Has anyone taught their own child to drive?

[Gnarlytoe]

We are in Wales and so there is no end in sight for driving lessons to resume at the moment.

DC turned 17 during lockdown and was keen to start driving so we’ve added him to our little car as a learner driver. He’s never driven at all before so any tips please? Even if it’s just simply so he gets a feel for it before proper lesson can start.

Thanks.

DH taught DD1.
We 'accidentally' bought a dual control car for her (needed an automatic and that's what happened to come up).
Get a secondary rear view mirror.
Start somewhere really quiet like a disused car park or an industrial estate out of hours.
Go gently, don't shout.
Lots of stuff on youtube on current recommended techniques (eg where to position hands). Much better to learn right than have to undo.

Interested- my dad taught me, and I am planning on mixing paid lessons with time in the car with me for my son this year.

Bear in mind that the way you need to drive to pass a test is not necessarily the way that someone who's been driving for 20+ years will drive, even if they are a good and safe driver. All that exaggerated mirror-signal-manoeuvre stuff. At some point at least a couple of lessons will be a good investment so that your DC is coached in the correct test-passing techniques!

I would pay for an instructor while they learn the basics. Once they can handle clutch control, gear changes etc, then take them out.
You've got to have balls of steel, I feel anxious the whole time but never let my son know this. DP couldn't do it, too much shouting! I do it now, started on an empty industrial estate at the weekends. Now on the quiet country roads. Good luck!!

Following from above. The reason DH taught DD1 was that we couldn't find an automatic instructor.
She had 4 'proper' lessons in total with a normal instructor in our car (as it had dual controls) with DH in the back to learn.
Approx
1 - was he teaching right
2 - how to do manoeuvres
3 - test prep
4 - test readiness check
He would not have been able without the dual controls though.

We are currently teaching ours, we started with a large empty can park and mastered. Clutch control, she had a good basic knowledge of roads and signs as we have been pointing them out for the past year anyway.
After clutch control was mastered we got her doing short drives 2/3 minutes on the road to get road positioning right, then we increased the drive time, found car parks to practice maneuvers and now she is doing 1-2 hours driving a day.
We have to be firm on hand positioning and mirrors and plenty of you tube videos for help!
Good luck!

My DH taught our DD and then we got her a few lessons just before her test. I was quite confident in DH's ability to teach her to drive, but she needed an instructor to teach her to pass the test. The instructor knows the test routes etc so she got to practice doing the various manoevres in the places where she was likely to do them on the test. Things like that were helpful. She passed with a clean sheet on the first attempt. We plan to do the same when our next child turns 17 later this year.

DH took both of our DC to a local 'car park' out of hours, which helped them get used to clutch control etc., and DD had a couple of pre-17 driving lessons. They went to a school around 20 miles away from home, so when DS was 17 I would travel in with him every morning, with him driving, I would drive back and then go and collect him, so that he could drive home. It meant that he was doing around 50 miles each day - but gobbled up my time too. He had 6 lessons with a very uninspirational driving instructor, but went on to pass his test just 5 weeks after his birthday. As we said at the time, at that point he started learning to drive!

As DS was driving DD in to school when she turned 17, she didn't get the practise with me that he had done. However, she had a load of lessons with a brilliant guy, and we still did 5/6 hours a week with her. She also passed quickly with 1 minor.

I had to keep a handle on myself, and keep calm, which was not always easy. It worked well with DS but I don't think it would have been so successful for DD.

Both of my DC were really motivated to learn, and both DH and I are confident drivers, which helped.

I went out with the DDs after they had had a few lessons. I wouldn’t teach from scratch. They were highly motivated as we live in the middle of the middle of nowhere.