PARENTING & DRIVING - LEARN BY DOING??

There are two potentially dangerous activities that people do in this world, for which they are poorly educated. The first one is parenting.

We are terribly under-educated when it comes to parenting. Schools in the early education years are forbidden to touch the subject. The vast majority of people who are parents have never taken a course or read books or intentionally made an effort to learn what a "good" parent does and knows, certainly before becoming parents themselves. Until they become parents, they haven't the vaguest idea of how other parents function except for what they learned from their own parents or parents of their friends.

Most people haven't gained parenting knowledge available to them through education and from the experience of trained and knowledgeable people who have done research, written books and who do give courses on the subject. Certainly, men only learn to be fathers from their own fathers, often without any awareness of the impact of their fathering on their children. Sadly, mothering is often learned the same way.

The other huge area of human endeavor where education is sorely lacking is pre-licensed driving.

Learning to drive by watching how parents drive is less than fruitful unless the parents are aware safe drivers who intentionally educate their children to become safe drivers. The few skills and limited knowledge taught in the usual Drivers Ed courses, has proven to be insufficient if judged by statistics of young-driver crashes. We in the United States, do an enormous amount of driving and yet, again, the only way that people learn is through experience, which is a hell of a way to learn!

Learning to drive by driving for many years is a costly and dangerous way to learn how to become a good driver. There are so many skills and so much knowledge needed to become a good and safe driver that to learn by driving on the road is the least effective way to gain the skills and knowledge. Driving is also not the best way to gain the temperament need to be a safe driver. Experience, though a great teacher, is the most dangerous way to learn to become a safe driver.

A Drivers License is simply the right to drive on the roads. NOTHING MORE!

Uncle PACKSman

Quick tip: Consciously decide to BE a safe driver.