ground instruction

[Turbomallard]

Ha! This strip really resonated with me (though I never forgot what Chuck did here). I've taught ground school for several years on and off, and it took me a while to get used to the idea that there were things students would ask which I would not have an immediate answer for. At first I felt awful and embarassed, then I learned it was a fact of life for anyone. What finally drove that point home was an encounter with a Thunderbird pilot. At an after-hours unwinding party after an airshow a couple of years ago (I worked our local airshow for many years) I chatted up a Thunderbird pilot, hoping to get some interesting tidbits on flying the F-16 that I could use in teaching ground school the following week. I asked him what Vy was on the F-16. His response: "I don't even know what that is." Well, heck, I thought... if he doesn't know that, I guess it's okay if I don't know or forget things on occasion.

Then there's almost always one jerk in every class whose mission is to humiliate you in front of everyone else. One dufus had designed model airplanes for many many years and knew more about aeroydynamics than I ever could or would. He got his jollies out of asking things that I had no clue about and then explaining his question, and the answer that he already knew, to the rest of the (bored) class. Finally I told him that there was absolutely no need to go into his level of detail in order to get a private pilot's license. But, still, once a class, he would have to humiliate me. If I was able to answer his question, he'd keep asking more until he found one I didn't know the answer to, then he'd shut up, his mission accomplished. The rest of the class didn't like him, either.

I mentioned him to the instructor who was actually flying with him (I wasn't a CFI at the time), and the CFI just laughed. "Yeah, he tries to land the airplane like it's a model, too, no matter what I tell him. Until he admits I'm right and starts doing things properly, he's never going to solo."

The dufus quit both lessons and ground school not too much later. 

TM

[fireflyr]

HAHA---My wife's favorite saying is "there's a lot of truth in humor" and todays strip points that out!

Being an instructor is the best way to fully understand flying and I'm sure Chuck is finding that out!!

[Roland]

@ Turbomallard:

I’m sorry to read that you had such an a§§hole in your class. It happens from time to time  to have such a person in the classroom.

Here at Diamond I’m creating the training manuals for the DA 40 and DA 42. My surveyor, who cross-reads those manuals from time to time, is an experienced pilot and engineer, retired but helping the young. He told me to make this manuals as watertight as possible, to give the instructor a good enough tool to avoid such sceneries. I know that this is impossible. I’ve been on many trainings myself and have held trainings too and found such an knowitall in almost every course.

A lesson is, as you said very correctly, not to go into this. How much has one to know to do a certain job? Well, I think as much as possible and a little more. But the teacher/instructor is just an other tool to get there. I always try to wake interest on the certain subject I teach. But I cannot give all information available, I just don’t know all. If a person is interested furthermore than I can teach I can show him where he/she gets more information. I, personally, don’t want to know ALL. What for?

It is a personal thing how I present myself to the other (students in this case). Behaviour is a minimum request, I suppose.

And what I like most on that strip: Chuck goes back to read, at least tryes to find the correct answer (well, he tries to find the correct question) instead of telling bullsh!t right away on the spot.

[Mike]

Yeah, the strip really wasn't invented much.
The actual question was but fact is, that "the real Jason" has thousands of questions everytime we go flying and I can always answer only so many of them. He is a really nice guy though and just gets so excited about flying and helicopter especially that it doesn't bother me. He, in a way, always reminds me how cool this whole aviation thing really is. I sometimes loose "the loving feeling" a little because I do it for a living....

Chuck can be a bulls#!tter though. Just you watch!
ESPECIALLY when it comes to women (or better "chicks" which we can leaglly say here in the forum....) !! 

[chuckar101]

Great strip guys.  Reminds me of last summer when we were sitting in Ely and me and Mike got stumped and pulled out the manuals to look up the answer.  Can't remember the exact question but looks a lot like what happened to Chuck.

[happylanding]

Then there's almost always one jerk in every class whose mission is to humiliate you in front of everyone else. One dufus had designed model airplanes for many many years and knew more about aeroydynamics than I ever could or would. He got his jollies out of asking things that I had no clue about and then explaining his question, and the answer that he already knew, to the rest of the (bored) class. Finally I told him that there was absolutely no need to go into his level of detail in order to get a private pilot's license. But, still, once a class, he would have to humiliate me. If I was able to answer his question, he'd keep asking more until he found one I didn't know the answer to, then he'd shut up, his mission accomplished. The rest of the class didn't like him, either.
.............................
The dufus quit both lessons and ground school not too much later. 

TM

these guys do not deserve to flight actually. An instructor should fill a FP with two people at T/O and just one at landing.....

[fireflyr]

Then there's almost always one jerk in every class whose mission is to humiliate you in front of everyone else. One dufus had designed model airplanes for many many years and knew more about aeroydynamics than I ever could or would. He got his jollies out of asking things that I had no clue about and then explaining his question, and the answer that he already knew, to the rest of the (bored) class. Finally I told him that there was absolutely no need to go into his level of detail in order to get a private pilot's license. But, still, once a class, he would have to humiliate me. If I was able to answer his question, he'd keep asking more until he found one I didn't know the answer to, then he'd shut up, his mission accomplished. The rest of the class didn't like him, either.
.............................
The dufus quit both lessons and ground school not too much later. 

TM

these guys do not deserve to flight actually. An instructor should fill a FP with two people at T/O and just one at landing.....

