Advice for New Instructors

[shamrock1215]

Hi,

I am just starting on my Class IV rating and am looking for any advice/caution. Not so much for passing the test but for real-life teaching.

Is it reasonable to take notes on student performance? What sort of format is best?

TIA

[Bede]

A few things:
1) don't tell a student to "pull back". Rather, apply back pressure. Students have to get used to the amount of pressure that needs to be applied, not the position of the controls.
2) either you fly or the student. Never both.
3) You should rarely be taking control. The student needs to learn when a landing is not going according to plan and be able to confidently go around- even before they can confidently land the aircraft. A mistake that I made as a newer instructor is always saving a bad landing. No matter what position, I took pride in being able to "save" it and get a greaser in. This was wrong. A student needs to know that if things aren't looking right, you go around. No difference if in a C150 or a B737. Go arounds are covered early in training and the student should have them mastered by the time they get to exercise 18.

[PilotDAR]

What Bede said, particularly point 2. And...

Remain calm, even if things are going wrong, fix it while remaining calm. If appropriate, say: "we're going to discuss that later." while remaining calm. Don't convey to your student that you should get emotional when things don't go well. Do not allow the student to sense if you are getting frustrated.

Brief what you're going to do/want to see flown. Probably, demonstrate it well first, so you set the standard for skill and precision first. Don't allow a poor example to be the example.

Teach what the rudder pedals and ball do. Teach the student to use the rudder to keep the ball in the middle, unless they want to slip, then slip properly. Teach to lead a turn with the rudder a little if that type responds well to that. "Fixing" the yaw once established in the turn is late.

Demonstrate a power off landing from the downwind to touchdown. Going around at 200 feet omits the most important elements of a power off landing.

Demonstrate at a safe altitude how attempting to fly a power off landing from speeds slower that Vy will greatly reduce margins for late error correction.

Brief the expectations for the flight, and then debrief after the flight. Ask the student if they have any questions at relevant times, and encourage a brief discussion if it will remove doubt about anything.

If you don't know the answer, or did not execute the maneuver being demonstrated well, say so, then get it right. Don't "blow off" getting it right.

Aside from airwork, all flying should be encouraged to be smooth - as though you're carrying the CEO and their spouse in the back - 'cause that may be the job the student wants, so learn it right first time! No jerky flying, no sudden configuration changes, no slamming the throttle open and closed - See Bede's point 1- Apply pressure to the control, rather than pulling pushing.

Teach that the airplane is to be "flown" even while on the ground. Ailerons in the correct position considering winds, and elevator held in a nose high position if doing so will reduce nose wheel/strut/propeller wear and tear.

Nothing you teach a student should have to be unlearned later so they can fly "better" [as a paid pilot].

Fly, and demonstrate flying, the plane as though you had to pay the maintenance and wear and tear costs!

[praveen4143]

There is no shame in not immediately knowing the answer to a question. Even after a decade of doing this I get the odd question that completely stumps me and I sit down and try to find the answer together with the student. I find that it gives them an idea on how to go about finding the answer while I get a chance to look up something I didn’t know.

Also, your supervising instructor can be quite the lifesaver, especially if you have a good one. Make sure you take the initiative to go beyond basic instructor supervision. Have lots of questions for them with specific cases on how to handle specific things with your students. A few minutes of preparation ahead of time in this helps you and your supervising instructor.

[Squaretail]

What Bede said, particularly point 2. And...

That point can't be stressed enough. Remember to always review how the exchange of control works. Even with (and maybe especially for) advanced students. Students NEVER initiate the exchange of control. They may ask you to if they need to adjust themselves in some way, but they never but never are allowed to go "you got it!". They have to get in the mindset that someday there won't be you to guide them. You also never want to be in the position to fight a student for control of the airplane.

Remain calm, even if things are going wrong, fix it while remaining calm. If appropriate, say: "we're going to discuss that later." while remaining calm. Don't convey to your student that you should get emotional when things don't go well. Do not allow the student to sense if you are getting frustrated.

If things aren't going well in the air for whatever reason, its best to discuss them on the ground when fuel ain't burning. Occasionally this may need for a lesson to be cut short. Hopefully a proper briefing before the flight heads this eventuality off, but sometimes it becomes apparent that the student isn't in it that day for whatever reason. Don't beat it into the ground, sometimes a fresh approach, sometimes on another day is what is required.

Also don't let them see you cry.

