The elements of learning to bike

As an accomplished father who just taught his 5yo to ride a bike in 4 sessions of 30-45 minutes each, I can unequivocally say that starting with the pedals removed is indeed a quicker way to learn. While I did not refer to it before teaching my daughter, I referenced it before writing this post and I can say that this post by REI documents the process well.

Here are the implicit rules my daughter followed while learning how to bike:

1. If the bike went too close to parked cars, she'd stop.
   Implicit rule: don't touch things that do not belong to you. She has no problems running into me with her scooter.
2. If the bike went too fast for her comfort, she'd drag her feet and bring it to a stop.
   Implicit rule: uncontrolled speed may cause injury.
3. When there is little room to steer between people on one side and a tree on the other side, get closer to the trees.
   Implicit rule: don't hurt a human. 

If something unexpected happened, such as a fall, then she'd take a break before getting convinced to start again. This seems to be a critical aspect of learning - to fail, pause to internally assess what went wrong and retry with a plan.

I'll close with her picture - the sheer joy of learning something new is quite apparent!
Regards,
Kuntal.
PS: I wrote this back in July 2016 but didn't get around to publishing it.