Driving Lessons

The debate about what type of car in learn to drive in came round again this week.

I took a pupil for PassPlus who had learnt to drive and passed their test with a different school and had learnt in a diesel car. Problem was she couldn’t drive my petrol car! and took about 2 hours to get used to it in a way that we could then carry on with the passplus modules.

The problem is that in a diesel car, you don’t need any gas on to be able to move the car off in most situations. In a petrol car you need to apply gas before bringing up the clutch to the biting point, before being able to move off.

Not too much difference but one that caused alot of pain for the young driver trying to get to grips with it.

Maybe only driving tests should be done in petrol cars.

If you learn to drive in a petrol car, it’s easy to pick up the technic for a diesel - but very difficult the other way round!  

When choosing a driving school, look beyond the initial sales pitch.

Basically don’t get suckered in by a free DVD or a free Highway Code, both of which cost a few pounds from any where - don’t pay for a block of lessons up front before you know what your instructor is like.

What if you pay for say 10 lessons to get a cheap rate and on the first lesson you decide you don’t like the driving instructor, basically you’ve already paid so you will probably continue. What then happens is that you begin to hate your lessons and in many cases this leads to giving up driving altogether - what a disaster!

In stead just go for a few lessons paying the normal hourly rate, this will give you the opportunity to decide if you want to continue to learn with that instructor but without the burden of knowing you have to stay with them.  During this time, it will give you chance to see what they are like, do they turn on on time for the lesson, do they answer your questions, are they teaching you anything, and probably most importantly - do you get on with them!

Try before you buy!!

Seems a simply question - but one that continues to baffle at times!

Many young people are pushed into having lessons by their parents, they don’t want to drive, have no desire to drive - so why waste your money, or in most cases their parents money.

There is only a small majority that fall into this category, most people need to learn to drive - want to learn to drive and put 100% into their lessons. That’s great and always ends up with a safe competent driver at the end of their training and go on to be safe drivers for life.

The small majority where their parents pay for their lessons and they don’t want to drive - are in truth extremely difficult to teach - take 2 or 3 times longer than someone who wants to learn, but most importantly are very often not safe because they don’t want to drive!

With anything that we do - if you want to do it - you will - if you don’t - you won’t.

So before booking driving lessons or blaming the driving instructor for not getting on with your driving - think about wether or not you want to learn first!

So we have all learnt to drive at some point -

 so we all know how nerve racking it can be out there when you are not confident about your driving skills -

so why do so many drivers forget this fact and see you with that L plate on and just have get past you?

Often driving in such a way that scares the poor learner that’s trying their best to concentrate. Is it not them that needs driving lessons?

I think it just comes down to one thing, life is lived in the fast lane these days and people cannot be held up by anyone else. OK but don’t do it and put yourself at risk or others, otherwise that fast life will be over, for good!

What does that mean - it’s about driving in a way where you are not carrying out the correct observations, or in plain English - not seeing what is around you.

The number of pupils that drive in their own bubble is quite scary, driving by only looking forward a short distance is dangerous. In order to pass your driving test but more importantly, to be a safe driver you need to continuously scan ahead, looking for dangers long before they become an issue. When you are on your next driving lesson, try looking as far down the road as you can see, to the left and to the right, then scan back towards your car taking in any problems that you may see. This way you will have a continuous assessment of any problems ahead and be able to deal with them in an effective manner.

To be a safe driving - you must burst your bubble!