AXA & ISM EDT Diary: Day 1 (Lessons 1–2)

17 November 2025

To celebrate 10 years in partnership with AXA, in September 2025 we teamed up with AXA and JOE.ie to offer one lucky young driver the chance to win their 12 EDT Driving lessons for free.

We’re delighted to announce our winner is Alanna Costello (pictured), from Navan. Alanna passed her Drivers Theory Test and received her learners’ permit in August 2025 and all of us at ISM are delighted to begin helping her on her journey to getting on the road!

Alanna’s Journey

At ISM we like to do lessons in pairs, so Alanna’s EDT’s will be covered over 6 weeks with a 2-hour lesson each. (1 EDT per hour). This will ensure a swift but effective progression through each lesson and getting that application in for her driving test as soon as we possibly can. Alanna began her lessons this week, so read below and follow on for more updates in the coming weeks.

Day 1 – Lesson 1 – Car Controls and Safety checks

The first of our EDT lessons is always about getting comfortable with the car you’re going to be driving.  Alanna was taken through what is called a “Cockpit Drill” in her instructors’ car.

The Cockpit Drill

This drill puts our learner into the driver’s seat (literally) from the off while her instructor points out some key controls:

• The Handbrake

The handbrake’s primary function is to keep your car stationary when parked. Here we’ve shown Alanna how to apply the handbrake and more importantly when to apply it.

• Seat Adjustment

Something very important to us is that you are comfortable in your seat before you start and you have its height adjusted so can easily view the road, your mirrors and reach your pedals.

• Seatbelt

We’ve made sure the driver’s (and passenger’s) seatbelt are securely fastened. There should be no twists in the belt.

• Steering Wheel

Picturing the wheel as a clock, we make sure our learner has her hands at 10 and 2, with a slight bend in her elbows and we made sure she can see the full dashboard of the car with no obstruction.

• Mirrors (Rearview and two wing mirrors.)

These are always last in our drill. We want to make sure we have full visibility through each of the mirrors in the car. The rearview should have the full back window of the car centred and with the wing mirrors, you should be able to see the door handle in the corner of the mirror. (Bottom right for left wing mirror, and bottom left for right wing mirror.)

Now our Cockpit Drill is complete, we’re ready to move on to foot and hand controls.

Foot and Hand Controls

We’re almost ready to get the car moving, Alanna has got her mirrors in place, seat in the correct position and our seatbelts are on. So how do we start?

Foot Controls – The Pedals

• Accelerator – Right hand Pedal (Use right foot only)

For want of a better phrase, this is going to make the car go! You should only use your right foot with this pedal, and use it gently. Easing on to the pedal speeds up the car, while easing off it begins to slow the car down.

• Brakes – Middle Pedal (Use Right foot only)

The opposite of the accelerator, this pedal is for slowing the car down. Like the accelerator, while you want to press the brake progressively and gently wherever needed.

• Clutch – Left Hand Pedal (Use left foot only)

The clutch will be our learners first point of contact for selecting gears, and changing gears to suit your acceleration and braking while driving.

Hand Controls

• The Gearstick

Manual car gears are normally split into 5/6 forward gears and 1 reverse gear. The gearstick, coupled with the clutch is used for changing the gears to match the cars acceleration when the car is moving.

At ISM, we like to use the palming method for changing gears. This involves careful placement of your palm on the gearstick to ensure a smoother transition when changing gears.

• The Handbrake

Applying the handbrake causes the rear wheels of the car to lock, and as mentioned previously keeps the car in a stationary position. Throughout her lessons, Alanna will learn of the different situations needed to apply her handbrake.

• Steering

Your steering wheel enables your car to turn in a left or right motion. As mentioned already, when shown, Alanna has been advised to keep her hands at 10 and 2 and use the push-and-pull method.

This means if turning left, you push the steering wheel with your right hand upward from 3 to 2, and with your left hand, you pull the steering wheel towards your original 10 position. If turning right, you push your left hand up from 9 to 10, and with your right hand pull the steering wheel all the way around so your right hand is at 2 again.

• Indicators

A relatively easy one, Alanna was shown how to indicate correctly when turning left, or right. Indicators show another car what your intention is before you start to make a manoeuvre.

