A Little Road Safety
By Claire Scott
Child fatalities on Scotland’s roads double in last year – drivers urged to be more vigilant as summer holidays approach
Following the latest Scottish road accident statistics which show that child fatalities on Scotland’s roads have doubled in the last year, Road Safety Scotland teamed up with Calderhead Nursery School and North Lanarkshire Council’s Road Safety Unit to organise a Road Safety Action Day to teach young pupils potentially life saving road safety skills.
With the summer holidays and lighter evenings upon us, many more children will be out and about. Motorists need to aware of their responsibility for our children’s safety by keeping their speed down and being more cautious.
Thirty five nursery children and a number of parents took part in the road safety day which was run in conjunction with the Children’s Traffic Club in Scotland, a strategy for injury prevention aimed at reducing child injury and death in Scotland. Various activities were planned for the children in order to showcase aspects of road safety, including safe cycling complete with bikes, helmets and a replica road; demonstrations on how to cross the road at a real-life puffin crossing; mind maps (a system used to record learning before and after teaching road safety context) and in-car safety focusing on seat belt safety.
Michael McDonnell, director of Road Safety Scotland, said: “In light of these new road accident statistics, it is clear more needs to be done to target young road users. As summer approaches and more children are out and about on Scotland’s roads, drivers need to be more vigilant than ever. Road traffic accidents are the single leading cause of death and serious injury to children and young people in Scotland, so it is important that we educate our youngsters about road dangers. Unfortunately, the cost of complacency is the loss of young lives. The provision of free and practical parental support is at the heart of the Children’s Traffic Club in Scotland and we are calling on parents to help drive down child road fatalities by working with us to educate their children on road safety.
“A road safety activity day such as the one held at Calderhead Nursery School today is a step in the right direction to teaching young children the rules of the road. It’s a great initiative.”
Irene Morrison, Senior Road Safety Education Officer for North Lanarkshire, adds: “We are thrilled that Calderhead Nursery School has organised this road safety action day today and are delighted to be a part of it. We hope today will inspire more schools and nurseries to take action to educate their children about road safety issues. Any programme that helps reduce child injury on our roads must be welcomed”.
Calderhead Nursery School pupils are among thousands of children across the country to participate in Children’s Traffic Club in Scotland. Membership of the Club is free to all three-year-old’s in Scotland. Registration forms are sent to parents on their child’s third birthday and members are sent a library of six books over 18 months that parents can use to help teach children about road safety.
About the author
Claire Scott started her PR career in London before moving to Edinburgh to join IAS SMARTS. She has worked in the industry for seven years, across a diverse range of public sector, not for profit, business to business and consumer clients.