As part of a more extensive research program investigating cognitive, linguistic and motor skills in children with Williams - Beuren syndrome (WBS) we made some preliminary observations of prehension movements. Eight children, in a restricted age range (9 - 11 years), took part in the pilot study. We individuated and classified three types of prehension in two different tasks: the Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration (VMI) for assessing perceptual and motor skills, and the Movement Assessment Battery for Children (M-ABC) for assessing manual dexterity. Sixteen typically developing children, individually matched with WBS children, were also assessed, resulting in two different comparison groups: 8 children were matched for mental age and 8 for chronological age. A peculiar type of prehension (referred to as the ``lateral grip'') was used by all children with WBS, but was only rarely observed in the comparison groups. These findings can contribute to a better description of motor development in children with WBS and to a better understanding of their visuospatial difficulties.