• The Ignition – Starting the car

Last, but not least in our internal controls we’ve shown Alanna how to turn on the engine. This is normally on the right of your steering wheel. In our instructors car, the steps to ignition were as follows:

• Key in ignition
• Clutch down, and make sure car is in neutral
• With clutch pressed, turn your key to the right and wait for the engine to start up.

Under the bonnet

Before we move off, we’ve switched off the engine and taken a quick look under the bonnet. Here we’ve shown Alanna each of the following:

• 4 types of liquid and where they’re found – Water, Oil, Coolant and brake fluid
• The position of the battery.

Moving off safely

The last part of our first hour, we covered moving off, and stopping the car in a safe and controlled manner. We took Alanna through the POM routine:

• Prepare – Make sure everything previously mentioned in this article is in place. Mirrors, seatbelt, gearstick in neutral.
• Observe – we went through the correct observations she needed to take when moving off.
• Move – Once we’re happy we can safely move off, we slowly lift off the clutch while gently pressing the accelerator and move off.

For stopping, the same process applies. Prepare to stop, observe your surroundings, and stop when it is safe to do so.

Day 1 – Lesson 2 – Correct positioning 1

So in the first hour of day 1, we’ve covered all car controls and methods for moving the car from a stationary position, but now its time to bring the car out on the road!

When learning to move off in the first hour, we used our POM routine. But since we’re about to head out on to the road, we then introduced our GOSHO routine.

The GOSHO Routine

• Gear – Select the appropriate gear (First gear in a manual)
• Observation – Check your mirrors and blind spots
• Signal – indicate your intention to move off by using the appropriate indicator.
• Handbrake – Release the handbrake
• Observation – Do one last check around you, in each of your mirrors and blind spots.

Once happy you’ve covered each step; Release the clutch slowly, and gently press the accelerator and start to move out.

Getting out on the road for the first time

Alanna, like all learners was nervous at bringing the car out on to the road for the first time. But we’ve assured her that this is natural, and we’ll take as much time as necessary to get things right.

Once out on the road, we like to take our students through different types of junctions, and the correct positions for approaching them. That includes:

• Left & Right turns
• T-Junctions

To help Alanna approach these different types of situations, we like to teach the MSPSL Routine. This routine stands for:

• Mirror – check your mirrors on what’s happening around your car
• Signal – signal your intention to other road users.
• Position – position the car correctly in the lane.
• Speed – adjust your speed by slowing down and braking as needed.
• Look – Look for hazards, pedestrians, cyclists or other vehicles before continuing.

At the end of this lesson, Rod had a quick Q&A with Alanna. They discussed how she felt she got on in the first lesson, while Rod identified how everything is working for her, and if we needed to change anything as we progress to day 2.

Here’s what Alanna had to say about her first lesson:

“I was excited but naturally nervous to start my driving lessons, but it quickly became clear I’d nothing to worry about. During my lesson, my Instructor, Rod, taught me about how the car works before then allowing me to test it out for myself. I drove around an estate and practiced stopping and starting, as well as turning around corners. Overall, it was a really positive experience which I can only credit to Rod, as not only was he a great teacher but a lovely person who made the experience much easier.”

Here’s how Rod, our instructor feels Alanna is progressing as she finishes her first day of lessons:

“So obviously Alanna was very nervous, for a couple of reasons, firstly meeting me for the first time and secondly the unknown of driving my car for the first time. She took to it so quickly, learning to steer left and right, stopping and moving off. As the session went on Alanna was so much more relaxed and held in the information I was giving her so much easier, what a great student and really looking forward to our next session.”

Next Time

Lessons 3&4 are all about applying everything Alanna has learned her first day. Next time, we’ll look at changing direction in more complex situations as well as progression management and controlling the speed of the car when you’re on the road. Follow on for more updates as Alanna continues her journey.

The AXA and ISM Driving Lessons Offer

If you’re a driver between the age of 17-40 and you have an AXA car insurance policy, you can get your 12 EDT Lessons for €545 and if you complete your lessons within 12 months, you could get up to €400 off your car insurance. Read more now on the AXA Website.