Elly Riding Her Bike

Elly recently learned how to ride a "big girl" bike, meaning with pedals and no training wheels:



The part about having pedals is key because we started her on a balance bike (aka running bike) a few months ago.  These little bikes are awesome.  They have no pedals and the child can easily touch their feet to the ground while sitting on the seat.  The idea is that it's harder to learn balance than to learn pedals.  So these bikes allow the child to comfortably and safely learn balance as they "run" the bike.  Soon, they're gliding with their feet up.  Then it's a relatively easy transition to a pedal bike with no training wheels.  That's another key.  Elly never rode a bike with training wheels, so she never learned to rely on them.

Here's a little video of some of our first sessions learning the balance on the balance bike.  Check out this site for the brand we got - Strider.  We highly recommend it.