Beginning Teen Drivers

Overview

  • See our Pricing page for details about pricing and packages.
  • We pick students up at their location, do the lesson, and drop off – all in our state-certified and dual-brake equipped Driver’s Ed car. Read more about our Methods.
  • A beginning driver will normally require 8-10 lessons or more. Read our recommendations on How Many Lessons to take.
  • Student must have a Learner’s Permit to be eligible for lessons. See our FAQ for info about obtaining a Learner’s Permit.

Teaching Teen Drivers

It goes without saying that we do a LOT of this! Every student is different, of course. But, in a lot of ways, most of them tend to learn the same way. Many of them have picked up bad habits from watching other drivers (we’re not pointing fingers, it’s just reality). Our job is to teach them how to drive in accordance with Florida law, and how to get around in traffic with the highest degree of both courtesy and confidence. We’ll teach them what they need to know to pass their Road Test. But, if you give us time to do it, and especially if you give them the practice time that they need between lessons, we’re going to spend a lot more of our time making sure that they are actually comfortable DRIVING and know how to be safe out in the real world.

Foundations

The first thing we teach is how to sit the car. How to adjust the seat base for proper pedal reach. How to adjust the seat back for proper hand position on the steering wheel. How to check and adjust the mirrors. How to properly START the car. These are all the things most of us instinctively do when we get in our cars. But, they are among the easiest things to gloss over when teaching a new driver. And that’s just the beginning!

From there, we teach the fundamentals of how to drive the car either in an empty parking lot, or a quiet neighborhood. How to accelerate and brake smoothly. How to turn smoothly and correctly without ever compromising another driver’s space, or hitting a curb. How to use turn signals. How to properly stop at a stop sign.

We’ll take whatever time a student needs to LEARN these concepts and get comfortable with the car before we move on to driving on faster roads, or getting into lane changes, or anything more complex. Without a good foundation, everything they ever do behind the wheel is going to be more of a challenge. Most students will get by with just one lesson at this level. But, if they have absolutely no experience, it could take two lessons, or even three. Whatever it takes, we’re willing to do it.

Technical Stuff

Parking the car to the left. Parking the car to the right. Executing a three-point-turn. Negotiating tight parking lot turns. Straight backing. Backing out of a parking space or driveway. Even parallel parking, or backing into a parking space. Some of this is required for the Road Test and will definitely be covered. Some of it is optional, but we’ll spend time on it if we can!

Progression

Once a student has learned the very basics and is able to smoothly and confidently drive around a typical residential neighborhood, after ensuring that they also understand how to make a QUICK stop when required, we will progress into driving faster. We’ll spend some time driving curves. We’ll teach proper basic lane changes. We’ll start introducing proper following distance and defensive driving techniques. Depending on the student and how much practice they get between lessons, we could spend 2 or 3 lessons doing this.

From basic traffic and lane changes, we’ll get into more moderate traffic and more challenging lane changes. Once they’ve mastered that, again if we’re given the time to do it, we like to do a full lesson dedicated to highway driving. We’ll do a bunch of merging on and off of highways, and work on managing traffic, reading signs, and more.

Extras

There’s more. There’s always more. If we’re lucky (yes, lucky) enough to do a lesson in the rain, we can learn about how to drive in the rain. On request, we can do a night lesson to cover the unique issues that come with driving after dark. We can spend MORE time in city traffic. MORE time on the highway. We can get out and drive some back roads. If the student needs help learning to assertively pull out into traffic safely, we can find a deserted place to practice that sort of thing. Whatever the student needs, we can do! Once they’ve got their driver’s license, we’re even up for teaching them to drive a manual transmission.