If you don't know the answer, or did not execute the maneuver being demonstrated well, say so, then get it right. Don't "blow off" getting it right.

The cardinal sin of instructing is bullshitting the students. Its ok not to know everything, and while when demonstrating, if you @#$! up, fess up and try it again. Strive to fly so you don't have to do that often. If the student asks something you don't know the best answer is "I will find that out." Of course that can't be everything. You do have to know some stuff, so also strive to not be a know nothing. You have the internet these days, make use of it. And no, don't come here and ask.

Fly, and demonstrate flying, the plane as though you had to pay the maintenance and wear and tear costs!

When describing to students what you are doing, or how you want them to do things, you shouldn't be using terms like kick, stomp, shove, jam, heave, jerk, etc. If you are, re-examine how you are demonstrating.

Advice I would add to the above posters:

1) Students will come and go. Don't take it personally if a student wants to go with another instructor, quits flying, disappears or otherwise leaves your tender care. While you may question if you're doing stuff wrong if you can keep NO students, for the most part remember that as customers they can be making decisions based on things you have no control over. And they're under no obligation to keep you informed. While it would be nice to know if they are dissatisfied in some way with your work, don't count on it. I'd say only about 25% of students that do an intro flight, decide to continue with it. Of those only maybe a third will continue to first solo, and only a third of those remaining will actually finish a license.

2) Don't burn yourself out. Wile it seems great when you're starting and you want to help the students, I advise against giving them your personal contact. It will get abused.

3) The worst students will take up 90% of your time. The unfortunate part about instructing is you have to spend more time with a student the worse they are. Your good students will leave the nest quickly. Many of them will also not look back. Its going to be Joe who never opens his FTM you have to fly with all the time. Hopefully not all your students are a Joe, but it will seem like it sometimes

4) While its all the fad these days to give death by PGI, students have a limited attention span. If it takes you more than 20 minutes to give any PGI, its too much. One thing to remember about the process is student's knowledge is additive. Simple to complex. You can always add more steps in, but you can't remove them later.

5) My God, learn meteorology. Don't take new students out into the crap. Not unless you like getting barfed on a lot. The students almost never hit the bag. Morning is almost always the best time to do flying lessons. Try to encourage your students to get out of bed.

[Squaretail]

Is it reasonable to take notes on student performance? What sort of format is best?

Yes. Don't be afraid to write such notes on performance in the PTR, it will save your butt if the student under performs and wants to come back at you. If you're taking notes in the airplane, don't spend a lot of time doing it. You're supposed to make the most of the time with the student after all. I always just wrote stuff down when I got back on the ground, but if you don't have a good memory, use some kind of shorthand.

[455tt]

ALWAYS do the aircraft pre-flight inspection with your student.

I can't believe how often I see senior flight instructors leaving the pre-flight inspection to the "lowly" student all alone, as if it is beneath the instructor's time and effort. The pre-flight is really important. Instructors should use the pre-flight as an opportunity not only to ensure the aircraft is 100% safe and legal for take off, but also to pepper their student with questions so as to make it a valuable opportunity for learning. If something goes wrong on the flight that is attributable to something the student missed on the pre-filght with an absent flight instructor, it is not the student who is going to be at fault, it is the PIC.

[rookiepilot]

Care. Stay off instagram while in the circuit.

If you don’t care about teaching, and are just filling your ATPL requirements, don’t teach.

Your students deserve better.

You asked.

[Squaretail]

ALWAYS do the aircraft pre-flight inspection with your student.

I can't believe how often I see senior flight instructors leaving the pre-flight inspection to the "lowly" student all alone, as if it is beneath the instructor's time and effort. The pre-flight is really important. Instructors should use the pre-flight as an opportunity not only to ensure the aircraft is 100% safe and legal for take off, but also to pepper their student with questions so as to make it a valuable opportunity for learning. If something goes wrong on the flight that is attributable to something the student missed on the pre-flight with an absent flight instructor, it is not the student who is going to be at fault, it is the PIC.

Here's a secret: The aircraft are inspected before the students get there. Or should be. You don't need to pepper the students while they're trying to do the walk around, in fact walk arounds should be done un-distracted. The purpose here is to put the student in the position of responsibility for the flight, even though the instructor is ultimately responsible. Shadowing your students during walk arounds shows them that you don't trust them, and they will learn that the instructor will always catch anything they miss and will rely on this. It would be akin to keeping your hands on he controls while the student flies. The goal with training is to progress so the student operates as if they are on their own. The more they feel this way, the better.

