Why do kids write some numbers and letters in mirror image?

Question

I’ve been practicing the ABCs and 123s with my son and notice that certain letters (J N P S Z) and numbers (4 6) he always writes backwards/mirror imaged. I’ve seen other kids, and even my own writings as a child, have the same quirk. Is this pretty much universal?

In: 1018

Answer 1

They’ve learned a shape. They haven’t yet learned that the orientation matters too. That’s an additional detail and another level of understanding on top of simple shape matching.