Teaching my 4yr old to ride

justyn_c_uk

Our old next door neighbours very kindly gave us a bike for my son and for the past year we have been trying to get him to learn to ride and singularly failing. It's not that my son isn't trying, he is and I think he really wants to learn, but over the weekend I started to consider where the problem may lie.

To start with, my son will be 5 later in the month and is quite tall for his age (120+ cm), the bike he was gifted is not the smallest size and probably has 14in or 16in wheels (not sure) and although it's a little on the heavy side it's got stabilisers.

But I'm not convinced the bike is stable, yesterday in a straight line, unless he was at full pelt, the bike was leaning over by about 5deg with him correcting by hanging one cheek off the side of the saddle and he is so nervous he would get off to turn a corner (I also tried it, an interesting sight for the neighbours, and it was leaning over on me). When he does try to turn it seems to manage to pitch him out onto the pavement, not something that I remember happening to me. If I lower the stabilisers the rear wheel spins in the air and I can't really raise them (can I?) because he is so nervous. I also can't put him on a smaller bike to lower his CoG because of his size, his knees would probably hit the bars.

However, I do know my son has a sense of balance because we had him on his 2yr old sister's wooden learner bike (like the Rothan) and he was off down some slopes, feet off the ground, correcting the steering and no once did he look like he would come a cropper or look unstable.

I'm now stuck is it bike or boy or father? I know about Islabikes, but don't necessarily want to buy a bike just for the sake of it, if all that is required is perserverence. All help would be usefully accepted.

Justyn

Ian Sims

I think the main thing is not to push it too much. If he's happier with his stabiliers at the moment leave it at that and try again later. He'll get there I'm sure.

This is one thing we've learnt with our 4 year old. I think we managed to put him off swimming a bit by being too pushy. He still enjoys going for splash at the pool, but for the moment that's all he wants to do. I've tried to take off his stabilisers a couple of times, but he's not quite ready yet.

Ian

cvm

Hi
Could you take both the stabilisers and the peddles off? That way it's like on of those push along bikes.
Our almost 4 year old has a bike with 16" wheels so sounds to be a good size.
We were given a smaller bike with no stabilisers when he was around 2 yrs old. Due to slow-ness on the part of his parents, we never put stabilisers on. He got the hang of wheeling the bike round the garden, leaning it against things, then sitting and pushing himself along by his feet then he took off by 3 yrs 3mths. In between we ran round the garden with him lots, so he liked the idea of going fast!
It was all done under his own steam - never occured to me he would get the hang of it so early so we def. weren't pushing him.
A couple of weeks before he got the hang of it, we got him a 2-wheeled scooter - this seems to help with getting 2 feet off the ground simultaneously (and only costs 10 quid from argos!)
Hope that is helpful and not just rambling!
Good luck
Clare

redvee

Start on stabilisers, then over time make the bike's stability less dependant on them by raising them slightly so when riding your son is using his balance and not relying on the stabilisers, once he's mastered that, take one off :shock:

chrisbuck

These :
(http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_204917_langId_-1_CarSelectorCatalogId__CarSelectorGroupId__varient__categoryId_90925_crumb__parentcategoryrn_90925
worked a treat for my son.

They are stabilisers that have some "flex" in them, so you can't rely on them too much (ie, if you lean too far, they will let the bike fall), however they do keep the bike upright at slow speeds. My son had them on for only a couple of months before we took them off.

ChrisB

Mike Healey

Remove the stabilisers. They don't teach the kids a thing.

1. As another forumer said, remove stabilisers and pedals and put saddle low enough for him to reach ground easily.

2. Either :

a) get him to scoot along until he gets the hang of balancing and steering for some distance
or
b) find a suitable slope leading on to a level area and get him to roll down on to it until he can travel for a fair distance

3. Then put the pedals back on and your real worries will start. We've taught several 100 kids this way at our kids club and it's never failed, even with one 14 year old with fairly severe dyspraxia

Ps Mr. Moderator, sir, can't we make this subject a sticky?

andrewc3142

My kids (now 5 and 8) learned in completely different ways.

