It's all about knowledge and understanding the requirements of Unit 6.2.
This has been a week of study of the National standard for driver and rider training document. Well, not every hour of every day but you know what I mean. Looking in the right hand column of unit 2 we see that item a) tells us we must know and understand the relevant National driving or riding standard. So by reading it I am fulfilling this condition at the same time. That's good to know.
Moving along we see that we must understand the requirements of acquiring a licence for the tuition vehicle which is straight forward enough. Next item regards the requirements of any formal post test training. I would think this means either Pass Plus or an advanced driving test with one of the motoring organisations such as Diamond or RoSPA. If you are registered as a Pass Plus instructor then all the information is in the pack. I would think many driving instructors will belong to an advanced driving organisation and so should have some knowledge of post test training.
We need to understand a range of prior-learning inputs and how to feature them in how the learner is taught. Does this mean experience of riding a bike? I suppose practise taken with parents would count as a prior-learning input, as would any study for the theory test. Anything previously experienced that has anything to do with driving could be used in some way or another. It can boost a learners confidence to think they already know something which will help them to drive.
Cultural and religious factors must be taken into consideration when arranging driving lessons. Some people may not be able to attend on certain days. I had a refresher lesson on a Saturday with a client who recognised the Sabbath. He could have his lesson but couldn't pay for it. I just waited a couple of days to get paid. No problem. When it comes to fasting there can be some disruption. driving performance does deteriorate when people are fasting in my experience. People get up early to eat before sunrise so lack of sleep can factor into the equation.
If people don't want to make eye contact then that's fine by me. Sometimes it's a cultural issue. It's not something I insist on and I never find it rude if people don't look at me when I'm speaking. What worries me more is people who do make eye contact when they are driving the moving car. I always advise to look at the road and speak. People from some cultural backgrounds do not like to contradict the teacher. I find questions a good way around this. Answering a question honestly is not actually contradiction even if the answer is a different view from the one expressed by the teacher.
I don't know of anyone who uses psychometric tools. But we must understand the ethical issues it says here. Where does one go to study these issues? I'm sceptical of these things anyway. People have a certain view of themselves which is personal to them. When this view is combined with a subconscious desire to please or at least be correct the data acquired simply can't be accurate.I can't see much scope for it's use in driver training.
Now we come to the section on learning programmes. Like many instructors I don't work from written plans or pre-prepared programmes specific to the learner. I make notes and refer to them, sure. The actual lesson content follows the learning to drive syllabus but apart from that the lessons are shaped by what occurs during the drive. Not according to a plan I wrote the night before. Plans change anyway as you respond to your learner's needs. This was an issue on the check test where the instructor would be expected to shift the focus of the lesson if that is what was needed according to the situation at the time. It's all about flexibility.
Fostering good relationships with parents is important should the need arise. I must admit I very rarely meet or speak to parents. What I like to do though is regularly monitor and review my pupil's progress. I will shape future lessons on the result of these reviews but it's not like I rewrite a learning programme. The instructor, the pupil and the driving test syllabus is the learning programme and everything else stems from this. Have a read of the document to see what else this section says as I'll be moving on to unit 3 next time. Ciao.
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