How it works
- Type your text, one word or sentence per line.
- Choose print or NZ style handwriting, and the line size for your class.
- Pick the rows: trace then write, trace only, or copy from a model.
- Download the A4 PDF. Longer lists carry on over as many pages as they need.
Handwriting in the New Zealand Curriculum
In the first years of school children learn to form letters correctly, starting and finishing in the right place, and then build the fluency to join them. Tracing a model and then writing it independently, a little every day, is how that fluency grows.
Ideas for your own text
This week’s spelling words
Practising spelling words in joined handwriting links letter patterns with spelling. For the full set of activities, use the spelling worksheet maker.
A sentence a day
One sentence traced on Monday, traced and written mid-week and copied on Friday makes a short daily handwriting routine.
In the New Zealand Curriculum
- Year 1Letters and numbers written neatly with a good pencil grip.
- Year 2All letters and numbers formed correctly, with a comfortable grip.
- Year 3Sloped letters and numbers written correctly, easily and automatically.
- Years 4–5Stamina for several clear paragraphs in Year 4, and longer pieces written easily in Year 5.
Year 3 is the turning point in the refreshed English curriculum: the goal shifts from forming letters correctly to sloped writing that comes without effort. By Years 4 and 5 the focus is stamina, which a short daily sentence builds better than an occasional full page.
Use spelling words as practice text so handwriting and spelling grow together: tricky words such as was, of and said in Year 1, or homophones like their, there and they’re in Year 4.
Summarised in our own words from the New Zealand Curriculum: English, Years 0–6 (2025), and the Ministry of Education’s year-by-year guide for parents and whānau.
