A flight instructor wrote to tell me about a middle-aged student (whom we’ll call Ken) he adopted from another instructor. Ken had nearly 50 hours of dual and hadn’t soloed. It turns out that Ken’s previous instructor (whom we’ll call Bill) began Ken’s ab initio training in the traffic pattern. Ken was expected to master the basics of flight while making pattern circuits while he was simultaneously taught how to land an airplane. Really? Yes, really.
Poor Ken? I’d say so.
Incompetent Bill? Not necessarily. Most likely, Bill didn’t know any better. He was simply teaching the way he was taught.
Bill had recently graduated from an aviation institution that preps students for airline careers. Some of these institutions now use a combined private/instrument flight training syllabus in their ab initio flight training programs. One version of this nontraditional syllabus has presolo students flying instrument approaches on the fifth or sixth lesson. By definition, these syllabi place relatively little emphasis on learning the basic fundamentals of flight in the early phases of flight training. After all, introducing presolo students to instrument approaches means that instructors must spend less time introducing them to slow flight early in their training. Keep in mind that these combined private/instrument syllabi are structured toward an end game of placing a young person in the right seat of an airliner.
Whether these syllabi are effective for students in the airline prep environment is a question that’s open for debate. What should be clear, however, is that a combined private/instrument syllabus isn’t a practical teaching guide for those whose aviation ambition is to fly recreationally.
It should be clear that Bill didn’t think that spending time in the practice area, helping his student isolate and master basic flying skills, was important. How could he if Ken’s first lesson began with landing practice? How did he come to believe this idea?
Given that the FAA sanctions the use of a combined private/instrument training program (and it does), isn’t the agency implicitly supporting the idea that mixing advanced training with basic training is both proper and desirable? If so, then why shouldn’t Bill feel justified in avoiding the traditional practice area as he simultaneously teaches flying fundamentals and landing skills in the traffic pattern? Combining fundamentals with advanced training must be good for the student, right? No, it’s not. It’s in complete contradiction to the building block principle of learning.
It seems clear that the FAA no longer feels it’s necessary to master basic flying fundamentals before moving on to advanced flying skills. If you need to be convinced, read the FAA’s 2007 Introduction to Scenario-Based Training booklet. The FAA recommends that presolo students learn basic flying skills while they simultaneously learn navigation skills during short cross-country flights. The booklet tells instructors and their presolo students to “fly to a nearby airport (no more ‘practice area’).”
The question is this: Is there a more practical and effective way to teach nonairline aspirants (or anyone, regardless of their career ambitions) to fly? I believe there is.
My recommendation is to use a flight training syllabus that supports using the building block principle of learning to teach the basic fundamentals of flight.
Consider using the FAA’s own primary flight training syllabus located at the back of the 1971 Flight Instructor Handbook. This syllabus is from a time when the FAA (and the aviation industry as a whole) emphasized the value of stick-and-rudder flying skills over all else. You can find it by visiting the blog area of my website (www.rodmachado.com).
This bare-bones syllabus provides you with the minimal content necessary for student training. It also shows you how to apply this training in a logical sequence. Of course, you should add the additional training as necessary to meet the requirements of today’s FARs. That said, you should avoid adding any training that distracts from the initial goal of teaching your student to solo safely.
As Albert Einstein once suggested, “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.” That seems like a good rule for any flight training syllabus, too.
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