The other day, I was driving to a meeting when I got a call from my 17-year-old daughter: “Dad, I have a flat tire!” I headed over to help her out. We swapped cars, she got to school relatively on time, and I got to practice my tire-changing skills. It had been a long time since I’d changed a tire, but we grew up with a lot of suspect cars that had frequent issues, so muscle memory kicked in and it went fine.
I’ve always been a big believer in giving my kids life skills and independence and I debated, should I have changed it for her, or should I have made sure she will always know how to do it on her own? But I just pictured it happening again when she’s on a busy road, potentially in the path of speeding cars, or in the dark, or otherwise in a situation that’s just not safe, especially for a teenager.
I know I’m not the only parent that’s thinking about this issue. In case you haven’t noticed, Central Park is full of teen drivers! It’s a very odd feeling to look over at a stop light and see a teen you remember playing at your house when they were all little kids! (Are we getting old?)
So I decided to look into some guidelines about what to tell your new-driver kids about changing a tire. Consumer Reports talked to a few experts who point out exactly what I was worried about for my daughter—roadside conditions, especially in a large city, may not be safe for a complicated task like changing a tire.
Here are a few options for you as a parent. Which route you choose is up to you, but a plan of some sort seems smart so your teen has a plan when the inevitable flat tire happens.
Option 1: Just Call For Help
If you decide that prioritizing safety over everything is the most important thing to your family and you just want to instruct your child to call for help if they get a flat, you can prep both your kid and the car to make that situation safer.
The American Red Cross details out the essentials for what to keep in the car for any emergency, including a first aid kit, flashlights and batteries, blankets and warm clothes, water and non-perishable snacks, and maybe most importantly, a portable power bank to charge a phone.
Make sure your child has the phone number for your roadside assistance programmed into their contacts and any needed account information accessible in their phone, on a card in their wallet if they carry one, or the glove box. Alternatively, check if your provider has a phone app that you can pre-install that allows you to request help. (AAA has one that stores your account information, so you don’t need to scramble for it in an emergency).
While they wait, your kid should pull over as far to the right as possible and wait in the car with their seat belt buckled—even if the worst happens and their car is hit by another car, they are better off in the car with a seatbelt and airbag than outside the car by the side of the road, according to AAA. If they must get out of the car, they should exit via the door away from traffic, even if that means crawling over to the passenger side door, and move at least 40 feet away from traffic. (Note: We saw some conflicting advice on getting out of the car vs staying in it so do your homework and make your personal choice.)
Option 2: Change The Flat If You Can Safely
Say you have a mechanically-minded child and you lean more to the “learn to be self-sufficient” side of the argument—you can prepare your kid and your car for that situation, too.
That Consumer Reports article wisely advises practicing changing a tire at least once on any car you drive regularly, because there are more specifics than we can list here about what changing an individual car’s tire safely will involve. One example: the car your child drives may have an actual spare tire or just a donut (newer cars may just have the latter; car makers lately sometimes skip the full-on spare for price and fuel efficiency reasons.)
If you’ve ensured your child knows what to do for their specific car, there are some general tips: Stock the car with a lug wrench, a jack, and the car’s owners manual. You could also stash a printout of some general steps to changing a tire in the glove box (here’s one from Aamco). Watching a video might also help; this Cars.com tutorial is general, simple, and clear.
You could also purchase a portable tire inflator like this highly rated one, which would allow your teen to air up the tire and get to a safer location or even a nearby tire center. Again, trying it out at home in advance would probably go a long way in terms of making sure your teen feels well-prepared to handle things when they have that first flat.
So which path is right? That’s your choice as the parent. Personally, I think we’re going to do a combination of both. We’re going to work with our kids to learn how to change a tire by practicing at home, but also teach them to know when it’s not safe to do so—and what to do in that case. So my first instruction to all my daughters will be, if you’re on a busy road, in a deserted area, if it’s dark or you’re on a hill, or if you feel unsafe in any way—just call me, or call roadside assistance (which is in your phone!). Prioritize safety over trying to prove you can do something.
I hope this is helpful and gets the wheels turning (no pun intended) on how you’ll help your teen be prepared for that first flat.
Photo by JESHOOTS.com from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-inside-vehicle-13861/
