Teaching Your Children About Road Safety
With increasing traffic on the roads and people driving at high speed, sometimes not caring for traffic rules, crossing the street or a road often becomes difficult even for adults who have been doing this for years. Teaching children how to follow safety traffic rules while crossing the road is almost like a project.
Some children, studying in schools which are nearby, do walk down to school accompanied by some senior member. They slowly get used to traffic rules. However, those children who do not venture out much find it difficult to cross roads. Parents of such children have to teach them the rules of crossing. The parents should give a demonstration of crossing the road to the children.
For teaching the child, take her to the zebra line of a street. Tell the child that on the traffic light pole there is a switch. By pressing it the traffic light will turn red and pedestrian crossing line will turn green. At this point the child should cross over at a fast pace.
Where facility of stopping traffic is not available, the method of crossing the street should be demonstrated. Even if there is no traffic on the road the child should not rush but wait for the light facing her to turn green. When the light is green then she should rush to cross the road after watching for any traffic movement. In case there is a divider on the road, she should stop when mid way, observe the traffic of the other side and then cross over.
The difficulty comes when you have to cross the road where there is no zebra crossing or traffic control light. This is normally on the roads where the traffic is thin. Here, before crossing, the child should carefully observe for the presence of any moving vehicle approaching her, and if there is none nearby only then she should cross.
If on some road there is a traffic officer, tell the child to observe his signals and explain to her about each and every action of the officer. When the child is with you in a car, explain to her about traffic rules and the need to allow the people on foot to cross the road safely.
Once you have given demonstration to the child, hold her hand and tell her to cross the road. While crossing observe her to see the level of confidence the child has, if need be explain to her again. If the child is able to cross properly while holding your hand, tell her to repeat the exercise on her own. This way, by repeatedly crossing the road for days together in your presence, she will gain confidence and will develop safety habit.