Parents As Driving TeachersParents who are good drivers are not necessarily good driving teachers. It can be hard to teach long-established skills to novice drivers, especially your own teens. Emerging research shows parents may not be adequately equipped to teach teens the specifics required to become skilled drivers and to avoid crashes. You can help by giving parents the guidance and information they need to best support their teens in this process. Ideally, the parents’ role is to reinforce the skills taught to their teens by a professional driver education instructor (DEI). Tell parents that teens are at their lowest lifetime crash risk when practice driving with a trusted adult, whether it's a parent, guardian, or driving instructor. In our National Young Driver Survey (NYDS) of 5,600 teens nationwide, over half reported working with a DEI, and 87 percent said a parent was involved in teaching them to drive. However, we need to be sensitive to the fact that 4 in 10 teens report only having parents teach them to drive, and these parents may need extra guidance. Providing teens with lots of quality practice driving (a minimum of 50 hours) is necessary before they can drive on their own. Parents who stay involved after licensure by setting and enforcing rules for using the car can cut crash risk in half. Here is information to share with parents to help them with practice driving and rule setting. |
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