Teaching kid to drive

[Sschell]

I don't know.... this may be a job for bendo...

speaking of which..... where is Mr. ver?

 

[snickerd3]

I sympathize, benbo. Ours are both "experienced" drivers now. But it was not easy getting them there. And we have 2 girls. Boys, I imagine, are more aggressive drivers.

Consistent with what Supe said, it's my expereince that boys may be more "aggressive" but thay are also more attentive and more concious of their surroundings. girls are more preoccupied with the radio or phone and less aware of things around them, which IMHO is just as bad or worse than going fast.

My parents paid for drivers ed so they didn't have to deal with the teaching.

Driver's Ed is no substitute for actual driving/teching. In MA they recently (2007 increased the number of hours that kids need to log before they can road test. Also PARENTS are required to have 2 hrs. classroom "training" as part of Driver's Ed.

from here: http://www.mass.gov/rmv/rmvnews/2007/driver_ed_regs.htm

Behind the Wheel Training: Required 12 hour behind-the-wheel driver education training (up from 6 hours) and required 40 hours of parent-supervised driving (up from 12 hours).

Parent Curriculum: Required two-hour parent/guardian class on the driving skills and rules their children should be learning and practicing throughout the driver education experience.

My dad put me through car boot camp when I turned 16 and it was one of the best things he ever taught me. One of the challenges was changing a tire within a taped off area that was supposed to simulate the shoulder of a highway. Step outside the tape = failure. Another one was he left his headlights on over night and got me up at 5 am to jump start his truck (if he was late to work = failure). I had to be able to identify all the fluids in the car by the color.

Not sure how these drills will improve your driving but they are certainly good life skills to have.

they have Hr requirements in IL now and recent increased them, but I missed all that. It started the yr after i got my license. My parents had to deal with that with my sister though.

 

[cableguy]

I go through an intersection like the drawing above every day. Everyone I work with (leaving work) who lives South of Waco does the same thing as me... hangs a U turn at that intersection following the blue line (staying close to the "inside" median). It works much better that way.

That said, if I were turning a hard left, I'd follow the red line. But hanging a U, I follow the blue, especially with the line of traffic that we have after work going through the intersection (all turning U's).

 

[Supe]

Million dollar question: which is the right way to cross a divided highway to turn down the road on the bottom - red or blue?

if the road you would be turning on is also one way then either would work.

Bottom road is not one way. Also, think of traffic moving right having to do a u-turn to go left.

red, but with a stop at the center before you cross the bottom road.

Congratulations. I guess I'm not nuts. Hugging the blue line is no different than driving in the wrong lane. Also, in a U-turn situation, hugging the blue line leaves you unable to see oncoming traffic if two cars are turning.

I have lost count of how many people in NC will actually stop with a deer in headlights look, or actually nose their car IN FRONT OF YOURS, because they don't know what to do, even if there's room on the other side of you.

 

[roadwreck]

Boys, I imagine, are more aggressive better drivers.

Fixed if for you Mary.

 

[maryannette]

Boys, I imagine, are more aggressive better drivers.

Fixed if for you Mary.

And, we should listen to advice about driving from "ROADWRECK"????!!

 

[roadwreck]

Boys, I imagine, are more aggressive better drivers.

Fixed if for you Mary.

And, we should listen to advice about driving from "ROADWRECK"????!!

Yes, I have lots of experience on the subject.

 

[envirotex]

My 16 y-o is about to get his permit, and we are going to spend our spring and summer with him driving us around...I think he'll do OK. He's pretty into cars, so I think he has some decent respect for the responsibility required, but you never know what could happen once their out on their own.

I do find it somewhat strange though, that lots of kids today wait until well after their 16th birthday to get their driver's licenses.

The day I turned 16, I was at the DPS taking my driver's test to get my license.

 

[snickerd3]

now adays they have to get so many driving hrs in it takes a while longer to qualify

 

[RIP - VTEnviro]

I learned to drive in a school parking lot early on weekend mornings. When I had the basics down, we moved on to me driving to an active parking then driving around there.

A strip mall parking lot on a Saturday morning is a pretty good place to learn. There's all the usual stuff from driving, parking, backing up, etc. to do with other cars around. But there's also a lot of commotion going on - people driving across parking lanes and things like that to make you be alert around your car. But it's low speed, so the worst that you get is a fender bender.

 

[pbrme]

I learned out in the country, less to run into out there.

 

[snickerd3]

my parents let drivers ed classes do the teaching...although my dad did teach me to drive stick in the middle school parking lot over the weekend and at night. Haven't driven a stick shift in years but it should come back to me if the need ever arises.

 

[engineergurl]

sitting back to see where this one goes now...

 

[chaosiscash]

I drove tractors and farm trucks well before I was old enough to get a license. By that time, I pretty much had it figured out, other than parallel parking. That was about all Dad had to teach me.

 

[Flyer_PE]

^Same here. My uncle had me driving the baler when I was 9 since it freed up somebody bigger to stack the wagon.

 

[FLBuff PE]

Haven't driven a stick shift in years but it should come back to me if the need ever arises.

I feel bad for Mr. Snick.

 

[Dexman PE PMP]

Haven't driven a stick shift in years but it should come back to me if the need ever arises.

I feel bad for Mr. Snick.

A very PG way of saying what several of us were thinking...

 

[Dexman PE PMP]

I learned to drive using video games. We had one of those steering wheel/pedal combos to play indy & nascar racing games. Learning how to correct a sliding nascar going 175 mph without overcorrecting translated to driving in the snow/ice pretty well.

Neither my brother or I ever went through any driving classes, and only had parents ride with us while we had our learners permits because that was the law. We both could drive anything with 4 wheels from the beginning (manual or automatic).

 

[snickerd3]

^ very true.

 

[Slugger926]

I was given my grandpa's old 66 Chevy truck at 14 to rebuild with the condition it stays in the pasture, and I had to feed the cattle everyday along with haul fresh bailed hay to the barn. After 2 years of sanding, and lots of hard work rebuilding that truck, I was extra cautious when I got my license. I also learned how to get myself out of a jam in snow or mud since not feeding the cattle was not an option no matter the weather conditions.