By Dr. Donald L. Green, 1 November 2022
This week I have been thinking about my professional library and how it supports being a RiderCoach. The choice to continually read and self-develop as a coach supports Life-Long Learning, an enviable RiderCoach characteristic and a trait we ask our students to learn in every course we facilitate.
1) The RiderCoach Guide is the ONE base document used by RiderCoaches to understand how the Motorcycle Safety Foundations Curricula facilitate student learning. With this ONE document, using the Classroom Slides, Range Cards, or our Experiences would probably be haphazard, and the outcomes with the many different locations where the curriculum is used would be highly consistent. Reading the RiderCoach guide regularly can inform RiderCoaches based on the continual experiences of working with students and other Coaches. It is incredibly beneficial when the words gain greater meaning as understanding increases with good learning experiences.
2) TWO essential documents supporting the RiderCoach Guide include the Motorcycle Safety Foundation’s Rider Education and Training System (RETS) Standards Document and the Jurisdictional Policies and Procedures Manual.
The Standards Document framework provides clarification and a basis for deploying programs, processes, evaluations, and quality control procedures for those using the systems. It applies to everyone who uses the system, from the most basic to the more advanced offerings.
The Jurisdictional Policies and Procedures Manual provides guidance based on jurisdictional statutes, laws, and regulatory constraints necessary to operate training sites and rider education at a location. Despite the MSF Standards Document and Curricula, the Jurisdictional Policy and Procedure Manual provides program guidance and directly contributes to the “health” of a program. It is essential to the culture of the jurisdiction and either restrict or unleashes the potential of a program and how students, RiderCoaches, and Sites benefit from it. How a program uses the curriculum and builds a corps of RiderCoaches heavily relies upon the Jurisdiction and the Policy and Procedure, much more than the generalized oversight of the Motorcycle Safety Foundation.
3) THREE more books I would recommend as companions aligning with the previous mentions would be:
“Self-directed learning” by Malcolm S. Knowles (1975)
“Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us)” by Tom Vanderbilt
“Motor Learning and Performance” by Richard D. Schmidt and Timothy D. Lee.
I hope this stirs thought and exploration of RiderCoach Material. Have a great week!
-Don