Oh, I can tell you're insstructor material!!!!

[happylanding]

Oh, I can tell you're insstructor material!!!!

AH AH!! ? , you know what? I think that either you share the passion, or you go away. I mean, flight is one thing you do because you love it, not because you have to (like a school course and exams and all the brouhaha). But, it works on the two sides. I remember a course (aviation law) that I actually hated. The instructor was and old owl, with preconceptions about woman and aircraft…I really had tough times. Knowing he could not ask me anything about law, considered that I was studying it at university, he just kept asking me the strangest things in front of everybody (gyroscopic precession was an example, actually! Aerodynamics, problems with angle of wind or NAV interception I still could not understand because a thing was theory and another the practice.). I came out from the courses as if I was coming back from a battlefield and I used to read all the manual over and over again, before going there!

[Frank N. O.]

I applaude and agree with your ideas about being an aviator! 

I have a similar view about driving cars too. I daily see people driving around corners with a cell-phone in their hand, I saw a lady driving out of a parkinglot holding a soft-ice (ice-cream cone) and she could barely turn the wheel and not operate the indicators at all. A car is a lot easier to control than a plane, but it's still so complex that you have to keep driving as the top priority as long as the engine is running and keep the hand on the controls. We've had a car-crash by a guy writting an SMS and not looking at the road, on the freeway. The police found the phone outside of the car and saw it was on and with a partial SMS-reply to another SMS recieved just minutes earlier on the screen. Generally it's a misunderstood attitude to what's important, like people just thinking about the rules and if there's a loophole they use it, instead of looking at why the rules were made, mostly for safety so common sense should prevail, but it doesn't.

Ok back on topic. Sorry to hear about the chauvinist teacher, I strongly dislike such behaviour. Sometimes things can be misunderstood because people act differently or come from a different life etc. but it doesn't sound like that was the reason there, this also only excuses in-direct percieved behaviour and it sadly sounds like this teacher was very direct about his opinions
I do hope you did well and proved yourself well

Frank

[fireflyr]

Oh, I can tell you're insstructor material!!!!

AH AH!! ? , you know what? I think that either you share the passion, or you go away. I mean, flight is one thing you do because you love it, not because you have to (like a school course and exams and all the brouhaha). But, it works on the two sides. I remember a course (aviation law) that I actually hated. The instructor was and old owl, with preconceptions about woman and aircraft…I really had tough times. Knowing he could not ask me anything about law, considered that I was studying it at university, he just kept asking me the strangest things in front of everybody (gyroscopic precession was an example, actually! Aerodynamics, problems with angle of wind or NAV interception I still could not understand because a thing was theory and another the practice.). I came out from the courses as if I was coming back from a battlefield and I used to read all the manual over and over again, before going there!

Oh my little petunia, this is the second time you've mentioned law studies--does this mean you are a lawyer and if so you are going to entertain us with lawyer jokes?   (I have some that I can't even post in public)

[happylanding]

Oh my little petunia, this is the second time you've mentioned law studies--does this mean you are a lawyer and if so you are going to entertain us with lawyer jokes?   (I have some that I can't even post in public)

AHAHA! Studied law and finished my studies just one month ago. the most booooooooooring and fu&&ing thing existing on earth (it's enough to read the index of a book about it to fight any insomnia). I hated it! So, it's quite sure that I won't transform myself in any.....Perry Mason. About jokes....gosh, actually I do not know any....maybe I just fell asleep listening to them!!!!   Will catch up, will catch up!!

[fireflyr]

How about this one From the movie" Philadelphia":

What do you call 100 lawyers chained together at the bottom of the ocean?

---A good start!---

[happylanding]

How about this one From the movie" Philadelphia":

What do you call 100 lawyers chained together at the bottom of the ocean?

---A good start!---

nothing contrary! Less boring people around the world!!! Hope you're not counting former law students anyhow........I like better the skies, uh?!? 

[happylanding]

Ok back on topic. Sorry to hear about the chauvinist teacher, I strongly dislike such behaviour. Sometimes things can be misunderstood because people act differently or come from a different life etc. but it doesn't sound like that was the reason there, this also only excuses in-direct percieved behaviour and it sadly sounds like this teacher was very direct about his opinions
I do hope you did well and proved yourself well

Frank

Yes, everything went straight at the end!! So, no worries. Ol' memories of the past! 

[SteepTurn]

Hmmm....

I remember the different instuctors I had during my training. We had one who was very good in meteo and he also had e excellent way to xplain things so that also the thumbest student (me as well ) understood the things. Anotherone - living for aviation - who allways xplained things with lots of fun and very very well. Unfortunately the third I'm writing about was a great pilot with lot xperience, but absolutely unable to teach / train anything. His prefered subject was navigation. So far so good, but when he tryed to xplain us law it didn't work very well considered that all his examples came from navigation.. quite confusing.
But tha last one I'm writing about was really useless. The subject was "procedures".... He only read the manual..c'mon guy, I can read it for myself... at home probably with a beer under the sun, instead in a old classroom...
Anyway, teaching is quite tricky. I had to train people for six years in my former job and I liked very much, because it's a great challenge to figure out how to explain things, because every person is different with a different strange mind

...I don't know what's about you out there, but here is
LUNCHTIME!!!!!

c u
ST