7 Tips To Keep Your Child Safe On Roads

Besides teaching about road safety rules for kids, parents should also keep in mind the following tips to ensure that their children stay safe on the road.

1. Buckle up! – Ensure that your child always wears the seat belt, or is secured in a car seat.
2. Use the child lock feature to prevent your kids from opening car doors by themselves.
3. Teach them about the rules practically – take them for walks and cycling, and teach them how to do it right.
4. Exhibit patience when driving – set an example for your kids to be calm and not rush on the road.
5. Be punctual and disciplined to avoid speeding and rash driving.
6. Do not use mobile phones or other gadgets when driving.
7. Never leave your kids alone in the car.

Road Safety Games & Activities

One of the best ways to teach your kids something important is play. Here are a few road safety activities you can rely on to help your child learn about road safety.

• Have a discussion – give your child a scenario and ask them what they should do. For example, ask “You are playing, and your ball rolls into the middle of the road. What would you do?” Or, you can ask “You are getting late to school, so you should run to the school bus bay, correct?” and see what they say.
• Draw or paint road and traffic signs or posters to help them remember better.
• See if you can create a fun road safety song with the signs and what the signs mean.
• Crosswords are excellent learning tools for older kids. You can find road safety education crosswords for kids online
• Play a guessing game – play noises or sounds that they are likely to hear on the street and ask them what it is.
• Use activity sheets to teach your kids about road safety. You can download road safety education worksheets for different age groups on the internet. Automobile companies like BMW have free resources online that can be used to educate your child about road safety (3). You can also download the Renault ‘Safety For All’ app for interactive road safety lessons 

Road Safety Facts For Kids To Know:

Did You Know?

1. Vulnerable road users like pedestrians, cyclists, and bikers account for around 50% of deaths due to road accidents.
2. Wearing quality helmets reduces the chance of injury and death due to crash by 40% .
3. Reducing or controlling the speed can reduce the chances of an injury during an accident.
4. Child and infant car seats can decrease the number of children dying in road accidents by 54 to 80%. Making child restraint mandatory in vehicles can decrease child deaths by 35% .
5. The chances of death by accident can be decreased by 51% with the proper use of seat belt.
6. For every 1km/h that you reduce your speed by, you mitigate the risk of accident by 2%.

Make learning about road safety rules a fun activity, or your kids will not pay attention to what you say. You can collaborate with other parents and plan activities that will introduce your kids to road safety. Kids tend to have an active imagination and can exaggerate what you say in their minds. So be careful of what you say when you talk about road safety – the idea is to make them cautious, not scared.

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