toolman04

Got a quick question for other instructors out there (and students if they've had instructors like me). I am a new CFI with about 4 primaries right now. I work full-time as an Air Traffic Controller/Airfield Manager for the Air Force and then head to the airport to instruct after work and on weekends. Therefore, I don't have a bunch of time available. With my first student, I attempted to teach groundschool concurrently with flying. He has progressed very well and is going to be more than prepared for his tests. However, my schedule of work, groundschool, flying, home, sleep, then wake up and do it again was just too taxing for me to continue to teach a full-up groundschool. My other students wanted to do groundschool online, and do their flight portion with me. I thought this was a great idea as it saved me from teaching groundschool full-time. A fellow part-time instructor said he requires all his students to take groundschool, test, and then begin training before he flies with them. I thought, "Great! Just fill in the blanks and tie in their ground training with flying." Nice in theory. What I found with my first "flight-training only" student is that he would complete the lessons (which I know teach the test, for the most part) and show up with little to no knowledge of the material. Understanding of aerodynamics, systems, etc. were all below-average. Now, I usually wouldn't expect a new student to understand all of these areas, but when the student has completed the groundschool portion, I would expect he/she would at least know a little bit about basic aerodynamics and things such as the various types of altitude, airspeed, etc (particularly after I told him the answers the lesson before and assigned him some short studies on certain subject areas). I felt as though I was wasting his time/money by having to teach him about all of these subject areas after he had already completed the "groundschool." He asked if he could just "learn as we go" and "fly the airplane first." I explained how each subject area was a building block to the next, and why knowing things like how the instruments worked (he wondered why he couldn't just know how to read them) were actually very important to the overall objective of learning to fly an airplane. After an additional hour of groundschool on his thrid lesson, he again failed to complete a thorough study of the subject areas I asked him to look over, and only knew a few "test" questions. I told him we weren't going to fly and asked him to go home and study specific areas before we were to fly...otherwise, we would be wasting his time and money. He wasn't too happy and, of course, I got dropped. I now wonder if I required too much of the student to understand these principles before flying. I know that there are basic standards to be met and that every student should not be an expected to meet these standards within the first month. However, I do like to build a certain amount of base knowledge upon which to build, and I realize that I sometimes do go a great deal into depth on some of the subject material. Has anyone else run into this problem? Was I a bit too demanding? How about the online groundschools - do these work with folks who may not be as motivated to study? Thanks for the advise and sorry for the long post.

saabguy493

I dealt with students that were perfect to ones that just can't get it. I tell them what is expected, but the goal of where I worked was to make money and keep the students happy! Some times I would have someone show up unprepared or who had just been plain lazy, this does not mean we still would not fly! I would tell them what I thought about their performance and how important it is to study the material and when we flew they would realize this and it would motivate them for the next lesson. Flying is supposed to be fun. I know there are schools out there that are only meant to teach and that is it. I was told to keep them happy and that is what I did and 99% of the time, the problem students worked themselves out. Only once did I have a problem student quit on me!

lstorm2003

Well here is what I would do with a student like that. You will find a lot of primary students get into flying because it seems like a fun thing to do. So find out what their goal is. If they just want to fly for fun and not a career, thats great. Just be upfront with them and tell them you can go fly togehter anytime he or she wants but if he is not willing to also put in the effort on the ground he may never finish and get his rating. If he is okay with that, then great, go fly and have fun, teach him what you can, and just have a good time. But ask him if his goal is to have a private license within a couple of months and within 60 hours or so? If he answers yes, then explain that in order to meet that goal he has to work hard and study a lot. If its for a career and not just for fun then he MUST do that. But if there is a guy who just wants to fly and not study much, just be upfront. Explain that he won't get a rating with that attiude, but still take him flying whenever he wants. There is nothing dangerous or wrong about that, some people just want to fly and have fun and will never even solo. Seems like a waste of money to me, but for some people this is what they want. And to each his own as they say...

rickair7777

There are two kinds of ground school programs, don't mix them up...

Test Prep: If this is the goal it should be 1-2 days of question bank review, followed by the test. This is best for someone who is too busy to study the gliem on their own. This does NOT replace actual knowledge...you still have to cover that somehow.

Actual Knowledge: This is what you need if you are not doing the ground yourself. It should not emphasize the question bank, but real knowledge. I'd be looking for a 20+ hour course, possibly at night at the local community college or at a flight school.

Self-study: Allowed per the FAR's as long as the CFI verifies that it has been completed. Get a course with a workbook so you can verify progress. This works great if the student is an engineer or other technical professional. All you have to do is a little review along the way and checkride prep.

