Forming Good Driving Habits

“Drive more....... Learn more” – is this in fact true?

Well, let me give you an analogy from my experience skiing last week.

This lady in our group on the ski school was I would guess about 50.  At the end of Day 1 and Day 2 she was complaining that it was going to slow for her, she wanted things to pick up pace a little bit.  She wanted to be on more demanding slopes and to have the freedom to do more skiing.  So on Day 3, she gets what she wants and spends most of her day painfully falling on her behind. 

What then happened was the Instructor attempted to improve her ski technique back on calmer conditions, using a number of drills.  But she didn’t like drills, she didn’t like concerted effort to improve technique and eventually, in what was rather an uncomfortable moment, the Instructor faced her directly and said in his very unlimited English.... “you do not do as I say”.  What he was referring to was her lack of effort to replicate his actions on the drills.  Of course, on calmer slopes, with less skiers and snow boarders around, and not so steep, she managed to get away with the flaws in her technique.  But as soon as she was put in the more testing conditions again, those little flaws became gaping big holes in technique which inevitably resulted in loss of control.  It wasn’t particularly nice to experience to be honest, because by the end of the week, she actually said “I’m hanging up my skis for good now”, she was completely demoralised, she felt intimidated, embarrassed and to say her confidence as a skier was crushed is an under-statement.

So, if you were to say.... “The more you ski, the more you learn”, then with knowledge of the above, perhaps you can see that it is not entirely correct.   In a learning environment, there is a need for the ‘learner’ to at least ATTEMPT to adopt the words/actions of the Instructor.  If like this lady I met last week, you do not intend to, then it really begs the question why she paid the money to attend the ski school?    

But getting back to driving lessons in Peterborough, which is my world.  The reason I adopt the slogan is because I fully believe that the experiences that a Learner picks up from lots and lots of good quality, focussed driving practise is absolutely key to developing good driving habits.  This is precisely why after 40 hours of driving on my Intensive Driving Course, my customers feel confident, they have well established good driving habits and they inevitably comfortably pass the Driving Test.

If you care to look at my Facebook page, you will see a post on 19/12/12 which shows one of my customers drove 82 miles in a session.  82 miles!  That’s not 82 miles of him driving round while I switch off and fall asleep, that’s 82 miles where I am sat there beside him, constantly developing good driving habits, fine tuning here and there.

Only by giving people the OPPORTUNITY to practise the principles of good driving, will they become habit forming, and in a nutshell, that is precisely what I mean by ‘The more you drive, the more you learn”.  It’s no good being the best ‘theoretical’ driver in the world on a simulator in a classroom but not having much chance to actually drive on public roads.  It’s also counterproductive to have loads of driving experience practising bad driving habits – you need the opportunity for quality and experience, and they are two ingredients that I constantly strive to achieve on my courses. 

If you are a Learner or planning to take driving lessons soon, I'm interested in hearing your views on the above blog.  Was it useful?  Please put questions/comments below,  or just grade the blog using the tick boxes.

Thank you.