Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => Freewheeling => Topic started by: rogerzilla on 15 June, 2009, 07:40:21 pm
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Any ideas? Mrs Z insisted I put the stabilisers on because Emma would not go near the bike otherwise, and it was gathering dust in the shed. She has since consented to a go without them again, but can't "scoot" at all. She's now outgrown her first bike and still can't actually ride!
Does anyone teach kids to ride professionally, with guaranteed results?
My parents used the traditional terror method of running along holding the seat post and then letting go - I crashed a lot, but it was on grass.
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...I crashed a lot, but it was on grass.
I assume there's no grass in Swindon?
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I was taught in park with a (small) hill on grass. Parent running alongside then let go once up to speed. No need to pedal because of the hill. Once confidence in balance is gained pedalling is easy.
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If there is anything that applies to teaching a 5 years old to ride, I will be interested.
She managed to fall off with the stabilisers on as she decided to move her weight the wrong way round in a turn!!!
We have done some zigzagging and it is better now. I am trying to persuade her that cool kids can cycle with the stabilisers off the ground with some (minor) success. All this running keeps me fit!
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Leaving stabilisers on too long is counter productive as they actually make the bike unstable when it leans ie when too much weight ends up on one of the little wheels when cornering or zig zagging which then destroys confidence.
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I know. I threw away the ones that came with the bike and refused to use them, but eventually had to buy some more as she wouldn't go near the bike (literally).
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Peer pressure is a wonderful thing. A couple of years ago I gave my nephew Pcolbeck Junior's first bike complete with stabilisers. He rode it a bit then lost confidence before he got the hang of it. It seems at school (he is 5) they have a few bikes in the playground and he came home last week and asked his dad to take off the stabilisers. He was off. Obviously he had watched the other kids at school do it and had been practising a but there.
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Have you tried bribery? I told my nephew that when he could ride his bike down the road by himself, I'd get us all an ice cream from the van. It took us about half an hour of running up and down the street ;D.
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The first time Superstoker rode a bike was upstairs at a bike shop when he saw a bike he wanted. I told him that if he could ride it, he could have it. I kept the bargain, and he has the bike still.
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I thought the way to do it was to drop the saddle height and remove the pedals so that they can sit on the saddle and scoot it like hobby horse. Then when they are happy using the bike as a hobby horse and used to balancing, re-fit the pedals and get them to pedal instead of scoot. Then raise the saddle to the right height, possibly in stages and not all in one go.
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+1 for what he ^^^^ said.
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The key is to teach them how to put a foot down when they stop.
Then to teach them how to brake.
Then to teach them how to go. It is far easier to go when you know how to stop.
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I thought the way to do it was to drop the saddle height and remove the pedals so that they can sit on the saddle and scoot it like hobby horse. Then when they are happy using the bike as a hobby horse and used to balancing, re-fit the pedals and get them to pedal instead of scoot. Then raise the saddle to the right height, possibly in stages and not all in one go.
I know. But it didn't work and she wouldn't go near the bike.
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Sometimes you can't make children do what they don't want to do ;)
The key is use you superior intelect to make them want to do it by clever reasoning. As that's never worked for me, I would try depriving her of food and water for 2 days and then when she's weak enough cable tie her wrists to the handlebars :thumbsup:
ps: +1 to peer pressure, does she have a friend who can ride their bike? Their parents may have more success persuading her than you. Sometimes, these "battles" disappear when approached by someone else. The scooting thing worked for Miss Rapples :thumbsup:
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Some kids just aren't ready to learn to ride a bicycle.
Some can ride at 3.
Some kids can read at 3, most can't. Most sensible people don't press toddlers to read.
Maybe it's best to leave the matter a year or so, till she's good and ready. Making an issue of things may put her off, possibly for life.
The summer holidays are coming and she may be more tempted to have a go when she sees others having fun.
I didn't learn to ride a bike until I was 7 but I never tried before.
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My parents used the traditional terror method of running along holding the seat post and then letting go - I crashed a lot, but it was on grass.
That's the method I used with both my kids (around the same age).
I took them to local park (many acres of flat football pitches) and ran along side them. I still remember my son's shaky voice "don't let go, don't let go, don't let go.."
He didn't realise that I'd let go a while back and was just running with him. I stopped running and he carried on (still repeating his mantra), he did a long slow arc of about 100 metres until he was finally riding back towards me. He looked up, saw that I wasn't holding him and promptly fell off. He was smart enough to realise he could now ride a bike though.
