Behind the Wheel with ADHD

Our instructors are certified through Behind the Wheel with ADHD, a specialized training program developed by Gayle Sweeney and Ann Shanahan aimed at equipping driver education professionals to better assist students with ADHD and other executive functioning challenges. This training is crafted for instructors eager to exceed the boundaries of standard driver education, employing a more informed, structured, and supportive methodology for teaching students who may face difficulties with attention, impulsivity, distractibility, organization, or the ability to process multiple driving tasks simultaneously.

What sets this training apart is its focus on understanding how ADHD can influence driving behavior, decision-making, and the learning process behind the wheel. Rather than assuming that all students learn in the same manner, certified instructors are trained to identify the specific challenges ADHD students encounter. They utilize a variety of tools, strategies, and coaching methods designed to help students maintain focus, establish safe driving habits, and cultivate confidence over time. This may involve assisting students in managing distractions, reinforcing routines, enhancing self-monitoring skills, and practicing driving techniques in a structured, easily retainable format.

For parents, this means that your teen will be learning from instructors who recognize that teaching driving to students with ADHD often necessitates increased patience, repetition, clearer communication, and a more tailored teaching style. The aim is not solely to instruct a student on vehicle operation but to nurture them into becoming safer, more aware, and better-prepared drivers by addressing the unique learning styles and executive functioning needs that can impact driving performance. This specialized certification provides our instructors with valuable knowledge and practical methods that empower ADHD learners to achieve success in ways that traditional instruction frequently overlooks.

Webinar for Parents of Special Needs Drivers

This webinar offers you peace of mind. Gayle and Ann, creators of the “Behind the Wheel With ADHD” professional training program for driving instructors, have brought their research and experience on this topic to a new webinar just for parents! This webinar will help you keep your teen with ADHD safe behind the wheel.

What You’ll Learn

Gayle and Ann offer specific tools and strategies to help mitigate the risks and confusion associated with the new driver who experiences symptoms of ADHD.

The new parent webinar series:

Presents new research on the part anxiety plays in traffic safety for ADHD teens
Alerts you to the special dangers of distracted driving for ADHD teens
Explains how you can use the coaching approach to work more effectively with your ADHD teen
Demonstrates the latest technologies available to support your efforts as parents to mitigate distractions
Shows you how stimulant medications impact driving competency
And much MORE

The Webinar Modules

Behind the Wheel with ADHD is presented in 3 modules, lasting 50 minutes each.

MODULE 1

FOUNDATIONS

Learn why your ADHD teen faces serious risks in driver safety not encountered by his/her peers. While many driving skills are thought to be acquired naturally for most, we now know that for drivers with ADHD and other executive functioning deficits, these skills need to be integrated into a program that provides specific skills training and creates new cognitive routines. We share what we have learned from the professionals and from ongoing research.

MODULE 2

PARENTING STRATEGIES FOR NOVICE TEEN DRIVERS WITH ADHD

In this module we offer specific information on the most serious challenges to driving skill and traffic safety encountered by teens who have ADHD or other learning differences. We offer tools, strategies, and recommendations on how you as parents can coach your teen through this important training experience and keep them safe behind the wheel.

MODULE 3

RECOMMENDATIONS AND RESOURCES FROM THE PROFESSIONALS

Finally, we offer you an in-depth presentation of useful resources and recommendations from professionals parents can use to help implement the strategies we suggest for enhancing the driver training experience for novice teen drivers with ADHD. We include take-aways for the important documents / templates that we recommend and professionals use.

Meet the Trainers

Gayle Sweeney and Ann Shanahan are ADHD and Executive Functioning Coaches who specialize in working with teens, college students, and young adults who have ADHD and other executive functioning issues to help them set goals and create strategies to achieve them. . As co-creators and authors of the new program “Behind the Wheel With ADHD”, Gayle and Ann hope to share their passion for helping people focus on specific strengths and weaknesses in a remarkably tailored driver education experience.

Gayle and Ann were trained and certified in 2014 in the Rush Neurobehavioral Center Executive Function Skills Program© taught by Rush University Medical Center. Gayle and Ann presented “Special Risks Associated with the ADHD Driver” to the Illinois Driver Educators Association (IDEA), November 2013.

Gayle Sweeney is a graduate from Marquette University in Business and trained at with JST Coach Training, LLC, and received training in the Coach Mentor Training Program and earned a Certificate for Advanced Coaching Skills Practicum. Gayle enjoyed a successful career in commercial real estate in Chicago with CB Commercial (now CB Richard Ellis) and then chose to stay home to raise her four children before embarking on a coaching career.

Ann Shanahan is a graduate in Psychology and Education from North Central College. She began her career as a UPS driver and was quickly promoted into the management ranks becoming one of the first female Managers of the brown package car drivers in the North Illinois neighborhood districts. She became the North Illinois Safety Manager, responsible for the UPS training and development fleet of drivers. She has two children in college.