A new UK survey has raised fresh questions about the effect of screens and artificial intelligence on children’s writing habits. In the UAE, educators interviewed by Khaleej Times disagree on whether UAE children handwriting skills are declining, and there is no national UAE statistic on the subject. What follows are the views of school leaders in the UAE, alongside the UK numbers.
The UK figures come from the National Literacy Trust‘s report “Children and young people’s writing in 2025”, based on 114,970 responses from children aged 5 to 18 in UK schools in early 2025. Those figures cover the United Kingdom alone.
Key points
- UK NLT: 26.6% of 8- to 18-year-olds enjoy writing in their free time (down 20.2 points since 2010); 10.4% write something daily
- No UAE national statistic on handwriting decline is available in the source material
- UAE school voices (via KT interviews) are split: some see less fluency and stamina, others say letter formation is still taught
- The policies named are decisions for each school, not ministry-wide rules
- Educators stress handwriting and technology should complement each other
What the UK numbers say, and what they do not
According to the National Literacy Trust, only about one in four children and young people aged 8 to 18 (26.6%) said they enjoy writing in their free time. Enjoyment has fallen by 20.2 percentage points since 2010. Just 10.4% said they wrote something daily in their free time. The sample is UK schools only. It does not measure UAE classrooms, and they do not reflect classrooms in the UAE.
Those UK results are what sparked the local debate, raising questions that also matter to parents and teachers here. For more school news, read Dubai’s outstanding schools guide and parent-teacher communication rules at some UAE schools.
UAE children handwriting: what local educators say
Leah Atkins, deputy head of primary at Nord Anglia International School Abu Dhabi, told Khaleej Times the school will “remain a school where children learn to write, use a pencil”. “We fully embrace technology, but we do not believe that everything needs to be completed on a device,” she said. Handwriting, in her view, builds coordination, muscle control, concentration and perseverance, and it is taught across primary, not only in English.
Ola Laniyan, also deputy head of primary at the same school, said laptops for everyday learning start only from Year 5, and that most lessons, especially English, stay pen-and-paper. She believes children should develop their own ideas before using AI tools, according to the same interview.
Kathryn Kelly, PYP co-ordinator at Swiss International Scientific School Dubai, said she is seeing a decline in handwriting fluency and stamina among some children as digital engagement rises. “Handwriting supports cognitive processes linked to memory, concentration, and literacy development,” she told KT. She argued that handwriting and technology should complement each other, not compete.
“Handwriting supports cognitive processes linked to memory, concentration, and reading and writing skills.”
Kathryn Kelly, Swiss International Scientific School Dubai (via Khaleej Times)
Rebecca Crean, principal and CEO of GEMS FirstPoint School in Dubai, took a different line. She does not see a decline in handwriting skills. Children still learn letter formation; what has changed, she said, is how often they write long texts outside school. Stamina still matters for GCSE and A-Level exams, which may require handwritten answers in exams lasting two hours or more. Device use, she noted, is often limited to tapping and swiping, not actual typing.
“I wouldn’t say there has been a decline in handwriting skills. What has changed is how often they need to write at length for longer pieces.”
Rebecca Crean, GEMS FirstPoint School (via Khaleej Times)
Parents’ anecdotes, and the limits of the evidence
Parents quoted by Khaleej Times, including Moldovan expat Alexandra Rusu and Indian expat Devyani Prasad, compared their children with their own generation and noted weaker letter formation, speed or written expression, and in one case a Spanish teacher linking handwriting to marks. Those are personal observations, not survey data.
The school policies above are specific to each school, not ministry decisions. Early years practice is also in focus this month through UAE National Early Childhood Week 2026, underlining that foundational skills still sit at the centre of the local debate.
In short: children in Britain enjoy writing in their free time less than they did a decade and a half ago, UAE educators are not of one mind about whether handwriting itself is slipping, and nobody has published a UAE national figure that settles the question. Screens and AI are part of classroom life; the question that remains is how far pen and paper will keep their place beside them.
Sources: National Literacy Trust, Khaleej Times
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