The oldest started with stabilisers almost as soon as he could walk and loved riding. Every opportunity and he was off on the bike. He progressed to the next size and continued with stabilisers until he was 5, using them to lean on corners. His younger brother didn't want to ride at all until he was 4 and started riding without stabilisers straight away. The older brother, seeing this, told me to take his off and after a couple of wobbles was riding on 2 wheels.

Both now love riding and the oldest was big enough about a year ago to go on the back of the tandem, which we use for quite long trips to Cub things, the Freewheel thing last summer and so on.

In answer to your question? In my view it doesn't matter one bit. The main objective is to get him starting riding and for him to enjoy it. Another year and however he starts it'll be the same.

baudman

I also vote for temporary conversion to a 'runbike' (remove stabilizers and pedals, and drop saddle so they can 'balance' naturally with flat feet). After all, balancing is the tough bit - pedalling and steering is easy.

I also vote for this being a sticky. (This has been on this forum a few times already - with a few differing points of view).

BigLee1

I think one of the best things I taught my daughter when she was learning to ride both with & without stabilisers is how to set off properly. By bringing the pedal up so she can get a good downstroke to set her off paid dividends when I whipped the stabs off as it was one less thing to learn and she was doing it automatically! The little girl next door could ride but couldn`t set off unless someone pushed her!

hamstercp

I'd support the runbike. My 5 year old got it in about half an hour with one after 6 frustrating months with stabilisers. A nice low ramp helped a lot. He walked it a couple of times and then was unstoppable!

My 2 1/2 year old got the hang of a runbike in an hour and was better than his brother for a long time.

The problem with staiblisers is that the bike falls over easily as it trips over the stabiliser, it doesn't steer like a bike (by leaning) and also establishes bad habits like taking both feet off the ground when stationary.

kieranb

as others have said, and we did, remove the stabilizers and pedals then add pedals later. Its like learning to swim with arm bands - go to a swimming school and you'll see no kids with them.

sc999cs

We went with the stabiliser approach, start low and raise them bit by bit so by the end of the time they aren't actually touching the ground while the bike is in motion. Thing to remember is that all children learn at different rates. When they're ready they'll ride fine just as Andrew C said above. Don't rush your son - let him learn at his own pace. Otherwise you'll get stressed, he'll get stressed and things will get unpleasant...

bike was leaning over by about 5deg with him correcting by hanging one cheek off the side of the saddle

this happened with both my children and is perfectly normal a
s far as I'm aware, just make bike riding fun for him.

Steve C

janeho

Both of ours now (7 and 5) learnt by taking the pedals and stabilizers off as described above.
A few runs down a gentle slope, pedals back on, and they were both wobbling along on their own within the hour.
We did it with both of them at around 4
Good Luck!

robotsuk

My local bikeshop stock these bike type things with no pedals on them, so the idea is the the child can push themselves along with their feet, let alone pedalling, which allows them to focus on balancing part of it all, they worked wonders for my mates son who learnt how to ride a bike on one of them in just a few weeks, its awesome

I think they are called ''scoot's'' or something like that i will try get down my bikeshop sometime and find out what they are called

Thanks

kris

ItsIllak

Another experience, this time very marginally different, and for a 5 year old it worked a treat.

My daughter cycled with stabalizers for quite a while (though not very frequently), but didn't learn any cycling skills at all (except possibly pedalling). When she expressed interest in going on two wheels, I took the stabalizers off. I told her to put her left foot on the pedal at 6 o'clock, and start with her right foot behind the other pedal, and push off, kicking off regularly after that.

At first she effectively hopped while sat on the bike, but fairly quickly she was gliding for a meter or two between kicks. From there she naturally gained some confidence, and without being told to started putting her right foot on the pedals and trying to cycle.

Although I sometimes suggested she went back to kicking off, generally, unaided, over the course of a few hours over a few days, she was cycling OK.

At that point I realised her bike was far too small and now I've gotta get her a new one. Oh well.

Daz555

As I recall, my dad taught me to ride by running me down a grass slope then letting go and screaming PEDAL PEDAL PEDAL until I fell off.

It actually worked.