Try teaching the newbies how to drive the car safely and courteously first before throwing gimmicks at them... and definietley how to drive on a motorway..........
I'm a biker too, daily in and around Paris (things can get hairy especially on week end when you get the out of town/weekend drivers).
I think that teaching how to properly set up and use satnav is a good move. People
will use those devices (either standalone units or their smartphone) so it is wiser to try and give them a few pointers as to where to install them and how to use them (as navigation aid, not some otherworldly voice to be obeyed at all cost).
Cars and driving habits change (although the basics like looking around you stay the same). Keeping our head deep in the sand won't help.
It's not an easy task to define the minimal skill set:
- too low and you get dumb*sses on the roads, obviously a safety threat
- too high and you end up rejecting way too many people and to some of them it might become acceptable to drive without a licence (*) which is obviously also going to be a problem
(*) over their first few years of service, about 10 years ago, speed cameras in France got tens of thousands of people to lose their licences (mostly speeding up to 15mph over the posted speed) because they were just passing speed traps a lot more often than before. The point-based licensing hadn't been updated and a string of minor speeding offenses - that were virtually unenforced before - would lead to a voided licence (ie: go back to driving school and start over). What happened next was a surprise to only the most naive: driving without a licence just skyrocketed. People have to go to work so even usually-law-abiding citizens felt they didn't have much choice.
Laws were changed so that minor speeding offenses aren't that penalizing anymore. And there's technology (Waze, Coyote ...) helping people.