Another good option would be to find a young full-time CFI who needs money and is willing to do the ground portion. I've seen this done for individual students, and even small groups of freelance students who agree on a day and time that works for all involved (ie every Tues night, 7-10). This is good because you can provide some input to the ground instructor as to content, if needed.

Rama

It may be easier for your student to relate to the material through hands on knowledge as opposed to theoretical knowledge out of the book. If he is all right paying more by taking more lessons why not keep going? Not everyone learns the same way or has the same amount of motivation.

blastoff

Bingo! Let the kid fly and see if he likes it before asking him to bust his...rear.

Cubdriver

Fundamentals of Instruction gives some clues on how to approach students like this. Several posts have hinted at it already. When you have slow or less than capable student you should repeat the same material until they get it and do not get impatient with them. You can also vary the order of lessons if someone is hung up on a particular topic or approach a topic from a new angle and use a different tack. If you have a keen or impatient student you should raise the bar a bit each time so they remain challenged and this will help keep a smart student interested and an overconfident one sensible.

Sounds like this student is a mix of the two. He may be capable and eager in the flying part but he is lazy and unmotivated in studying. You need to fly with him despite his lack of preparation while pushing the bar ever higher. This will keep him interested and hopefully if he is smart enough, show him that he will need the knowledge in order to be able to achieve PTS standards in his flying. If he sees his flying is not up to the standards and I am sure he will eventually, he may take more of an interest in studying. My guess is he thinks one doesn't need to know very much to fly well. He needs to be shown you do need the knowledge and without it you can't pass the test.

I'll be the first to admit that it is easy to cite FOI principles and hard to implement them. Perhaps you should jump to the lessons where book knowledge is more critical such as in flying cross countries. I think he will see that those silly books are actually useful and start studying. As Rick says there are different types of ground schools and he may be unaware of the other options.

You also say that this student was doing some kind of pc based ground school before flying which is fine, but I take this to mean he did the whole course before taking flying lessons and flying was not integrated with the course. Not good. FOI says the third step in the cognitive domain for learning is application. Sounds like he got to the third step and there was no application so it didn't stick. He may be a quite normal student in this case. Also, disuse is a cause of memory loss, so if he goes weeks and weeks between taking the online course and actually using it, he may have just forgotten it.

bustinmins

I know it can be frustrating. Most pilots I know learn more from doing than from reading about it. Incorporate a little ground in each lesson to "remind" your student about the reading part and then ask your student to review those sections and bring questions with them to the following lesson. Of course, you should require your students to be read and prepped for the lesson before they arrive. Some students might need a little extra push at the end of a lesson to brief it up for the next one. Charge for the ground instruction even if it is .3. This will do one of two things:
1 - financially motivate your student to be prepared
2 - fill your pocket book as you spoon feed this variety of student

Whatever you do....have fun. Remember what it was like to be a student and do what you can to bring the law of intensity to bear in each lesson.

My .02

sqwkvfr

First, it sounds like you are a very conscientious instructor and I thank you for your efforts to make certain that your pilots are safe and knowledgeable. In recent years, it's very unfortunate that so many pilots were instructed by IPs who were just building time to get into "their" regional job.

....and the quality of pilots out there is indicative of this. I hear not only PPLs doing stupid things, but I've heard and seen many instructors do things that anyone with a PPL should not be doing.

Regarding your problem--If I remember correctly, you're a fairly new instructor, so this little exercise will benefit both you and your student:

When your student comes unprepared, or lacks knowledge in a certain area, use the flight to not only instruct him, but use it to demonstrate what he DOESN'T know as the result of his lack of preparation. I'm hard pressed to think of an example, but let's say he was to study adverse yaw and he comes in for his lesson unprepared. When in the air, demonstrate the principles of adverse yaw and explain to him the importance of knowing about it, properly correcting it, and what exactly causes it (which goes right along with properly correcting it).

This should have the effect of him realizing that he's missing out on "learning as he goes" if he doesn't prepare and it will help you get better at applying theory to actual flight while breaking it down into small, easily digestible bit of information...something that not enough instructors are good at doing.

Then, revise the information in an extensive debrief to make certain that he "gets it".....then revise it again on a subsequent lesson.

It sounds like you're doing great....keep it up.

Ewfflyer

Is this guy getting training for personal use, or are they doing it to become a professional??? If the answer is A, you're busting his @$$ too much, but if he's going to start a career out of this, then you are within your rights, but make it known why you are doing it because the expectations are higher, even at the lower grade licenses.

I have so much to say, but hate typing all of it because I know most folks hate reading it if it's more than a few paragraph's. (much as myself)

Good luck, and remember that having fun is just important as learning the material. If they aren't having fun(as should you), they probably aren't going to learn anyways.