NEWSLINK January 2024_compressed

Towards your CPD
And we’re off!
Identifying faults on the move
Steve Garrod takes a look
at the challenges involved in
identifying driving faults on the
move, and how to communicate
them to your pupil without
disrupting the driving process
Identifying driving faults still plays a major
part in teaching people to drive, but to do this
effectively it is important to have your pupil’s
full attention while discussing them.
If we are not able to engage with pupils to
discuss faults, the risk of them being
repeated increases, with the risk that the
faults becoming potentially dangerous.
There is nothing wrong with pulling up
somewhere suitable to analyse what went
wrong and what action needs to be put in
place to prevent the fault being repeated.
That is not to say we need to pull up for every
driving fault made; if we did the car would
spend more time parked by the kerbside than
on the move! The skill of a good instructor is
to be able to prioritise faults and to be aware
of the prevailing road and traffic conditions,
and then determine the correct action to take
for the particular pupil.
For example; if you can deal with the fault
by asking a question then it may be
appropriate to keep on the move (such as a
‘driving fault’), but if something specific
needs to be highlighted it may necessary to
pull up (such as a serious or dangerous fault).
The reason for this is there is a real danger of
what is commonly referred to as ‘teaching
out of the rear window’ and distracting our
pupil’s attention while we try to discuss what
happened, subsequently building up more
faults, which is known as instructor-induced
faults.
Questions beginning with ‘What’, ‘Where’
and ‘When’ are often answered with a quick
response or a recall of a fact, which do not
require much thinking, such as:
n “What is the danger of not checking
your mirrors?”
n “Where should you look before emerging?”
n “When will you signal?”
Questions beginning with ‘Which’, ‘Why’,
‘Who’ and ‘How’ require a little more thought,
such as making choices, reasoning and
understanding meaning, such as:
n “Which mirrors should you check before
overtaking?”
n “Why is it important to return to the left
hand lane after overtaking?
n “Who has priority?”
n “How could you have made that
situation easier?”
Which question we ask will depend on the
amount of time there is for it to be answered.
If pupils are asked too deep a question, their
performance may drop while they take time
to consider their response (known as an
instructor induced fault).
Questions on the move, therefore, should
be in the present or future tense to help
pupils focus on what they are doing or what
they are going to do; eg:
n “What is the next hazard?”
n “How will you deal with this?”
n “Where will you stop?”
n “When will it be safe to go?”
Questions while stationary should be more
thought provoking or in the past tense, or
refer to a question that was asked on the
move, such as:
n “What could have happened had I not
There is nothing wrong with
pulling up to analyse what
went wrong... but we don’t
need to pull up for every
driving fault made; if we
did the car would spend
more time parked by the
kerbside than on the move!
asked you to slow down?”
n “Who had priority?”
n “What should you do if someone is
overtaking you before you enter a higher
speed limit?”
n “Where should you have waited at that
junction?”
n “Why do you think I asked you which
mirrors should you check?”
Read the last five questions again and think
about what could happen if you asked them
on the move. How might they affect your
pupil’s concentration? The chances are you
will still be discussing them by the time you
reach the next hazard, which could prevent
your pupil from dealing with it safely (another
instructor induced fault).
18 NEWSLINK n JANUARY 2024