Capital or Lowercase First? Teaching Preschoolers to Write the Alphabet

England’s Department for Education sets out what children learn before school in Development Matters, the non-statutory curriculum guidance for the early years foundation stage, last updated in September 2023. For 3 and 4-year-olds, the writing list includes:

• write some or all of their name
• write some letters accurately

For children in reception, the year before year 1, the list says “form lower-case and capital letters correctly.” The guidance then adds how: “Teach formation as they learn the sounds for each letter using a memorable phrase, encouraging an effective pen grip. When forming letters, the starting point and direction are more important at this stage than the size or position of the letter on a line.”

So at this stage the guidance names both kinds of letter in one line, and puts where a letter starts and which way it goes ahead of how big it is.

Year 1 and year 2 in England

The national curriculum for English at key stages 1 and 2 has a statutory handwriting list for year 1. Pupils should be taught to:

• sit correctly at a table, holding a pencil comfortably and correctly
• begin to form lower-case letters in the correct direction, starting and finishing in the right place
• form capital letters
• form digits 0-9
• understand which letters belong to which handwriting “families” (i.e. letters that are formed in similar ways) and to practise these

Lower-case letters come first in that list, and capital letters are the next item. In year 2 the list moves on to size: “form lower-case letters of the correct size relative to one another,” and “write capital letters and digits of the correct size, orientation and relationship to one another and to lower case letters.”

The US standards

The Common Core State Standards for kindergarten language ask children to “Print many upper- and lowercase letters.” In grade 1 this becomes “Print all upper- and lowercase letters.” Here too, both kinds of letter are named together.

What capitals have to do with lowercase

A 2010 study by Pence Turnbull and colleagues in the Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research looked at what makes young children know lowercase letters. The 461 children were 3 to 5 years old and attended public preschool programs serving mainly children from low-income homes. The task was naming letters, not writing them.

Knowing the uppercase letter was the strongest predictor: children were more than 16 times more likely to know a lowercase letter if they knew the matching uppercase one. How similar the two forms look, and how often the letter appears in printed English, also predicted lowercase knowledge. The authors conclude that carrying knowledge over from uppercase letters may be a primary way children come to know lowercase ones.

Capitals first, or lowercase first

One view is to start with capital letters. Another is to start with lowercase. Of the sources above, England’s year 1 list puts lower-case letters first, and both Development Matters and the US kindergarten standard name the two together. The Turnbull study is about recognising letters by name, and it found that lowercase knowledge goes closely with knowing the matching capital.

What the sources give you to work with

Their name. Writing some or all of their name is one of the first items in Development Matters for 3 and 4-year-olds.

Start and direction. At reception age, the guidance puts the starting point and direction of a letter ahead of its size or position on a line.

Sounds and shapes together. The guidance suggests teaching how to form each letter as children learn its sound.

Letter families. The year 1 curriculum groups letters that are formed in similar ways and practises them together.

Size comes later. Making lowercase letters the right size compared with each other, and with capitals, is a year 2 item.

Letters that come out back to front, such as b and d, are covered in Why Kids Write Letters Backwards, and holding the pencil in How to Teach Pencil Grip.

Alphabet courses in BrainDojo Kids

BrainDojo Kids is an iPhone and iPad app I make for ages 3 to 6, where children write on the screen with a finger or a pen to practice letters and numbers.

There are two alphabet courses: First Alphabet, for capital letters from A to Z, and Lowercase Letters, from a to z. Either one can be started first. Both go in four steps, Trace, Copy, Write and Test, and the first three stages of each are free. The courses are there whatever language the app is set to.

The three daily games in Today’s Training and the four Recommended games are free each day, and every other game can be tried once. In the parent settings there is a daily time limit, on by default at 10 minutes. There are no ads and no account to create. The app is free to start, and a Premium subscription (monthly or yearly) opens all courses and games. The first session is covered in Getting Started with BrainDojo Kids.