How did your child learn to ride a bike ?

[Sorrento]

Have we left it too left for DD ?
She's nearly 9, has no balance what so ever, she has a bike with pedals but cannot stay upright on it.
DH simply cannot hold the weight of her (hence she could do with the bike), would stabilisers help at this stage ?
She is just generally un co ordinated, trips over her own shadow etc, roller skates have been a disaster so far but she needs to do something outdoors, it's getting beyond a joke now.
Any advice ?

Why don't you try stabalisers for a while - maybe go somewhere where you know she won't by spotted by her friends (only if she is embarassed by it).

Alternatively if it is just something outdoors why not get a trampoline? Ours was the best money I've spent - it is used by my 2 dds nearly every day (and by me and dh sometimes as well)

Well my ds has only just mastered it and he's just turned 8. I say mastered, he now thinks because he's learnt he never has to go out on it again, which kind of defeats the object.

Could you try a scooter to begin with ?

It was blood sweat and tears with us...he refused to ride on anything but long grass, which is impossible to pedal on, so of course then he couldn't do it.

My dh explained it in terms of levels (he is PSP obsessed) He told him he was on level 7, but neeeded to get to level 10. Within half and hour he was peddling. I know this proably doesn't help yu, but persevere.

Let her decide how much she wants to do. Is she dyspraxic?

She might be dyspraxic I guess, if she can't do something like riding a bike she'll throw herself on the floor dramatically and pretend she's broken both her legs, i'd be delighted if she's dyspraxic rather than just a PITA.
Scooters worked quite well actually she did get on with that for a while.
Might try stabilisers, just looked at trikes £300
Thanks

I am over in Germany where bike riding starts very young. We bought DS1 a bike without pedals and after 2 months of just not getting the sitting on a seat and using his legs to 'run', one day it just clicked.

When he was 4 he got a proper bike and since he had got used to balancing on the previous bike, we didn't bother with stabilisers. Yes we had maybe 3 very muddy grumpy bike rides where he fell almost constantly but now we have to run to catch up with him!!

I hope that this helps. Maybe a bike without pedals will introduce your DD to the feeling of balance.

Yes my ds did all that rolling around in agony too. Anything to not actually get back on the bike.

We eventually backed right off because we wanted him to ride a lot more than he did!

Well, DS got a bike for his 4th birthday and after two weeks with stabalisers I took them off, and he cycled with me holding the back, I kept letitng go, he kept falling off, and after 15 minutes of this he just got it, and hasn't looked back.

Does she feel under pressure to master it? Could anxiety be holding her back? Perhaps she just needs time to keep practicing on her own, until she gets it?

My dds bike had stabilisers annd dh raised them up abit, so they can ride without using them but will also stabilise if they wobble, then we noticed she was mostly riding without going on to stabilisers and she got a bigger bike xmas 2007 and she just took off on it, needed help to get on and off it for awhile and lots of practice turning without falling as when they have stabilisers they seem to turn too sharp

DS also had one of those bikes without pedals for about a year befoer he got his real bike at 4, and like abroadandmisunderstood we live somewhere where everyone cycles everywhereand almost all the children cycle to school, so it was very much the norm for DS.

DS has dyspraxia and the occupational therapist told us about a technique where you take the pedals off the bike and teach them to 'scoot' on the bike so they learn to balance. First of all get them to scoot along on the flat or a gentle slope then build up to going round corners and take it very slowly. Eventually when they are confident scooting along put the pedals back on. They should have better balance now and eventually be able to pedal. It worked for DS - we were amazed ! Learning with stablisers or with someone holding the bike means there is too big a leap for some children to riding on their own.

With my DS he had stabilisers on his bike for ages before we took them off. He only just learned to ride without the stabilisers and he will be 8 this year.

I took him to Weston beach and he practiced there without stabilisers and within 15mins he was riding on his own.

Both of DC's learned to ride their bikes after I took the pedals off. In fact we never bothered with stabilisers on the advice of the bike shop where we got their bikes. It took about 30 mins for each of them to learn.

Ditto what WorkInProgress said. And in our case it took weeks of going out with him every weekend day. It's easy to take the pedals and pedal arms off.
I also wonder whether a tandem or tag-a-long would help get the 'feel' of riding?

Agree 100% with WorkInProgress.

Take the pedals off. My eldest DS's OT taught us this method and he was riding within the hour. He is also dyspraxic and even struggled to ride with stabilisers on.

I run a publishing company; here's an extract from one of our latest books, Family Cycling. It's the chapter called Teach Your Kid To Ride. Hope it helps! God, this sounds like an ad. Sorry.

Another one agreeing with workinprogresses methods. WE left the pedals on actually (lazy ars me could be bothered to take them off!), but ds (8!) finally got it a coouple of weeks ago. Just get her to push herself along with her feet on the ground, and to life both feet up for a second or two. If you can find a car park or playground with a very gradual slope that will help.

Eventually she'll be able to push along going down a slope without her feet on the ground at all. Then you get her to put her feet on the pedals for a second or two, but not to pedal yet. Once she's got the hang of feet on the pedals rather than hanging down she'll be able to turn the pedals.

The advantage of them sitting with legs dangling by ground is that they can also practice putting feet on the ground to save themselves if they start to wobble, and can practice using the brake. Neitgher skills ds could cope with as well as trying to pedal AND balance, until we used this method.

dd4 had no balance atall. We finally bought her a scooter and it took her a while to find her balance on that. But as soon as she did she also found she could go her bike.

Stabilisers are good.

Start with both stabilisers touching the ground and then gradually lift them up so they do not quite touch the floor and then take one of the stabilisers of and then take both off. Hey presto.

DS1 and DS2 were taught this way without too many tears.

Actually, it's asking a lot of stabilisers to hold up a wobbly 9-yr-old. There's just too much leverage.

My (large, clumsy) nearly-8-yr-old has just learnt by scooting a bike meant for about age 4, then rapidly moving up the sizes (it helps that we seem to have a shed full of outgrown bikes). We had to do a bit of holding the saddle at each change of size, but not for long.