particularly if you learned to write with a fountain pen. I'm left handed as is my sister, although both my parents are right handed. My sister used to write perfect 'mirror writing' when little - like Leonardo da Vinci, also left handed!

When I met Charles Duke, who walked on the Moon on Apollo 16 mission, I remarked on his being left handed and he said it actually made it easier to pilot the spacecraft because of the design of the controls (designed to fit space constraints, not to suit humans!).


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## Steff (Aug 19, 2010)

Sorry carrying on the left handed thing me my sister  and my late mum were all left handed, and one time I was in school the teacher pulled me up in a lesson and said this is the kind of handwriting we dont want to see, if i put your handwriting up against 3 right handed you will see how bad yours really is, i was mortified at 14 but now its not an issue lol.


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## am64 (Aug 19, 2010)

Northerner said:


> A lot of left handers use the 'hook hand' technique to avoid smearing the ink, particularly if you learned to write with a fountain pen. I'm left handed as is my sister, although both my parents are right handed. My sister used to write perfect 'mirror writing' when little - like Leonardo da Vinci, also left handed!
> 
> When I met Charles Duke, who walked on the Moon on Apollo 16 mission, I remarked on his being left handed and he said it actually made it easier to pilot the spacecraft because of the design of the controls (designed to fit space constraints, not to suit humans!).



thats the one !! i really could beleive the school when they said that ! but then again we knew nothing of south bucks in those days  but thats a whole new thread ..sorry twitchy


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## rspence (Aug 19, 2010)

*it works for us*

I'm left handed and my husband is right handed - it means for giving our son injections I more naturally do one side and he the other - sorted!

i like ebing left handed you can surprise people by batting a rounders ball where they haven't got fielders (well if i could hit the actual ball!) and you can do opposite moves in roller skating that most people can't do without having to force themselves - its my new found hobby to relieve some of my tension of dealing with my sons diabetes )


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## Northerner (Aug 19, 2010)

I would confuse people in cricket by being a left handed bowler and right handed batsman! I play guitar right handed because the left handed ones were more expensive when I started to learn. I can also use scissors right handed because they only had the RH type at infant school during 'cutting out'


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## am64 (Aug 19, 2010)

just like my son ....!! my bro was ambidextrous and could swop hands at will from page to page ...


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## ukjeff27 (Aug 19, 2010)

Im a leftie too! although i play cricket and golf right handed.


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## Northerner (Aug 19, 2010)

President Obama is left handed


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## lucy123 (Aug 19, 2010)

Sorry for jumping backwards a bit on this thread but......
Northerner - you actually met a real astronaut? Crikey!

I am right handed but used to be a left footed figure skater - which caused havoc as sometimes it meant I skated the wrong way around the ice during my routines!


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## am64 (Aug 19, 2010)

lucy123 said:


> Sorry for jumping backwards a bit on this thread but......
> Northerner - you actually met a real astronaut? Crikey!
> 
> I am right handed but used to be a left footed figure skater - which caused havoc as sometimes it meant I skated the wrong way around the ice during my routines!



yep northe was on the moon at the time when they turned up !!


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## williammcd (Aug 19, 2010)

im a lefty and your story brings back to mind my own experiences at school, my first teach used to go nuts if i used my left hand to write, until i complained to my mother and told her i was made to stand in the corner if caught using my left hand .lol she went ballistic, i thought she was gonna smack the teacher in front of the whole school ,as my mother pointed out i could read and write before i went to school and this teachers medieval outlook on lefties was setting back my education ,never saw that teacher ever again lol

on a side note i used to do archery and played right handed ,was told by a professor its because your dominant eye takes over dictating which way you hold the bow


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## Steff (Aug 19, 2010)

Im weird i do most things with my left hand but at school i batted in cricket with my right.


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## cazscot (Aug 19, 2010)

Two  of my bfs are left handed and both have beautiful handwriting . My great aunt (who would have been at primary school in the 1930s) was whacked over the knuckles with a ruler if she dared to use her left hand!  And also had her left hand tied behind he so that she had to use her right hand. - how barbaric!


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## williammcd (Aug 19, 2010)

my teach from hell tried [tyeing my hand behind my back] that with me ,i just refused to even look at the blackboard ,
my best m8 told my father the teacher threw a wooden duster at me for using my left hand ,he told me she ever does that again you throw it back without hitting her ,the last time she threw it i waited till her back was turned and threw it at the blackboard as hard as i could ,she nearly jumped out the window with fright ,


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## Northerner (Aug 19, 2010)

cazscot said:


> Two  of my bfs are left handed and both have beautiful handwriting . My great aunt (who would have been at primary school in the 1930s) was whacked over the knuckles with a ruler if she dared to use her left hand!  And also had her left hand tied behind he so that she had to use her right hand. - how barbaric!



The same happened to my grandad  I was a neat writer at school, although now the only longhand I tend to do is my poetry, and that is a real scribble to get the lines down before the idea escapes! I've also learned to write Cyrillic, Arabic and Chinese script always been fascinated by right to left scripts like Arabic - wondered why it developed the opposite of our own, given that they would have been predominantly RH. Perhaps that old 'toilet' thing common amongst some populations where they would eat with their right and erm wipe with their left!


