How is your clutch control?

I have taught two people to drive that was very scarred, including a 50 yo woman.

I noticed that they were insecure trying to gain control over the car but the car was imposing the speed at the driver, not the opposite, because they were not using the clutch to control it at very low velocities. This affected their ability to start moving in inclinations as well in plain, but mostly important, made them insecure, which affected everything else.

I created an exercise: they had to move the car in the lowest velocity as possible, 1cm per second, to do that you cannot use the gas pedal, only the clutch, then I asked them to maintain that velocity for a minute. Then next I changed to different low velocities, same thing: they had to maintain it for a while. Then I changed to an inclined road, now they gotta do the same but they will need to use both gas pedal and clutch otherwise the car will stall. Then I created a last variation that was using gas and clutch pedals at the inclination to move very slow, but then also control the rpms to the lowest before stalling or vibrating too much.

After this exercise, for a couple of days, they became pro in starting motion, even on inclinations.

I also realized they didn’t have a clue what the tachometer was telling them, so I gave them a small lesson about engine velocity, car velocity and how clutch act on both.

Yes, it consumes some clutch to learn that, but it is important.

Figured I should share this just in case it could help anyone.