As Hard as it Can Be...

Little Britches is in Kindergarten.  His particular phonics program has him learning all the sounds the letters make.  For example, instead of learning that "O" says "Aw", he learns that O says: aw, oh, uh, oo.  Each letter has a cute caption to help him remember this.  Our practice might look something like this,  I hold up the flashcard with the letter O on it, and he sees the cartoon picture underneath with the phrase "Ox Over Love To" showing an Ox loving to jump over a fence.
Once he says all the sounds correctly, and has learned to write each letter by copying the flashcards, it's time for the next step.  He has to learn to write them by dictation, without looking at the flashcards.
"You mean I have to do it without looking, Mom?"
"Yes, and for each letter you make the right way without help, you can get one chocolate chip!"
He seemed a little reluctant to try until I mentioned the chocolate chips.  Then he sat down game to try.
As I dictated the first letter I happened to look up at his face and noticed this:

Little Britches trying to write his letters "without looking".  At the paper.

At all.

Lot's of things we ask them to do in school are new and strange.  Why stop at this?

We soon got that straightened out and things proceeded much more nicely.

"You can look at the paper while you write!"
Poor little guy.