Handwritten JournalSay it. Write it. Keep it.
Your child says what happened today. The words appear on a ruled page, and they write over them in their own hand. Finish a line and the guide disappears. A year of days becomes a book.
The basic app is always free. No ads, no account for your child. iPad with iPadOS 18 or later. Designed for Apple Pencil.
The app's own page: their words land, their ink is marked as they write, and the finished line becomes their handwriting.
Three steps, one page, no ceremony.
Handwriting practice is dull. Journaling is not. If the sentence a child practices is one they wanted to say, practice stops being practice.
Talk
Tap the microphone and say what happened. Up to five minutes, and stopping part-way is completely fine. Speech is recognized on the iPad, and there is always Type it instead.
Write
The whole thing is one long page, and they work down it at their own pace with an Apple Pencil. Ink inside the letter turns green and ink outside turns red, as they write.
Keep
Finish a line and the guide underneath goes away. What is left is their handwriting, exactly where they wrote it. The page joins the journal with the date, and exports as a PDF.
Their words. Their page. Their book.
Every other tracing app hands a child a word list — cat, dog, ball. This one asks what happened to them today and hands that back to be written.
Their words
The sentence is worth writing because the child said it. Speech becomes the guide text, right on the page, with no word list in sight.
Their page
The line they finished is theirs — the guide underneath is gone and the ink stays exactly where the pencil put it. Nothing interrupts the page, and nothing moves them on to the next word.
Their book
Newest first, dated, searchable by what they said. Export a page, a month, or the whole journal as a PDF for a grandparent.
A journal with a handwriting engine underneath.
Marked letter by letter
Green inside the letter, red outside, while they write — never afterwards. An untraced letter scores zero, so half a word scores like half a word.
Stroke order, taught not told
A letter drawn out of order keeps most of its score, and when the word is finished the page teaches that one letter — it draws itself, they trace it, and they carry on.
A practice sheet
Every letter Aa to Zz and 0 to 9 on the same ruled paper. Touch one and a blue dot marks where to start, then the letter draws itself stroke by stroke, with arrows to follow; trace it and it turns green. A Tutor switch turns the demonstration off for a child who already knows the letter — the guide and the blue dot are still there, the arrows just aren't.
Two typefaces, five sizes
Chosen by a grown-up, never earned. One print face, Jua, and one cursive, Playwrite; each is previewed at its real size before you pick it.
Points, stars and streaks
Three stars for a page at ninety percent, a streak for writing day after day, eight badges to earn. A number that only goes up, with nothing to unlock and no levels.
Several children, one iPad
A profile each, with their own journal, typeface and size, and an optional four-digit PIN to keep a sibling out. A grown-up PIN stands in front of sending, exporting, websites and deleting, and a grown-up can export any child's pages as a PDF from Settings.
A voice, if you want one
The iPad says whose turn it is, names the letter to trace and cheers a finished line — short recorded cues in a choice of two warm voices, and it never reads the journal aloud. A switch per child, and nothing is said while the microphone is listening.
Your child's journal stays on the iPad.
Nothing about your child leaves it unless a grown-up sets up sharing. Your child never has an account, and there is no advertising, analytics or crash reporting. Speech is recognized on the iPad and no audio is recorded or kept.
- The journal stays home. Nothing your child writes leaves the iPad unless a grown-up chooses to: a PDF they share, or a page sent to their own phone once they set that up.
- Grown-ups first. A note to a friend goes only to a family a grown-up invited, and a grown-up in both families says yes before the other child sees it.
- Never sold, never used for ads. No advertising, analytics or crash reporting. What sharing needs is kept for your family alone, and is never shared with anyone for their own purposes.
- Always free, and honest about it. The basic app is always free because we want our children to thrive. We may introduce additional features that will be paid because we will never sell your data.
Read the privacy policy — it says exactly what is collected, and what never is.
Settings, not rewards.
