Categories: uncategorized
Date: 28 June 2007 18:32:53
My road to qualifying as a Driving Instructor has been somewhat bumpy. Part 1 (the theory test) is easy and although I was happy at passing it, felt real sense of achievement. Part 2 is the practical test of Driving Ability. Now, that is hard work and passing that is a serious achievement. It also means that you are granted a temporary Trainee Licence entitling you to work as a Driving Instructor until the completion of Part 3.
Part 3 is the test of Instructional Ability and is conducted by a Supervising Examiner in role play as a learner driver.
Anyone who has followed this blog long enough will remember my total ecstasy at passing Part 2 way back in 2005. Then it all went wrong when I failed the Part 3 test which meant I had to give up instructing and go back to my old job of driving a white van in the pursuit of unsavoury animals.
So, from the ecstasy of passing Part 2 to the utter depression of failing Part 3 - 2006 was a pretty bad year.
At the start of this year, (January 5th to be precise) I went through the formality of Part 1 all over again. On St Valentine's Day, I passed Part 2 and started working as an Instructor again at the beginning of March.
This afternoon, I took and passed (yes, PASSED!) the final qualifying exam to be a proper Green Badge holding DSA Approved Driving Instructor.
To be honest, I thought I'd screwed up big time. Well, actually I had, but the difference this around was that I set my sights much higher. Last time, I was only thinking about the pass mark and aiming to do well enough just to get a pass. What I didn't account for was test nerves. By aiming for the high grade, this gave me a huge amount of breathing space. I got things wrong - I realised that at the time and the Examiner pointed them out to me in great detail at the end of the test, but by aiming high, the mistakes I made only dropped me so far that I was still above the pass mark.
So, it's been a long time, but I've finally done it. I feel like I'm floating. It's now half past six. I don't thing I've stopped smiling since 2 o' clock this afternoon.