I did the same with my daughter except that she didn't fall off at the point she realised she was riding unaided.
Here is that magical moment
(http://i170.photobucket.com/albums/u249/freddered/Various/elcycle.jpg?t=1245142678)
Both of them must have covered 5 miles around the park on that first day, once it had clicked.
I think the key is to find a big expanse of hardish grass and not to let them know you've let go.
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Thanks Lee for this. I think that I will try your approach. I have never thought of doing it on grass. I think that she may not be that far away from it.
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Lots of good advice up there ^^.
My first 3 have all done it a bit younger, so feel free to ignore this, but I've used a long straight stretch of tarmac lane for the final step. We ride out there with stabilisers, and then just at the point where the lane starts to slope gently downhill, I take them off and run along beside with a hand on a shoulder. I wait until they are confident enough like that that I'm not doing any of the balancing and then take my hand off briefly, and then again for longer, and so on. The downhill helps because they keep going. If need be, I go back to it several days on the trot before I start letting go. Lots of variation from child to child.
The first one went straight from stabilisers to that. The other two had an intermediate stage of playing "the whooshing game". No pedals, lowish seat, push them progressively further between mum and dad, with enthusiastic whooshing noises and loud cheering. Again, this is on tarmac in the cul-de-sac because the local grassy areas are a bit too long and bog them down.
The sound effects are important because you have to convince them that "THIS IS FUN". i would guess that different sound effects would work better for a 6YO. "Wow, you look just like a ballerina" maybe. "It's your magic pony"!
If they do fall over, I suggest not making much of it. A nonchalant "upsy-daisy" says it's OK to fall off.
It's lurverly when they go solo though. Tears to the eyes, literally! But you do need to take your time and not rush them.
Good luck
J
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Using the pedal-less method I had to reduce the saddle height quite a lot and was only able to raise it again v slowly once the pedals were back on.
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Here is that magical moment
(http://i170.photobucket.com/albums/u249/freddered/Various/elcycle.jpg?t=1245142678)
Yes, but isn't it true that you never saw her for 6 days. It took her 3 days to learn how to steer so that she could turn around again. :D
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Here is that magical moment
Yes, but isn't it true that you never saw her for 6 days. It took her 3 days to learn how to steer so that she could turn around again. :D
And in that time she rode to Menai and back again.
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David Hembrow has a nice guide - How to learn to ride a bike, how to teach children to ride a bike (http://www.hembrow.eu/personal/howtorideabike.html)
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I think that we have just cracked problem with senior UK granddaughter aged 4 3/4 ( we are currently in Oz - so not sure that progress has been followed thru by parents ) - we had tried "scooting" in summer - no particular enthusiasm for progress shown by Rom -but at beginning of Sept - we were told of a different method - using a bike with pedals on.
Have a long scarf - that is then put round the child under their arms - and held tightish to their body and then upwards at back by adult.
Now when they start to lean off vertical - the scarf stops them falling as adult is providing support.
After 2 days of about 30 minutes on a tarmac path in local park- Rom was now hardly relying on the scarf at all - and the final step was on grass with a gentle down hill - start and then after about 5 yards - just let go of one end of scarf and pull on the other end - scarf comes out from under childs arms - and they continue on their way.
We have a video much like Lee - of granddaughter disappearing into distance.
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How, and I forgot to say, my daughter (5 1/2) managed to ride on her own two weeks ago.
Thanks Lee for the advice, we went to a Park with a slightly slopping area, I held her for 5 meters and off she went without drama.
Most days she goes to school on her scooter and I think that she learnt to balance like this. Although she had never done it before she definitely knew how to balance!!!
She now manages to ride on the cyclepath staying on the left without being too much of a hazard!
We had this weird conversation:
me: try to ride in a straight line
her: it is not me it is the bike
me: go faster and the bike will stop zigzagging
her: Ok
5 minutes later, wild zigzagging more like a massive shimmy!
me (puzzled voice): what is going on?
her: this time it was not the bike, it was me! ;D
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How, and I forgot to say, my daughter (5 1/2) managed to ride on her own two weeks ago.
Well done her!
Should we expect to see her on the Spa Trek next year? :thumbsup:
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I taught my son by taking him to a local school playing field. Did the old lowering the saddle and removing the pedals thing.
The field was a bit soft, but fortunately there was an artificial cricket pitch, which he scooted up and down.
