Last night we went round some friends of ours a few doors
down. They provided our two little ones
with some entertainment, and I noticed my youngest, who is 7, when he found
himself playing a ‘Mario’ game which he has never played before. What was the first thing he did? He ran Mario off the edge of the walkway
seemingly into a free fall to certain death, and while he did this he asked “What
happens if I do this?”. The daughter of
our friends replied “No, it’s fine”.
Mario was captured mid-fall in a magical bubble and floated upwards back
on to the footpath.
How curious. I wonder
why that was the first thing he did. It’s
had me thinking today.
This afternoon we went to a ‘Battlefield’ laser gun event,
where 20 odd people all go round zapping each other into virtual death. Very similar to paintballing but the bonus is
that our little one (the same one as above) could join in, as the lower age
limit is 7. In one game, we were told we
had to defend our base at all costs, our enemy was going to attack us and it
was our job to hold them off – we only had a limited number of ‘lives’ if we
got shot, but our enemy had unlimited ‘lives’.
Now in my mind, I was all for laying down in some long grass, in a ‘sniper’
type approach, well camouflaged, with the aim of ‘picking them off’ as they
approached our base. What does my
little one want to do? He immediately
attempts to leave the boundary of the base to a side exit – how bizarre! It wasn’t facing the direction of the enemy,
it wasn’t in our base, it seemed a completely odd thing to do – he was called
back being told he had to stay within the base.
On Friday I was with one of my Learners and we were doing
some work on manoeuvres. The pace was
much too fast and a consequence of this is often either a lack of obs, or poor
positioning (and sometimes both). After
a demo or two from me, and some repeated emphasis of how important it is to
control the pace with the left foot (clutch control), he was still reversing
much, much too fast. In a moment of
honesty that my young Learners rarely display he said “I’m sorry Tom, I know
what you want me to do, but I just find it so hard to get the ‘boy racer’
driving out my system”. He gestured with
his hands and face a demonstration of utter frustration that I do not often get
to see – I was left in no doubt that his feelings were truly felt. You have to admire his honesty.
And I’m seeing a pattern.
There is a willingness to just “let’s see” that an older person would be
less willing to try. As we get older, we
tend to hang on to what is said, we fully listen, we absorb the info and we do
our utmost to comply to the instruction/rules/guidelines, because primarily our
experience shows us that it is often wise to follow advice from others when it
is offered. I remember with absolute
clarity going on a camping trip at school, being about 12. We had put up our tents and a game of cricket
followed. I was fielding close to the
batsman, about 15’ away on the leg side, and our teacher shouted out to me, “Tom,
out a bit”, I was reluctant to move. A
couple of my team mates joined in telling me to make some distance...... I
ignored them all. Next ball, literally the
next ball, went straight into my eye – a scorcher of a black eye. We ignore advice at our peril.
I like to incorporate a couple of aspects of driving that although
will very likely not be tested on, in my opinion are massively important to at
least be aware of. One is emerging from
a stationary position on to a major road where the traffic is in a national
speed limit. The other is being able to
read the severity of bends on rural roads.
A limitation with my training is that whilst I completely control those
situations in the training, I’m very aware that my Learners are having to rely
on my words only for the justification of why this is important – they can’t
get to say “let’s see” and just go for it.
Therefore, one has to wonder if they truly do appreciate the gravity of
the situation.
One other such example is dealing with a skid. On 1 in 3 tests a candidate is asked to
incorporate a simulated emergency stop.
But the DSA literally just want to see a stop, rather than what I hope
any of my Learners would be at least considering, a positional adjustment along
with the stop. In training, I talk about
how ABS facilitates steering by attempting to prevent the wheels from
locking. And when we practise we do some
stops as if we have ABS, and we also do some stops as if we don’t have ABS –
cadence braking. We talk about threshold
braking – it’s a big subject. But on
test, the DSA don’t want the candidate to steer away from the supposed
hazard. As such, our Learners don’t get
to experience some really important stuff.
They don’t get to experience how it feels when you are skidding forwards
but really want the car to go to the right for example – an incredibly
uncomfortable sensation where you feel entirely helpless for a split second.
Young people will learn from experience, and when it comes
to road safety, sometimes that experience can be far reaching. I’m going to investigate if we have a local
skid-pan near us that anyone would like to come and “let’s see” in a safe
environment. Skidding is a nasty old
business and if you can put kids running into roads to one side for a moment;
speed, traction to the road surface, severity of steering, heavy braking, tyre tread
and pressure are all contributory factors but one thing is for sure – if you
approach a bend at too high a speed you are significantly increasing the odds
of you losing control of the car with sometimes fatal consequences. Fatal...... not ‘oh well, best I don’t do
that again then I suppose’, but actually fatal.
Now that truly is a hard lesson to learn.
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