Who is at the centre of your Standards Check, your pupil or the examiner?

The purpose of the DVSA Standards Check is to assess our ability to instruct and see if the service that is provided to the pupil helps them to learn effectively.

The examiner who assesses the Standards Check will not ask the pupil any direct questions to check for the above.  As such, it is unwise to make any assumptions about progress being made within the session based on your previous experiences with your pupil.  What may be blindingly obvious to you as a productive learning environment must be evidenced as such for an examiner to grade appropriately.

It is fundamentally for this reason that the dialogue between you and your pupil must be very comprehensive.  For example, the planning of the session as being in context with your pupil's current ability and needs must be thoroughly covered WITH the examiner present.  

Assuming that you use a pupil that you have worked with before, then what are you covering?  What have we done together recently, what needs do you have, how can we work safely on those needs in a manner that will benefit you? 

The more you can demonstrate that your pupil is engaged, reflecting on performance, considering goals and what it means for a goal to be achieved the better.  

I've mentioned it before in these blogs, some pupils will think deeply about their driving ability and confidence levels in between in-car training, and some will not.  Our role is to tap into the mind of the pupil to facilitate these mind activities and help them to formulate skills of self-assessment.  Pupils learn by thinking, they think while they talk, so inevitably we communicate with them in a constructive, positive manner to aid learning.  Granted we can provide pupils with resources that assist learning OUTSIDE the car, but of course, the examiner not only does not see that but crucially cannot assess something that is not observed.

Using techniques that assist in quantifying or describing levels of achievement make a great deal of sense, as you and your pupil can check that progress is indeed taking place.  Our pupils would quite rightly walk away from the service we provide if we fail in this fundamental aim.

Perhaps consider what makes a happy pupil?

The relationship between you and your pupil is vital in identifying the answer to this question.  Generalising I know, but pupils want to feel safe, they want to think that progress is being made at a pace that is manageable but challenging.  Pupils like options that help them to learn; they like to be offered choice in how to develop skills.  Pupils want to perceive that the time they spend in your company directly contributes to their goal of obtaining a full driving licence.

If you honestly get into this mindset when you greet your pupils on a day to day basis, the Standards Check becomes a side issue.

"By all means, you can observe me while I do everything I possibly can to add value for my customer in the following hour - just like I do every time I see them".  

Just make sure folks, that your Standards Check is centred around your pupil rather than the person sitting in the back.