[photofly]

Instructors should use the pre-flight as an opportunity not only to ensure the aircraft is 100% safe and legal for take off, but also to pepper their student with questions so as to make it a valuable opportunity for learning.

Are you peppering the student with questions, or are they checking the aircraft? Also I wonder if perhaps by flight 40 or 50, the student might be adequately peppered, and the instructor could forsake any further peppering.

If something goes wrong on the flight that is attributable to something the student missed on the pre-filght with an absent flight instructor, it is not the student who is going to be at fault, it is the PIC.

Does that happen a lot?

[455tt]

Just curious, what ab-initio licence takes 40 - 50 dual flights?

And if you have an ab-initio student at 40 - 50 dual lessons, then you should be really, really careful for sure.

Do accidents happen alot, not really. So why not ditch the pre-flight altogether?

[photofly]

Just curious, what ab-initio licence takes 40 - 50 dual flights?

And if you have an ab-initio student at 40 - 50 dual lessons, then you should be really, really careful for sure.

I didn't acually say 40-50 dual lessons or even 40-50 dual flights, I (carefully) said "flight 40-50". I don't think many students are ready for a PPL flight test on page 4 of their PTR, which, if I remember correctly, is 10 flights per page. But maybe that's a topic for another thread.

Do accidents happen alot, not really. So why not ditch the pre-flight altogether?

I don't think I asked whether accidents happen a lot. I asked whether "something goes wrong on the flight that is attributable to something the student missed on the pre-filght with an absent flight instructor" happens a lot.

I think the question is whether an aircraft defect that causes an issue in flight is less likely to be detected by a student carrying out a pre-flight inspection without an instructor than if the instructor supervises them, and if so - how much less likely. If it does happen a lot, that would be an indication that instructors should supervise pre-flight inspections more. if it never happens, then the existing scheme of supervised vs. unsupervised inspections is as good as it can get. That's why it's a sensible question to ask - does it happen a lot - it's the one data point that will stand as evidence of whether instructors should always supervise pre-flight inspections or not. And data is much better than uninformed opinion.

Another data point of interest would be to consider how often a pre-flight inspection (by anyone) results in the cancellation of a flight.

You might consider that an instructor on their fourth flight of the day in a given aircraft already knows quite a lot about the state of the tires, whether there's water in the fuel tanks, whether the stall warning horn works, whether the rudder moves smoothly from stop to stop, whether the alternator belt is tight, and much of the other stuff that a student ought to check on what is (for them) their first flight of the day - or their first flight of the week or month - in that aircraft.

[455tt]

The point I am making is the rarity of accidents should not negate being cautious.

And as for types of scenarios I am worried that having both the PIC instructor plus the ab initio student pilot should complete the walk around together would be a good idea is the infamous "running out of fuel in training" accident category. In my area you can count on one or two fuel starvation type forced landings in flight training per year. What happens is the school gets busy, the aircraft starts the day full of fuel, and as flight after flight goes on throughout the day, on one unlucky flight where the student pilots have all been doing their pre-flights alone, sooner or later, a student and instructor take-off without sufficient fuel for the flight. Does this happen often? No. Would it be less likely with the instructor and student doing a joint walk-around? Yes, in my opinion.

It seems to me that if the instructor cannot be bothered to appear and complete the walk around with the student, the student begins to think of the walk around as not so important by the instructor's example. But we experienced pilots know how important it can be and how it can lead to an accident if done improperly.

An example from my own flight instructor experience: I was doing a multi IFR with a licenced, multi-rated CPL pilot in a light twin and sent him out for the walk around. You would think my student with his background could to a pre-flight, right? I came out and got into the aircraft a few minutes later without doing any part of the preflight and off we went. Just after the run-up and having received our take-off clearance a weird impulse came over me from I don't know where and I turned and asked my student "hey - you did remember to remove the air intake covers, right?" to which my student replied "oh wow - I forgot!" So we had to call tower, postpone take off, shut down and remove the air intake covers. That moment made a big impression on me and since then I always attend the student's preflights. And since I am already there I might as well ask the student some questions during the preflight.

[Squaretail]

There's a difference between not doing the walk around with the student, and not supervising the condition of the airplane you're going to fly in. Making sure they understand the importance of the walk around is part of the pre-flight briefing.

