Teaching your teen to drive? Don’t panic

It can be a white-knuckle ride when parents buckle up to teach their kids to drive. Getting a learner driver’s licence comes amid a flurry of teen rites of passage. But behind every freshly minted P-plater is often a proud but frazzled mum or dad who has taken on teaching their teen the ways of the road.

Relationships Australia NSW chief executive officer Elisabeth Shaw says not every learner driver will have a choice of adult instructors, but parents should have frank discussions as to who is best suited to the gig.

“It is something that parents often want to contribute to but feel defeated,” Shaw says.

In some cases, parents who may have watched their children grow distant as they have transitioned into their teens, yearn to re-connect with their children during lessons. At the other end, young people looking forward to the process may be disappointed and feel rejected if a parent says they are not up for it.

Bronte Mosley, 18, from Melbourne has accrued 85 hours in her quest to gain her licence. Credit: Wayne Taylor

“I think it is how you frame the non-participation,” says Shaw. “It might be something like ‘I love you to bits, but we rub each other up the wrong way. I don’t want to compromise that’.”

If a child is vulnerable to criticism, Shaw says they need to know their driving will be critiqued.

“If you are a bit of a shrieker, or saying, ‘what the hell are you doing?’ and clinging to the armrest it might not be a good idea.”

Motoring organisations RACV in Victoria and NRMA in NSW suggest learner drivers have some introductory lessons with an instructor. Mum or dad may be able to slide into the back seat for a refresher.

“Arranging a few driving lessons with a professional instructor can be a great way to start building foundational skills and eliminate some of the stress, while helping the parent or guardian pick up some good teaching techniques,” says RACV Drive School senior manager Lydia Kendray.

Good instructors will ask questions such as: “Is it safe to move away from the kerb?“, or “What’s the speed limit on this road?”, or “What’s coming up in the mirror?”

NRMA head of media Peter Khoury says it’s good to mix up instructors, and professional driving lessons are money well spent.

Victoria and NSW require 120 supervised logged hours, including 20 hours of night driving, before taking a driving test.

“The 120 hours can seem steep, but we believe at the back end, they graduate as more mature and experienced drivers,” Khoury says.

Victoria Police says young people aged 18 to 25 continue to be over-represented in road trauma data and, in their first year of driving, are almost four times more likely than an experienced driver to be involved in a serious injury or fatal accident.

The NSW Centre for Road Safety says young drivers aged under 26 make up only about 14 per cent of all licence holders, but were involved in crashes that made up almost a quarter of annual road fatalities in 2021.

In NSW, 17-year-olds who have held a learner’s permit for more than 12 months, have logged 120 hours and passed the Hazard Perception Test can take a driving test, but you must be at least 18 years old in Victoria. In NSW, if you have logged 50 hours driving and are aged under 25, you can score a bonus 20 hours by undertaking a Safer Drivers Course. Further, in NSW you can count one hour of a structured driving lesson with a professional driving instructor as three hours. The three-for-one is capped at 10 lessons or 20 bonus hours.

Melbourne dad Lachlan Mosley is the supervising driver for his family of seven aged 21 to 11. His son Leo, 20, has his licence, and three other children aged 21, 18 and 16 have learner’s permits and are at varying stages in their learn-to-drive journey.

“I am more patient than my lovely wife,” he jokes.

He says they slap on the Ls to drive to sport when they can.

“It is important to clock up the hours in as many conditions as possible. Start slowly but challenge yourself. It’s baby steps.”

He says the 120-hour target is onerous and while he believes his two children were ready around the 80-hour mark, he understands its purpose. Daughter Bronte Mosley, 18, has 85 hours and says driving across Melbourne from their Richmond home to play cricket helped get her hours up. The family is now using a smaller car, so the learner drivers don’t have to wrestle the family’s people mover.

“The first year I had my learners, I did not drive much because we just had the big van. I started learning in the manual car which was scary at the start, but now I am so used to it,” she says.

In Sydney, Northern Beaches’ dad Marcel van Schie has two sons, 20 and 16, with learner’s permits and thinks the 120 hours is taxing for families.

Callum van Schie, 20, has relied on his dad Marcel to help him reach the 120 hours of driving required before he can take his driving test.Credit: James Brickwood

“My youngest has just started and was very enthusiastic at first and got to a point where he is proficient,” he says.

“Some kids wait until the summer and drive up and down the coast to get their hours up. They are doing 90km/h and the speed limit is 110km/h on motorways, and it causes traffic chaos.”

Elder son, Callum, has about 25 hours in his logbook and has lost interest, but when he graduates from university may require a driver’s licence for work. For now, he has a motorcycle licence, which he went for first because it required the completion of training modules rather than hours.

“Where I live is very car-dependent. All my friends got their learner’s [permit] at 16 and went for it. I will have to get my licence at some point, but we’re a very busy family to find the time.”

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