Children Should Not Be Seen or Heard. (Really, It’s for Their Own Good!)
Every parent and grandparent knows that raising kids demands a lot of time and attention. But when you’re driving, your goal must be getting the children — and yourself — from place to place safely. Letting your attention stray from the road for just two seconds almost doubles your chance of getting into a crash, so you can’t let kids distract you when you’re behind the wheel.
Here are some tips from the AAA Foundation for reducing distractions:
- Pull over to change and feed children, even if you have to put up with a couple of minutes of crying or whining before you get to a safe place.
- Keep children in their car seats at all times. Handling children is much too distracting for drivers, and it endangers small children who might be unprotected in a crash.
- Plan something to entertain them in advance. Load up DVD players, find books, and arm kids with toys before you get on the road.
- Don’t get in a shouting match. Intense and emotional discussions are huge distractions to drivers, so wait until you’ve stopped the car to get into it with the kids.
- Travel with another adult. Sometimes the tag team approach works best. Leave the parenting to another adult, so the driver can focus on the road.
- Assign tasks to older children. Having an older child in the car who can change radio stations, read maps, and grab toys for younger kids is a great way to cut down on your distractions, while keeping at least one child occupied.
- Teach teens to do the same. Having other passengers in the car, including friends and siblings, is a big distraction for new drivers. Many states have Graduated Driver License laws, which limit the number of passengers a teen driver can have. Whether your state law mandates your teen limit passengers or not, it is a safe idea for them to keep passengers to a minimum.
For more tips like these that will make your driving safer, visit www.aaafoundation.org. |