Personally when I was a student I despised instructors who wouldn't let you do anything, or would constantly interrupt you doing things to "pepper" you with questions. Not letting the students at least have the perception their doing things on their own works counter to the learning factor of effect. I found in most respects students rose to the occasion when you put trust in them. The goal is for them to do things by themselves. The sooner the instructor stops holding their hand, the better.

[455tt]

Asking questions is a key component of good instruction - see the FIG.

I agree with you it is not good to prevent the student from ever doing anything. But I am not advocating for this. I am advocating for instructors to be present for the preflight inspection. And to teach by asking questions.

Do you believe that whenever an instructor asks a student a question, it is somehow an interruption of the student's training?

[PilotDAR]

You don't need to pepper the students while they're trying to do the walk around, in fact walk arounds should be done un-distracted.

This.

Bear in mind that a walk around inspection is a quasi maintenance activity. In well done maintenance, (like some piloting tasks, following checklist sections) if it is interrupted, it should be restarted from the beginning of that section to assure that a step is not overlooked. If an instructor is teaching the walk around, or would like to take the opportunity of the pre flight time to review external airplane things, that's fine, but it's a different task, at a separate time than actually performing a walk around inspection - which should be undistracted, and following.... a checklist! That said, it's obviously very wise for the instructor to supervise the walk around, until they are very satisfied that the student will be thorough and complete when performing it themselves.

As said, the instructor does not "help" the student fly. Either the student is flying (which is what they are paying to be doing there), the instructor is demonstrating, or, if the instructor let things get well out of hand, they are "saving" something. If that happened, the instructor missed something, or waited too long. Similarly, the instructor should not accept a "you've got it!!!" from the student - the flight should not have got there without some instructor mentoring/intervention. I have "gently warned" students that they were headed wrong, and should correct now, so I would not have it intervene in moments to come.

On the other hand, during helicopter dual training, I recall approaching in gusty conditions to land up to a hangar door in a new type. The instructor was certainly not paying attention to what I was doing (I guess that I looked like I knew what I was doing!). I asked him to follow closely, as I was not entirely confident about what I was doing. He paid more attention to me. On another occasion, in a helicopter type I was very comfortable in, my instructor, who was as cool and relaxed as could be, and normally sat with his hands crossed on his lap said to me (while I was flying a briefed confined area toe in) "I have to follow you closely on the controls, but I won't touch them unless I have to." he didn't touch the controls, but shadowed them perfectly - it was an appropriate and briefed training exercise!

[Squaretail]

Asking questions is a key component of good instruction - see the FIG.

I agree with you it is not good to prevent the student from ever doing anything. But I am not advocating for this. I am advocating for instructors to be present for the preflight inspection. And to teach by asking questions.

Do you believe that whenever an instructor asks a student a question, it is somehow an interruption of the student's training?

Asking questions does not "teach" see your FIG for the purpose of asking questions. There is a time and place for asking questions: before and after a student is doing any activity. Lot of instructors need to shut up and let the student do stuff. Your job isn't to see how many different thoughts they can have in their head at any given time - its not many. In the case of the walk around, you may ask them some questions before they do it to promote some thinking about what they are about to do, and ask them some after to gauge whether they did the task appropriately, and understood the purpose. But if you're asking them questions while they are up on the strut checking the fuel level, prepare for them not to remember anything about what they're doing. Or forget the fuel cap off, or the dipstick on the wing. If you feel you must directly supervise a student's walk around "for safety" then for shit's sake stand back and watch. The student is in the "do" part of the activity. When the student is "doing", you shut up and watch.

If anything, causing a distraction during a walk around is the least safe thing you can do.

[photofly]

I came out and got into the aircraft a few minutes later without doing any part of the preflight and off we went.

There are other options in between the rather binary choice of "the instructor must do the whole inspection with every student every time" and "the instructor gets in the airplane with their eyes shut."

[rookiepilot]

I came out and got into the aircraft a few minutes later without doing any part of the preflight and off we went.

There are other options in between the rather binary choice of "the instructor must do the whole walkaround with every student every time" and "the instructor gets in the airplane with their eyes shut."

I recall my instructor audibly verifying fuel and oil levels with me after my walk arounds, checking oil themselves, and looking at fuel caps from the ground, to ensure they were secure.

[Squaretail]

I recall my instructor audibly verifying fuel and oil levels with me after my walk arounds, checking oil themselves, and looking at fuel caps from the ground, to ensure they were secure.

Surprised he had time to do that between instagram posts, checking facebook and re-calculating his time built towards his ATPL.