You choose the letter style and the size, and nothing has to be earned to make the letters bigger. Progress is kept per setting, so a dip after you make the letters smaller shows you why instead of worrying you.
- Left-handed layout and color-blind ink, per child
- Voice feedback, haptics and guide lines are switches, per child
- Trace on paper: the page locks bright and still, so it can be traced on a real sheet laid over the screen
Made for children roughly five to eight who can speak in sentences and are learning to form their letters. Not a curriculum, not a reading app, not a game with levels, not a social network.
A writing center that runs itself.
No logins for children, no Wi-Fi to write, no class setup. Several children on one iPad, a dated page per sitting, and a PDF for the portfolio once a teacher has set up the grown-up PIN. Occupational therapists get per-letter scoring, stroke-order judgment and a lesson on the letter that missed — inside meaningful writing, not in a drill.
- For K–2 teachers and school leaders · one-page PDF
- For therapists, tutors and specialists · one-page PDF
- The parents' one-pager for a school newsletter or a waiting room
Free classroom pilots are running from October 2026 to January 2027 — ask about one.
Things grown-ups ask.
Does it need an Apple Pencil?
Handwritten Journal is designed for Apple Pencil — any model your iPad supports — and that is how it is meant to be used: palm rejection, pressure and the feel of writing are built around it. It works without one, too. The first time it runs it asks your child to trace a letter, with a pencil or a finger; if there isn't a pencil to hand it explains what the pencil adds and which pencils fit your iPad, and you carry on. Nothing is locked, and you are not asked again.
Is it free? Is there a subscription?
The basic app is always free because we want our children to thrive. We may introduce additional features that will be paid because we will never sell your data. The first is Send to friends, an optional subscription for notes between families who know each other; only the family that invites pays. Writing, keeping and exporting the journal never need a subscription, and neither does a page your child sends to your own phone. There is no advertising.
My child is hard to understand. Will dictation work?
Speech recognition on young voices is imperfect, so the words stay editable until they are written — a misheard word never has to enter the record. And there is always Type it instead.
Where does our data go?
Your child's journal stays on the iPad. Nothing about your child leaves it unless a grown-up sets up sharing — and then only a first name and sticker for each child you tick, and the pages and notes that are sent, kept for your family alone and deleted on a schedule. Speech is recognized on the iPad and no audio is kept. There is no advertising, analytics or crash reporting, and we never sell your data. The privacy policy says exactly what is kept and for how long.
What if we lose the iPad?
Export the journal to Files or iCloud Drive now and then; the whole book is one PDF. There is no cloud sync of the journal, by design, and pages your child sends you are kept for 30 days, so they are not a backup.
Is it cursive? Which handwriting program does it follow?
One print typeface, Jua, and one cursive — Playwrite, a traditional American model. Print stroke order follows ball-and-stick in the order most classrooms teach, and the cursive face is judged on its own routes, joins included. It is not a licensed program or a cursive course, and it does not teach reading.
Can two children share it?
Yes. Each gets a profile with their own journal, typeface and size, and an optional PIN. A PIN keeps a sibling out; it is not encryption, and the app says so.
Can my child share or delete things by accident?
No. A four-digit grown-up PIN is asked for before a journal is exported, a website opens, an entry or a profile is deleted, or progress is reset, and only a grown-up who has signed in can choose it. Once you have linked your child's profile they can send a page to you, and only to you; a note to a friend waits for your yes. Settings, typefaces and profiles stay open.
iPhone? Android? Chromebook?
The journal is for iPad: iPadOS 18 or later, in portrait or landscape, designed for Apple Pencil. A child holds an iPad like a notebook, and the page needs the room. On an iPhone the same app is the grown-up's side — it sets up sharing and receives the pages a child sends; nobody writes there.
Do it for a day and you have a page. Do it for a year and you have a book.
The basic app is always free. No ads, no account for your child, and the journal stays on the iPad.
