Shoe Tying

Shoe tying is such a hard skill because it combines so many fine motor and visual skills that many of us may take for granted. It involves bilateral hand use(using both hands), pinch, crossing mid-line, and some visual perceptual skills. There are many poems, songs and stories to help children learn the sequence or steps of shoe tying. There are also videos available online to help kids learn how to tie shoes. Even Pinterest has ideas for shoe tying!

The biggest challenge with shoe tying is that there are several ways to tie a shoe. When multiple people try to teach a student how to tie a shoe, the student could be hearing many different versions to how to tie shoelaces. To reduce confusion with shoe tying, I usually assess some of the student’s fine motor and visual motor strengths and needs and decide on which is the best shoe tying technique for the child.

I have some shoe tying reward charts and instructions that I use with students at school and often send home with the kids.