Remember from earlier, that you are the most important part of this training process. If you are willing to work hard, study and practise, you WILL become a driving instructor.
As long as you have this attitude, you be successful not just in the training but when working too.
As discussed earlier, driving lessons with a driving school are a very costly and poor learning environment and much of what work you need to do should be done away from a vehicle.
As you already know, we are specialists at delivering 'Rescue Training' - helping those let down by other training courses that simply deliver the bare minimum training. This has helped us understand what works and what does not, and to develop how NOT to train people just as much as HOW to, and what ensures a trainee gets to develop an understanding and knowledge to excel in the tests and be the best instructor they can be.
We asked ourselves why do less than 25% of those trainees with driving schools actually make it? What is wrong with the way instructors are trained now?
For over 30 years, driving instructors have been trained in a car and this has been the only way to train a driving instructor, and to keep the costs relativley low, all the driving schools have focussed on a 60 hour inCar programme.
When you look at the syllabus from earlier, there is an awful lot that needs to be covered. 60 hours inCar training is simply NOT enough time.
There is so much to cover and also, there is so much that should really not be done in a car at all - particularly at the beginning of part 2 and part 3.
Because of the cost you can only do the training ONCE. One single chance to get all the information in your head, and try and remember what you need to practice!
At Part 2 - think about it; when you were a learner, you needed an instructor next to you to keep the vehicle safe - it was a legal requirement! Now that you are an experienced driver, do you need an instructor there? No, you don't at this stage.
If you are actually driving the car, what is your brain focussing on? Are you learning anything or are concentrating on keeping the vehicle safe, on other road users and pedestrians? So having a driving instructor giving you a lesson on what you are doing wrong and reminding you to check your mirrors will not sink in. In car training simply does not work.
At Part 3, you are training how to teach and instruct. The test, is a test on 'instructional ability' so the skills you need to work on are much more suited to a class room enviornment, where you can study, write, read, revise and plan and use different media like video, slides, examples and coaching to aid you. There will be times perhaps, when you need to go over certain things again and again -to repeat a video, or practise what you have done or to experiement with different examples of what you have just done to see the effects on what could happen if you get it wrong -without the fear of crashing a car or indeed being made to look stupid!
Let's think about the car for a moment. Is it a comfortable, spacious and suitable learning environment? No. Can you comfortably use your books, write, plan, note, revise, brief, establish or repeat what you have just done? No.
"Ahh, you say, "you can do a lot of this at the side of the road"...... so why be in a car then?
Five years ago, we started with a clear canvas, and looked at what are the flaws in the curent methods. We took our 30 years experience in training drivers and saw how other industries have utilised technology and modern training techniques to provide a simple, easy and comfortable learning environment that give a trainee the best possible chance to learn, qualify and succeed.
We designed a course with a classroom to replace the vehicle, video, step by step animations, and structured practice and exercises to replace the inCar instructor and the ability to repeat over and over again and again.
People do ask: "at somepoint do you not need an instructor to assess you?"
Yes. It would make sense to have an instructor to give you mock test and make sure all the 'boxes are ticked" and AFTER you have had chance to get develop some of your more simple and straight forward skills so that any work needed at this point is more 'polishing of edges' or 'fine tuning'.
This is why we would recommend one of our SmartDriving Approved Instructor Trainers will see you in a vehicle at this stage.
This means you will only need to pay for what you need in-car - if any at all!
intelligent; individual; independent;
That's why we call it the iCourse.
Click here to learn about Part 1 of the driving instructor training process
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