Tips for Teaching a Teenager How to Drive (A Mother’s Survival Story)
Week 7 in my adventures on learning/doing something new is teaching our teenager how to drive. Over the past weeks, I have been working with Daphne who recently turned 16 and has her G1. Which means, she needs a licenced driver of more than 4 years in the front passenger seat, as well as zero tolerance for alcohol, and no driving midnight to 5 am, or on the super-fast highways.
It is a way better system then when I grew up. We drove around the block with a stranger on our birthday and they let us drive away on our own. When I got my licence, I was so excited I almost got in an accident coming home from my test. It seems just a bit safer now.
If you enjoyed that, you will also enjoy this Mother’s Calendar for December. Step aside Wear a Funny Hat Day, Mum’s are in charge this month!
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Wow. My hat’s off to you! Both of my parents gave it 1 try each before they gave up. Then my brothers. I took driver’s education in school (discount on auto insurance for the folks), but that taught me practically nothing. They finally handed me over to a cousin who succeeded where they all failed (no screaming). Although I have to thank a friend of mine for teaching me to parallel park. Which I never do. I basically quit driving in 2002 because you have to be crazy to drive in Fort Lauderdale. Or at least braver than I am. Not quite sure what I’ll do when my husband can no longer drive…….
By the time your husband can no longer drive, you won’t need to go far. Drones will bring your groceries and your car will drive itself to the movie theatre or restaurant. Better than being on the road with all these teenagers learning 🙂
A friend in Australia taught me to parallel park (on the other side of the road no less) and I do it like a champ. It’s all about the side mirrors and the starting point. I probably parallel park every second day on average. If I wasn’t good at it, I would never find a spot in Toronto!!
Every place has straight-in (perpendicular) parking down here. Everybody comes from some place else so it’s easier (and space saving) to prevent as many side-swiping accidents as possible. I haven’t had to parallel park since I left New York, and even though I no longer drive, I’m thankful that no one else has to park like that either. Residential areas probably still have parallel parking, as long as there’s on swale/no swale allowed.
Parking lot spots are so much harder to find than street parking here because people are uncomfortable with parallel parking. I once had a group of construction workers whoot at me, not because I was looking good, but because I got in the smallest spot in one go. They actually applauded and I took the opportunity to bow. We laughed. None of us were fired, criminally charged, filmed, shamed, felt bad, or became president afterwards either. It was a good day.
I was grateful for the spoiler alert–it was nice to know going in that this was not a posthumous post. And this brings back memories of my own driving test. Everyone assured me it would be six right turns around the license building, a stop at a stop sign, and I’d be ready to go.
Nope. The instructor took me on a 45-minute tour, wasn’t paying attention, and tried to get me to change lanes right into another car.
It was all good, though. I got my license twenty years later.
Christopher recently posted…He Was Grrreat!
Christopher: The definition of persistence.
My grandfather (when he was in his 90s) had a similar situation. They would give him a temporary license (same restrictions as Daphne), he would ignore the restrictions and kept going in for a new test every month until “He finally got an instructor who knew how to drive.” Having driven with him… I interpreted that as “an instructor who lived on the other side of town and just found out her boyfriend had another girlfriend so had a bit of a death wish.” Same/same.
I’m willing to bet this will be one of the most dangerous things you did in your 50 to 50.
At age 16, right after a snowstorm in Texas (which is rare), I perfectly parallel parked a yellow (not sure why I needed to mention the color) Chevy Malibu station wagon between the two poles they provide for the test. Then I remembered my cousin saying she failed because she didn’t back up far enough. I briefly let my foot off the brake and *BAM* knocked over the pole. Luckily I did everything else well and it wasn’t enough to fail me.
Arionis recently posted…I kind of got an award?
I got so excited after passing my test that I forgot how to drive and my driving instructor had to take over. I think I’ll let Mister drive our daughter to her test in June!
Great tips! I too think kids need a lot of support in things like driving, so we’d have much better and careful drivers on our roads and responsible adults afterwards