Things have been a little quiet hereabouts recently. That is because I have been preoccupied with my two-day assessment by the DSA at Cardington. This is an essential part of the qualification process for motorcycle instructors and one that most – if they are honest – dread.
However, let’s get one of the urban myths out of the way – the one that no one passes Cardington first time around. Oh, yes they do. As with any assessment, the key is preparation. A prepared candidate can pass this assessment with relative ease. Okay, so it is not easy – I would not wish to imply that it is. However, it is achievable with the relevant preparation. Part of that is to run CBTs and to have a decent instructor who understands the standards assessing you do it. The other key is to keep it simple. The DSA book Learning to Ride is the syllabus in a nutshell. If you have this handy and use it so that you know it inside out, your lessons will be complete and succinct, such that they will satisfy the examiner.
Prior to attending, I’d heard the horror stories associated with the role play nature of the assessment – and I detest role play at the best of times. The only resource I could find on the web gave one person’s experience and that’s getting a bit long in the tooth these days. So, here is my experience for what it is worth.
Firstly, preparation, preparation, preparation. Did I mention preparation? Don’t waste your time or theirs by attending unprepared, because you will not pass.
Make sure you know your stuff. The DSA will overlook weak presentation skills but will be paying close attention to fault analysis and rectification. This is the core competence they are assessing, not only of the person instructing, but of the supervisory part of the process too. If the instructor candidate does not pick up learner errors, they expect the supervisor to pick them up – and to be brutally honest in doing so.
I have to say, I found that part uncomfortable as my natural assessment and feedback style is usually more gentle, but I would have been doing no one any favours by not being brutally honest in this assessment process.
There were three of us attending, so during each exercise based upon a CBT lesson, one would instruct, one would supervise and the third would watch and provide supervisory feedback in the event that the supervisor missed anything.
Each part of the process is scored from 1 to 4 with 1 and 2 being unsatisfactory and 3 and 4 being satisfactory. This score applies to both instruction and supervision, but failures on the instruction part are not scored on the supervisory part of the assessment regardless of how well the candidate performed on this aspect.
Having had practise sessions with the school I work with, I knew precisely what to expect. The examiner role playing a student would put in fairly typical faults – not using the rear brake during a braking exercise, for example, or trying to pull away from standstill in second gear. On each occasion, if the instructor misdiagnosed the fault, the “student” would repeat it until the instructor correctly identified it or called the lesson complete. If, having not identified the fault, the instructor called it a complete lesson, it was the role of the supervisor to point out the missed fault and to correctly analyse it and provide a remedy for the instructor to use in future. If that was not done, the second supervisor was asked to put in an opinion.
Working through the CBT syllabus, this takes pretty much two days. The latter part being the road ride. This I found the most difficult. Not because I find giving instruction on the move hard to do, but because being unfamiliar with the area, I was relying on the examiner to give indications first, then I would have to direct based upon this and then, as time was running out, pick up on errors preferably before they developed. My only “3” came from this exercise as a direct consequence of the compressed nature of the subsequent fault analysis – I felt my delivery was raggedy and the examiner agreed. Indeed, he told me that I should be kicking myself for dropping a point on this one as, having scored “4” on every other exercise, I spoiled my otherwise perfect score. I couldn’t argue with him as it was fair comment and, yes, it would have been nice to get a perfect score, but so be it. The almost perfect score will have to do and I’m content with it.
The examiner was professional throughout and gave each of us opportunities to correct errors we had made – if we did, then the fault analysis was accepted as complete. If not, well, then it was scored down.
I am fortunate, perhaps in that the CBTs I am used to running religiously follow the DSA book and the trainer who prepared me insisted that I use it throughout. Doing this made it easy to slip into the role play and deliver a lesson as if it was the real thing – because it was exactly the same. The process was sufficiently realistic for me to forget that the student was, in fact, an examiner. He behaved and felt like a real student and the faults he committed were those a student would make and they came about exactly as and when expected, so I picked up on them and gave the correct remedial advice – whereupon, my student improved. Having done that, he carried this learning into the next exercise. If I picked up a fault as the supervisor, he did not repeat it when I was instructing, having learned it – oh, no, I got a whole new fault. Fortunately, none of them was that difficult to spot and correct.
