Riding a bike

[conway]

Am eager to get My son who is nearly seven on a bike as we are going on holiday in France in July with bike rentals and bike tracks.
He is too big for his bike with stabilisers and his other one without stabilisers he will not ride.
had one attempt but when fell has never tried again.
Any hints

[christywhisty]

Try and get other kids to teach him. Both mine learnt from the other children in the street, in fact all the children in our road learnt that way.

[Furball]

take the pedals off so he can sit on it and scoot himself along. it really helps with balance

[Romy7]

DD1 was 7 when she learnt, painstakingly, and with dh practically holding her up. DS decided he wanted to do it as well (2 years younger) so did with no fuss. DD1 went over the handlebars racing him and smashed her brand new front teeth... my tip? stand well clear and know where the emergency dentist is... oh, and it was easter saturday and she couldn't eat any easter eggs. disaster.

[chocaddict]

Hi
My ds who is 7 has only just learnt.
I can't believe actually how he just all of a sudden took to it.
I mean he had a bike with stabilisers and didn't even seem to be able to pedal it.
Anyway we took the plunge and got him a bike without stabilisers, put on his helmet, shin, elbow pads, and just let him do it without even holding on to him in any form, very difficult for me has I am a worrier but I have come to the conclusion that if you yourself feel panicky then your dc will and he took to it just like that with hardly any effort.
He fell off a few times and we had a few tears but I just made light of it and it seemed to work.
Now he is wizzing around everywhere and just weeks ago he wouldn,t even put the effort into pedalling.

[clayre]

my dd learned on a nursery bike, which is a balance type bike, and she started riding that on 2 wheels during the week and on saturday night she was on her own bike with stabilisers still and she asked for them off, we took them off yesterday morning and she took off, i dont think its something you can teach them i think they need to do it themselves.

[quickdrawmcgraw]

It's hard to teach them if they are nervous about learning but if he's willing to give it a try have him on a bike where the seat is set low enough for him to put his 2 feet flat on the ground. It'll seem as if the bike is too small for him but he can't really fall off that way.
then hold the back of the seat behind him (not the handlebars) and run with him until he feels steady enough to go a little way on his own. Tell him you won't let him go unless he says it's ok. Because he's a bit older he should get it fairly quickly.

[bellavita]

Put the bike next to the kerb, with the pedal resting on it for balance. Get DS to sit on the bike and put his foot on the other pedal and then just get him to push off with that foot and he should start going on his own.

[Fillyjonk]

agree with furball

i don't think stabilisers are that great for teaching kids to ride, tbh

[Othersideofthechannel]

We have just done it exactly how quickdraw describes (DS is 5)
We put kneepads and elbow pads because he was scared of falling.
After a while, I let go without telling him after a while and let him cycle for a while before showing him I wasn't holding on any more.

[Othersideofthechannel]

We have just done it exactly how quickdraw describes (DS is 5)
We put kneepads and elbow pads because he was scared of falling.
After a while, I let go without telling him after a while and let him cycle for a while before showing him I wasn't holding on any more.