Private Practice

Driving lessons with an experienced driver. Parents who hold driver’s licenses and are able to provide opportunities for private practice are a huge help, both for us and for driving instructors.

The closer you can replicate what professional instructors do, the more you help the student succeed.

The first thing to ensure: Before hitting the road with a learner driver, make sure you meet the minimum requirements. You are over 21 years old and have held a full driver’s license (for the type of vehicle being used) for a minimum of three years.

You must also remember that you are not just a passenger but a supervisor with responsibility for your driver and other road users.

Planning Routes: Route planning is essential in the early stages of learning, and if poorly planned, it can lead to mistakes and frustration for the learner. This often leads to nervous situations in the car.

There’s no rush, one step at a time: If you find that your learner, for example, frequently stalls the engine when merging onto a main road, the likely cause is insufficient practice in quieter areas with less traffic. It’s best to avoid rush hours on the roads until the learner feels confident.

Ensure that the basic skills, the so-called “driving foundation,” are in place, and success will come. Check with the driving instructor if the planned route is appropriate.

Communication with the learner

Your choice of words will have a significant impact on how your learner responds. Try to be precise with instructions. If you want the learner to slow down, tell them how much to reduce speed, such as down to 20 mph.

You must remember that actions that you can do on your own may be quite challenging for the learner.

If mistakes are made, instead of telling the learner what they did wrong, tell them what to do next time to improve. When the learner succeeds, praise them; it will help boost their confidence.

Don’t let the learner rush. When people learn to drive, they often try to do everything very quickly. I’m not talking about speeding up the vehicle in general, but about the time taken to perform a specific action or maneuver. To do something correctly, like merging into traffic at intersections, the initial speed should be no faster than the pace of elderly pedestrians. The slower the learner does it, the better and more effective it will be. However, rushing can lead to many mistakes. As confidence and knowledge grow, speed improves.

As a supervising driver, you need to familiarize yourself with the basic techniques: mirrors, turn signals, positioning, speed, and observation.

This scheme is the foundation for driving, and not following it can cause more harm than good.

As instructors

we must spend more time correcting the mistakes that mom or dad may have helped develop, and this can lead to additional time and money.

Finally, remember that the learner does not react as quickly as you might think in some situations, and it will require a lot of patience when working with them.