Third Update
Ryan S -
Hello everyone!
For this update I would like to present a more thorough analysis in the scope of my project through my site placement.
I have been able to talk to even more instructors, and in addition, more students training to become instructors themselves. In a previous meeting at my site placement I was able to speak to a class of students training to become instructors, however this time I was able to speak to students one on one. Although I initially thought this would be redundant and not as important information, as I continued my conversations with the students I discovered an area in training that may be very beneficial to my project.
When pilots are seeking their flight instructor license, they enter a classroom setting and review previous taught materials while learning how to teach others through presenting information required. At my site placement, these presentations involve one student standing at the front and lecturing about a topic of aviation – weather, airspace, maneuvers, etc.. This presents a peculiar situation, as the way this is designed is not how training is practically done with a real student. In these presentations, other students are not allowed to interject or ask questions in the middle of the presentation, contrasting to how a one on one learning environment exists with student pilots, where student pilots are allowed to speak up if they don’t understand a portion of the information being taught. Furthermore, when engaging in these presentations, the students listening have already learned the material and will 1. be less likely to pay attention and 2. won’t provide feedback that could be crucial to improve explanations of certain topics (this was the most prominent feedback I was given, as the students who I talked to were worried that the learning environment they were in was not like what they should be training for.
Although this presents a problem that seems to have multiple ways to fix, no immediate solutions can be applied. Having student pilots themselves sit in these classes to provide better feedback (which also improves their own studying and learning!) seems like it hits two birds with one stone. Unfortunately, legal issues prevent uncertified instructors from teaching students, and although this is a gray area, I’m not sure how well I can work around it.
With this coming up, it sparks my curiosity to further pursuit this predicament through additional meetings.
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