He did fall off a few times at first, but there was one key piece of advice I was able to give him that made all the difference - and it was advice that I got from the old place, IIRC.
It's this: if you feel like you are about to fall over, steer the bike in the direction you're falling.
When I told my son this, it made a very noticeable difference to his ability to stay upright - progress from then onwards was very rapid.
When we got as far as putting the pedals back on, I had a very similar experience to Lee, running alongside him "holding on"... Absolutely priceless moment. Once that happened, he knew he could ride a bike and his confidence grew hugely.
It took a fair bit more riding, quite a few grazed knees and one incident of falling off into a patch of nettles, before he learned how to use his brakes properly...
d.
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Miss Z now gets (small) air going over jumps and has just about got the hang of changing the 3-speed gears. She is rather quick. See her riding round Blenheim Palace on Sunday - pink Triumph Wave with a 1979 Sturmey-Archer hub, Deore V-brakes and a Suntour XC Pro front hub. And a pink basket.
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My 5-year old has balance - at least he seems to have it on his scooter - but refuses to pedal. It's just faster and easier for him to make Daddy push! He also has fear of being without stabilisers, even though he probably could balance without, I think partly because Mrs C says they're good, she learnt that way.
But it will come when they're ready.
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Some kids just aren't ready to learn to ride a bicycle.
Some can ride at 3.
Some kids can read at 3, most can't. Most sensible people don't press toddlers to read.
+1.
Our eldest learnt at 3 1/2, when I got fed up because he broke three pairs of stabilisers in one summer on his new bike.
His sister took till 6 1/2, and nothing I tried would help. It has to be when they are ready.
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I must confess to not being a Parent and having only taught one child to ride. This was my little brother who was then 5.8 years old.
He wanted to learn. I doubt we'd have had much success otherwise.
Stabilisers had been removed and I explained to Sam he'd need to try and keep himself up, rather than leaning to the side as he had done with the stabilisers.
We went to Hampstead Heath Extension, found a gentle downslope and got moving with him trying to stay upright.
By the end of the afternoon, we had success.
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At almost 6, I would have had them riding for pushing on 18 months now.
sorry, just my opinion.
Every child is of course different but my 6 year old is quite a nervous soul and a bit prone to giving up too readily at the best of time.
however, he's a great wee biker and loves going round the local skate park with the slack jawed/slack jeaned teenagers even when it's mental busy.
Confidence, confidence, confidence.
My break through with him was through his scooter. Balance, learning to brake ( as opposed to jumping off- messy) straight lines and turning were all things he nailed on his micro scooter first. All lend themselves to the bike suprisingly well. As he went without his stabilisers for the first few times I would remind him about his scooter, how it was just the same and good he was doing.
Maybe try that approach ?
One main problem is the fear of going too fast. They build up speed and get nervous. Show them you going down a gentle hill/ path in the park and how, when it's clear, they don't even have to brake. They will just slow down
awra best...........
Steve
Long time lurker/little time poster.
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I was relatively late to lose the stabilisers, and certainly didn't get the hang of it until after my younger brother did. This was largely through lack of confidence, but also because I had very few opportunities to ride other than round in circles in the back garden, which made it hard to get up any decent speed and taught all the wrong weight-distribution habits.
What made the difference for me was watching the Big Kids in the park, playing ride-as-fast-as-you-can-then-jump-off-and-see-how-far-the-bike-will-go. I don't remember, but my dad may have even given my own bike a good running-shove to demonstrate that it would indeed do the same thing. This provided much-needed empirical evidence (I was that sort of child) that bicycles have some sort of magic stabilising force that increases with speed, and that riding on two wheels is not, as one naively assumes, equivalent to the easily demonstrated to be practically impossible task of balancing a stationary bike.
As an adult who has recently learned (and taught a couple of other adults) to ride a recumbent, I can summarise this as "Moving bikes are self-stabilising. If in doubt, go faster.", but that might not be as helpful to a child who may not have the same pedalling skills or faith in the laws of physics. Fear of speed is probably an issue too, so perhaps stabilisers aren't entirely evil, as they let you get the braking/stopping bit sussed first. A bit of risk compensation through use of protective clothing might work to your advantage there, too.
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Simples, gaffa tape and a steep hill :)
what teethgrinder said, the "like a bike" bicycles are brilliant for that but simple and cheaper way is to remove pedals as said before.
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I was taught in park with a (small) hill on grass. Parent running alongside then let go once up to speed. No need to pedal because of the hill. Once confidence in balance is gained pedalling is easy.
