Driving Lessons

The Autopian has a post that asked for advice on what to teach new drivers. More than a hundred comments were all good. It took me back to teaching my kids to drive. I started when they were about 12, and whoever was in the front seat got a rundown on what I was doing and why, comments on other people's driving, plus tips on finding your way around. I also drilled into them the priorities: 1. don't hit anything, 2. don't let anyone hit you, and 3. get where you are going. 

At fifteen, they got to drive in a pasture. This let them learn how to handle a car without wrecking or breaking laws. We had a foreign exchange student at the time, who had apparently never had the chance to drive a go-kart or golf cart before. The way he drove, I had my suspicions he never had a bicycle, either. My kids did pretty good. 

With a permit, we moved on to parking lots. Then cemeteries, which have narrow one lane roads and no traffic. Once they mastered those courses, we drove in our quiet neighborhood to learn how to deal with the occasional traffic. Then we moved on to downtown, the shopping centers, and to school. I tried different routes with narrow bridges, one lane roads, and different kinds of intersections.  

There's always more to introduce. We then went to the four-lane town bypass, where the speed limit is 55 and you have to get used to an entirely different way of driving and observing. Once that was mastered, I let them on the interstate highway. 

Teaching in phases like this also helped me to assess what they needed to work on at each step. When Princess took the driving test, she was one of about ten test-takers, all girls. She was the only one who passed that day, which blew away the Asian woman driver stereotype. The instructor complimented me for teaching her. 

Contrast all that care with the time I learned to drive. I wasn't in any real hurry to get a license after I got a permit, because my bestie was a few months older and already had her license. You could do that in the '70s. I flunked my first attempt because I failed to come to a complete stop at a sign. I was driving Mom's car. When I later used my car, with poorly synchronized gears, I couldn't shift into first without coming to a complete stop, so I passed just fine. I drove a '66 MG Midget, and everyone at school wanted to borrow my car to take the driving test because it was quite easy to parallel park. That was fine with me, as being their licensed driver got me out of class. But the cops finally told me to never bring that car back, because they had too much trouble getting in and out of it.