How to change behaviour

Ultimately, in the driving instructor world, we are all about behavioural change.  Pupils across the UK can be told to behave in a certain way but that does not necessarily effect behavioural change on a long term basis.

No, this is complex, and there needs to be an added ingredient to the mix for there to be long lasting change.

The traditional way that driving instructors attempt to effect behavioural change in pupils is by raising awareness of the need for change, giving assistance in how to behave, and giving praise when change is shown.  If change does not come about, then instructors will respond differently. 

My own driving instructor (30 odd years ago) slammed on the brakes real hard when I went to move off without doing a left blindspot check at traffic lights.  Decades ago, schools used to administer the cane to effect behavioural change.  These harsh tactics that involve immediate shock only succeed in achieving long term mental trauma.

The fact of the matter is that the responsibility for behavioural change must come from within our pupils. What is not helping matters for driving instructors is that school leaders and teachers are in this awful situation where often they are working harder to encourage learning from their pupils than the actual pupils... the responsibility for learning has flipped and students know it!  Consequently, when those same students then start to take up learning to drive, they are very used to the idea that the "teacher" (in this case the driving instructor), tries harder than they do to achieve the goal.

Driving instructors and teachers can provide smart, well timed, constructive feedback to pupils as much as they like, but if the pupils are not recognising the goal of changing behaviour, learning will inevitably be limited.  There is simply no getting away from the fact.... ask any teacher who is spending hour upon hour marking books and filling out lengthy term reports - utterly wasted energy.

So unreliable is the current situation to long term learning, that black box telematics is the only way many can afford car insurance because without this continual monitoring of behaviour, insurance providers quite literally see young newly qualified drivers as too high a liability.

The way we are educating our younger generation is fundamentally flawed and as much as we need our schools to start facing up to that fact, we as an industry also need to stop 'spoon feeding' our pupils to pass driving tests. This unending quest for improved pass rates (or exam grades) at any expense is undermining the integrity of the end product. 'Safe Driving For Life' talks about the effects when pupils own their learning:

"When people learn in this way they are more likely to retain information and skills" and "People are also more likely to keep learning if they are encouraged to take responsibility for their learning at an early stage".

For driving instructors monitoring, I absolutely am advocating the use of continual checking of learning, but where I suspect we differ is how we behave when we have established the pupil is not learning.  The responsibility for road safety goes on for years after passing a driving test, if you are absolutely hell bent on ensuring your pupil is coached to pass driving tests, you are doing them a great disservice for providing > long-term learning <.

Professional, high quality training attracts appropriate pricing; low quality, superficial training attracts gutter prices.  If you could just allow yourself some CPD to recognise this relationship you will start to serve your customers far more effectively.

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