I did essentially that a year or so ago with my (then) 4-year old. She took maybe 3 sessions to get the hang of it.
We played the "Daddy retracing the path taken, counting steps" game, tracking what was her best distance yet, which she got quite into. I got quite tired.
EDIT: one thing I just remembered - it took her a bit longer to manage to get started off on her own (i.e. without a push).
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Little G never used stabilisers; she graduated straight from the balance bike & sussed it at the third sorties. Why not take the pedals off and start in the same way, even with an older kids? Most of my friends' kids have gone the same route and few, if any, have used stabilizers.
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Heard about this on R2, apologies if it's already been posted:
Balance Buddy Bike Handle (http://www.jejamescycles.co.uk/balance-buddy-bike-handle-id62753.html)
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That's exactly how I taught each of my 3 girls, all of whom were riding confidently without stabilisers before the age of 5. It just takes a bit of time, effort and persuasion, they'll get there.
My parents used the traditional terror method of running along holding the seat post and then letting go - I crashed a lot, but it was on grass.
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I think that's how they generally do it on the continent as well.
+1 for what he ^^^^ said.
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I second, or third, or nth, the grass idea. My daughter was taking an age to learn to ride, and I was a bit clueless to be honest. It's only when I took her to a playing field that she picked it up, almost immediately. I think she liked the soft grass, and the fact that she could steer anywhere she liked.
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Stabilisers are the work of Stan!
Balance bike untill they are confident and then the pedals.
If they are not interested, re visit later, not everyone wants to ride a bike.
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I've just taught my 6 yr old grandson to ride and used the same technique I used with both my sons. Grassy down hill slope, no stabilisers, hold them to start and then off you go. They fell off off goodness knows how many times but got the idea in the end 👍
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Just got our 4 year old pedaling! She's just turned 4 and been fast on a balance bike and then her bike without pedals for at least a year but attempts previously to get her pedaling weren't liked and didn't want to scare her off. Went out today after asking if she wanted to pedal and after a few nervous runs with me holding on she scooted off got to speed and started pedaling. Lots of wobbling as she looked at the front wheel but me running ahead have her something to look at. No stopping her now stuck the seat up from scooting height and went out for a good chunk of the afternoon.
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My experience with my kids was that they learnt to balance bike, but then needed to learn to pedal and use the brakes, with stabilizers. At that point they needed to take the lead and say they wanted to try without stabilizers, though 2m son had a try for a minute and then was cycling.
I disagree with grass, easier for them to pedal on a tennis or basketball court, they get familiar with it balance bike and/or stabilizers and you hold on to them until they can stop without crashing. (Also, crashing on a basketball court = falling over = no biggie).
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My kid brother was 5¾ years old when he mastered riding on two wheels.
He had possessed a bike with stabilisers for two years and HE wanted t learn to ride without them.
We removed the stabilisers and took him to Hampstead Heath Extension one afternoon, with the intention of getting him to learn. He was, of course, used to riding leaning over onto the stabilisers, as is usually the way with them.
I told him he should pedal with a 'staying up feeling', rather than leaning. I waled with him as he learnt to feel this.
We found a slight downward incline, I accompanied him but he got the knack fairly quickly.
He did pedal into a hedge as we went home.
Mission accomplished!
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See this from Saint Isla - https://www.bikeradar.com/advice/skills/how-to-teach-a-child-to-cycle-in-30-minutes/
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Well that's just what https://bikeability.org.uk/ is and what I was teaching kids about 10+ years ago :)
But it's a very good video and what all parents who have kids they want to learn to cycle should watch it
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My record was about 2min. If you remove the time I spend telling the kid about pedalling and braking. She had been using a balance bike for a year or so and was just over 4 years old. She got on the bike and I at the ready just as Isla in above video and off she went with a wobble. We tried one more time and after I remined her that she needed to give it some welly, she were off. I could have gone home, but I had to train her bigger brother.
Who was 5 going on 6 never touched a balance bike, spend some time on a bike with stabilisers. After an hour of faffing with him he could just about ride, if you ignored the wobbling. That is if he remembered to have a good push off, but most times didn't and therefore wobbled, then stopped pedalling as he got scared and then we started all over again. He also constantly just leaned to the left as he had gotten used to the stabilisers holding him up.
So I gave the brother some home work, ride the darn balance bike until your parents get sick of going to the park with you (ok I didn't say that but strongly hinted that he needed many hours on it).