So, overall, I found the experience positive and came away having learned a thing or two as I prepare for my Direct Access training and assessment in the New Year.
If I had failed, it would not have been because I was not adequately prepared – I was – it would have been my fault entirely, having goofed. So, to those of you who might be contemplating the leap, prepare, prepare prepare.
Did I mention preparation?
Yes, that’s all well and good; but what about your preparation? 🙂
Heh!
And how much like the “Highway Code” is the DSA guide ?
Does it, like the HC contain complete codswallop like the supposed braking distances given in the latter?
Is it a “guide to passing the test(s)” in other words, rather than a guide to how to learn to ride correctly & safely.
Remembering how I failed my first Driving test, in 1964, because I knew EXACTLY how wide my father’s car was (very tight fit into garage) – I was then fortunate in having the same examiner on re-test a couple of months later, & he explained that to me ……
The Highway Code is hardly codswallop. The stopping distances are a guide – of course they will vary from one vehicle to another and common sense must prevail. What they tell the reader is that it will take time to stop their vehicle and that road conditions will affect that distance.
The guide to learning to ride is just that; a basic introduction to riding for the novice.
The braking DISTANCES in the HC are still what they were in the 1950’s (I think).
They MIGHT be close to correct for wet surfaces [ when you woud expect people to be more careful, anyway … ] but for any car with servo-assisted (& even ABS) disc brakes, modern tyres & a dry road, they are waaaaay too long. The “thinking distances”, of course, will not change.
Reminds me …
On M-ways & dual carriageways, everybody races past me ( when I’m doing approx 70 mph ) but … let it be a twiddly country lane, or water fall out of sky, & suddenly, they are all getting in my way.
Why?
Long-Wheelbase Land-Rover, that’s why!
It doesn’t really matter what they are in the Highway Code – the point being made is that you cannot stop a moving vehicle quickly and that this distance will be affected by a range of influences. Also, not all motorcycles have assisted brakes or ABS. Having two manually operated brakes means that stopping distances can be rather long.
Ultimately, the figures themselves are irrelevant – the message is what matters.
Do you have “the comentary”?
Where you have to point out to the examiner every dam junction, road sign, telegraph pole, Granny in a wheel chair, child on the pavement which could run out,etc etc?
Or does that come later?
Add my congrats as well, please. 🙂
No, this is for novice riders, so the instruction is pretty basic. It is about fault finding and rectification.
Thanks, Longrider! Absolutely fascinating.
A really good read. I’d be interested in your views on the IAM philosophy re overtake opportunities and making progress.
I’ll give you mine if you like.
It is unnecessary. ‘Progress’ is not the way to measure how skilled a rider is. It will give you some idea of a riders judgement perhaps but to put the emphasis on overtaking is ridiculous and potentially dangerous.
I have very little time for the old guard of the IAM – the ‘Roadcraft’ brigade. The ‘How to be a better rider’ book is better but I have no idea how well that has gone down with the dayglo Dericks or if the ‘training’ has changed at all because of it. Probably not since you are asking about ‘progress’.
(I passed my IAM test for a bet – as a chap I know, ex-bike copper and IAM examiner then, bet I could not pass it without some training. I read the ‘how to pass your IAM test’ book and did it with a different examiner who was not forewarned. And passed
)
I’m inclined to agree with the caveat that I have had very little dealings with the IAM for twenty years, so their approach may have changed in that period.
Well done.
I didn’t know about the ‘no one passes Cardington first time around’.
I passed first time as well (as did a colleague who came with me) but it was clear that some of the others doing the test were woefully prepared and I doubt they made it though first time!
Maybe it’s just a local myth. Certainly I heard it mentioned more than once in the weeks prior to my attendance.
Anyway, thanks for The congrats.
Keep us up to date.