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Pedestrian Training
Pedestrian Training
Child Pedestrian Training
Child pedestrian training is available for Primary Schools.
What is child pedestrian training?
- Parents and volunteers are trained to teach children roadside skills,
- The children have practical lessons at the roadside,
- It is aimed initially at children who are in Year 1,
- All the children and volunteers wear high visibility vests,
- There are 3 main skills covered in a number of sessions: choosing a safe place to cross, crossing safely at parked cars and crossing safely at junctions
- Child pedestrian training helps to prepare children for future safety on the road,
What happens during pedestrian training?
- The children are taught how to find safe places to cross away from dangers on the road,
- They are also taught how to cross safely between parked cars and at junctions,
- We strongly recommend that children are supervised by an adult outside school hours and be accompanied by an adult whenever crossing a road.
What are the benefits?
- Pedestrian training improves children's awareness of road safety,
- It enables children to build up their pedestrian skills,
- It also encourages walking to school,
- If children are able to walk to school safely this could help to reduce traffic congestion,
- It develops good habits for later life.
Young children
Children under the age of 8 have difficulty dealing with traffic, so never let them out alone or let them cross the road by themselves. Your main aims at this stage are to make sure they are safe and teach them about traffic. Parents are the best people to teach children road safety. Only you can show them what to do right from the start. It is vital that parents lead by example - if children see their parents crossing the road dangerously, so will they.
The booklet "Getting Across Road Safety" has useful guidelines on how children should cross the road safely. It can be downloaded here Getting Across Road Safety
Older Children
As children get older, their parents allow them more freedom. However, this change in age brings with it more child pedestrian casualties. Older children will be walking to high schools along busy main roads, will be playing with friends who live a further distance from them and will have more distractions as they walk.
A training guide for parents aimed at 7-10 year olds and can be downloaded here. Getting Across Road Safety 7-10 year olds
External Sites
Hedgehogs - Games and guidelines on road safety
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