Our new handwriting upload feature is now live, making it easier for teachers to offer blended learning and reduce students’ screen time.

The process is easy: students write a draft using pen and paper, upload a photo directly into Writer's Toolbox, and see it converted into typed text in a matter of seconds. From there, we use the same frameworks we’ve always used, and students get feedback the way they already do for digital drafts.

They write by hand and edit on screen, with just seconds in between.

We built a way for students to write by hand and still get Writer's Toolbox feedback.

Why we built it this way

Schools are now expected to offer handwriting and digital tools, often within the same lesson. While teachers do their best to offer consistent feedback, this combination makes it harder to compare drafts, keep records, and track student progress.

Our new handwriting upload tool solves this problem, making it easy for teachers to  give consistent, evidence-based feedback, no matter how the original draft was created.

There's good research behind blending handwriting and digital tools in education.

 A 2025 review published in the journal Life found that handwriting draws on a wider range of brain regions than typing, spanning movement, sensory feedback, and higher-level thinking. Researchers at CQUniversity have found something similar. Professor Ken Purnell, the university's Head of Educational Neuroscience, puts it simply:

"Typing records words. Handwriting builds understanding." Prof. Ken Purnell.

There are significant advantages to writing by hand, and we didn't want this process to sit outside a student's Writer's Toolbox journey. Now, it doesn't have to.

What it means for teachers

Our new handwriting tool means you don’t need to plan lessons twice or create separate handwriting exercises from scratch. Now, you can set a handwritten task in class and a typed one for homework, with both exercises feeding into  a single feedback loop.

Students get all the benefits of handwriting, without you needing to interpret their messy drafts. They only submit their work once they’ve edited it in Writer’s Toolbox, using personalised feedback to fix their errors and improve on specific focus areas.

This means less time correcting common issues that appear in every student draft. More time for deeper one-on-one conversations that move a student’s writing and thinking forward.

What it means for your students

Whether they start their draft on paper or on screen, students get the same feedback, using the same evidence-backed frameworks. We don’t tidy up any typos or grammatical errors when we convert their handwriting to typed text, meaning students still need to spot and fix their own mistakes.

They don’t spend time in class typing up their handwritten notes. They don’t offload their thinking to a digital tool. And they don’t need to wait for personalised suggestions.

What do they do? They engage more of the brain when they form letters by hand. They sharpen their critical thinking skills by making edits themselves. And they strengthen their memory and  metacognitive skills when handwriting.

What it means for school leaders

Blended learning works best when it’s backed by consistent data. If you only get writing data from digital drafts, it’s hard to track student progress, and even harder to pinpoint those students who need more support.

With Writer’s Toolbox, school leaders can access consistent writing data for every student, even when reduced screen time becomes mandatory.  

It also settles an increasingly common question—with the rise in generative AI, how can you be sure that students are submitting original work? When you see students write something by hand and submit photos to prove it, you already have the answer. 

Two modes of writing. One programme, one set of writing data, and one feedback function.

How it works, and what you need to know

If students know how to take a photo, they know how to use the handwriting feature. 

All they need to do is write a draft, snap a photo, and upload it into Writer’s Toolbox. Even if their writing is messy or they’ve scribbled words out, our conversion engine can make sense of it. It’s trained on millions of data points, and can transform unintelligible scrawl into an accurate digital format. 

The point of all this

This was never about handwriting replacing typing, or typing replacing handwriting. It's about one programme that works intuitively with both, so schools can offer genuinely blended learning.

Sources

• Marano, G. et al. "The Neuroscience Behind Writing: Handwriting vs. Typing—Who Wins the Battle?" Life, 22 February 2025. https://doi.org/10.3390/life15030345

• Roberts, P. "Writing the right way: Early handwriting skills can boost creativity and learning." CQUniversity News, 9 October 2025. https://www.cqu.edu.au/news/1246971/writing-the-right-way-early-handwriting-skills-can-boost-creativity-and-learning