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## AlisonM (Aug 20, 2010)

I'm a southapw and so is most of my family. Dad was ambidextrous and could write with both hands at the same time - different things too! The show-off!! I _can_ write with my right hand, but it looks like a drunken spider crawling across the page while my left hand writing is beautiful, or so I'm told. I can write backwards and upside down if I want to (Leonardo Da Vinci is my hero). I have a whole load of left handed toys, such as scissors, a corkscrew, chequebook and spanner. I know what you mean Northe, I used to have that horrid claggy school ink all over my hand and wrist, and my school shirts were a mess. The stuff was mixed from a powder and put in ink wells on the desks. I was so glad when biros became universally available and so was my mum!

I did a stint in the Royal Observer Core in the 70s, before I grew sense, and took once part in a NATO exercise where I spent the whole three days writing stuff backwards on a glass map for the folk in front to read. This was before computers and large screens for you youngsters, when these things had to be done by hand.


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## AlisonM (Aug 20, 2010)

My mother started school in the late thirties and she too was forced to write with her write hand, she got the tawse* for using her left. Her writing was always atrocious and I've seen the same thing in others of her generation. They tried a similar thing when I started school in 1960, but being the stroppy little cow I was, I went ape at them and they let me be. I think I scared them.



* For non-Scots, the tawse is a thick leather strap about 2 feet long that teachers up here used on kids into the 70s. It's banned now.


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## novorapidboi26 (Aug 20, 2010)

I am also a left hander...............

I eat with my fork in my left though, similar to my right handed siblings....

I can write with my right hand, broken left wrist at exam time forced me too, all be it worse......

Was in school target rifle team and shot right handed rifles and also burst my chin with an automatic rifle as the cocking mechanism, on the right, came back on forth......ouch.........


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## SacredHeart (Aug 20, 2010)

I'm even weirder - I'm fairly ambidextrous! 

Writing is pretty much the only thing I don't do with my left hand, and I can scrawl slowly with it at a push. I hadn't even noticed that I used my left hand for lots of things until I got to university, where I'd get asked about once a week if I was left handed, because I'd be doing something with my left that I hadn't realised!


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## williammcd (Aug 20, 2010)

when i was an apprentice sand moulder way back in 77 lol my old boss watched me using both my left and right hands to slick moulds ,after about an hour he came over to me and asked if i was left or right because it was hard to tell watching me ,when i told him i was a lefty but that i could also use my right ,he pointed out that in the Victorian days an apprentice would get an extra bonus in his pay packet if he could show he was ambidextrous ,after i finished laughing i asked him when i would start getting the bonus lol 

and no i never ever got the bonus lol


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## Northerner (Aug 20, 2010)

williammcd said:


> when i was an apprentice sand moulder way back in 77 lol my old boss watched me using both my left and right hands to slick moulds ,after about an hour he came over to me and asked if i was left or right because it was hard to tell watching me ,when i told him i was a lefty but that i could also use my right ,he pointed out that in the Victorian days an apprentice would get an extra bonus in his pay packet if he could show he was ambidextrous ,after i finished laughing i asked him when i would start getting the bonus lol
> 
> and no i never ever got the bonus lol



Shame! You deserved it!


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## Northerner (Aug 20, 2010)

This is a great site for left handers 

http://www.anythinglefthanded.co.uk/


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## Steff (Aug 20, 2010)

Northerner said:


> This is a great site for left handers
> 
> http://www.anythinglefthanded.co.uk/



Excellent site thanks Northey lol.scissors and retractable tape measure are what i want lol


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## PhilT (Aug 20, 2010)

I am also left handed as was my late mum, but my dad and sister are both right handed.


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## Steff (Aug 20, 2010)

PhilT said:


> I am also left handed as was my late mum, but my dad and sister are both right handed.



snap r.e mum but my father and brother are both right handed, my son at the moment is right handed but left footed when playing footy and left handed when batting .


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## PhilT (Aug 20, 2010)

Did you know that Raffa Nadal is actually right handed but was encouraged to play left handed by his uncle Toni when he was very young?


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## Jimbo (Aug 20, 2010)

cazscot said:


> My great aunt (who would have been at primary school in the 1930s) was whacked over the knuckles with a ruler if she dared to use her left hand!  And also had her left hand tied behind he so that she had to use her right hand. - how barbaric!



This happened to my Mum as well, she was forced to write wrong, as she put it. That would have been in the late thirties as well.
I am lucky that I can use both but, for speed and due to more practice it looks prettier when I use my right, although it is still perfectly legible when I use my left, just a little slower to do. I can also play football using both feet too.
One of my other three brothers is a leftie but only for writing he plays all club and racquet sports with his right hand. Weird!


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## AlisonM (Aug 21, 2010)

Oh Northe, look at the Washburn. I used to have one of those. I wonder what happened to it.


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