CFI Lesson Plan questions....

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ArnoldPalmer

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ArnoldPalmer
So I am trying to put together my lesson plans and get a head start on that before I find an instructor/school that will work around my schedule to get finished up.

Everyone says the same thing "have your lesson plans" ready. Question: who is the audience for my lesson plans? Am I putting together PPL lesson plans? CFI? Commercial... ?
 
Your doing them all, for most that translate to both private and commercial the lesson is the same it is just the standards are different. Very few things like maneuvers such as Chandelles and lazy eights are commercial specific and turns around a point and a turns are private specific, the rest are for both mostly.
 
1anG said:
Your doing them all, for most that translate to both private and commercial the lesson is the same it is just the standards are different. Very few things like maneuvers such as Chandelles and lazy eights are commercial specific and turns around a point and a turns are private specific, the rest are for both mostly.
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Gotcha, thanks!!
 
The PTS (eventually ACS) for Instructor Airplane acts as your main bullet point outline for each topic. It also has the references you should pull from (such as the PHAK and AFM). You also need to make sure your creation meets the needs of both the private pilot and commercial pilot ACS

When done, you will have something that fills at 1.5”-2.0” binder with material.

Good organization helps, so get some tab dividers with those slide in tabs.
 
I’d also suggest flight reviews, checkouts, checkride prep, and not-current-need-to-get-qualified-again Pilots.
 
The lesson plans serve a different purpose than most people think. If you look at the flight instructor PTS, one of the tasks you will have to complete is the delivery of a ground lesson during the oral portion of the checkride. The lesson plans you create are generally used as a guide to teach this ground lesson. The examiner likely will not look at your lesson plans, nor will you be directly graded on the quality and completeness of them, which is a good thing since many people just buy them these days. You could show up with no plans and still pass just fine as long as you have some sort of plan in mind to teach from.

That said, I feel there is value in developing your own lesson plans. During the process of writing the lessons you'll be reviewing things you may not have thought about for a while and it will get you to think about how you would want to describe things to someone who is unfamiliar with the concepts. Assuming you're doing an airplane single engine rating, I'd suggest writing lesson plans you would actually use with a private or commercial student.
 
I am willing to scare ya like I have successfully done to all my CFI’s from the left seat
 
mondtster said:
The lesson plans serve a different purpose than most people think. If you look at the flight instructor PTS, one of the tasks you will have to complete is the delivery of a ground lesson during the oral portion of the checkride. The lesson plans you create are generally used as a guide to teach this ground lesson. The examiner likely will not look at your lesson plans, nor will you be directly graded on the quality and completeness of them, which is a good thing since many people just buy them these days. You could show up with no plans and still pass just fine as long as you have some sort of plan in mind to teach from.

That said, I feel there is value in developing your own lesson plans. During the process of writing the lessons you'll be reviewing things you may not have thought about for a while and it will get you to think about how you would want to describe things to someone who is unfamiliar with the concepts. Assuming you're doing an airplane single engine rating, I'd suggest writing lesson plans you would actually use with a private or commercial student.
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All four of my flight instructor orals started off with something to the effect of, “you’re going to teach me about _____. Write up a lesson plan and let’s get started.”
 
MauleSkinner said:
All four of my flight instructor orals started off with something to the effect of, “you’re going to teach me about _____. Write up a lesson plan and let’s get started.”
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Yep, exactly. I never understood why people call 'em (the advanced prepared ones) "lesson plans" anyway. They're supposed to be tailored to the particular student for a specific day. The real lesson plan format I remember (it's been years, but I have a mnemonic):

Objective
Elements
Schedule
Equipment
Instructor's Actions
Student's Actions
Evaluation
​
Only the first flight, the solo flight, the first cross country and maybe a mock checkride are the same for everybody and maybe not even then. So, why not just do those and make out your plans on the fly like posted by MauleSkinner?
 
dtuuri said:
Only the first flight, the solo flight, the first cross country and maybe a mock checkride are the same for everybody and maybe not even then. So, why not just do those and make out your plans on the fly like posted by MauleSkinner?
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If you have a set of lesson plans for a particular rating, they will all be used with each student who goes from start to finish with you in getting that rating. What changes, from student to student, is how long you spend on each lesson and how parts of more than one lesson may be combined into a single ground and/or flight lesson.

For example, I start lesson plan #1 with a brand new private pilot student. We complete the ground, preflight, and engine start but the weather deteriorates and prevents us from flying. On our next lesson, we'll move on to lesson plan #2 for the ground, preflight, and engine start then pickup where we left off on less plan #1 to complete those objectives. In any case, by the time we are done, all lesson plans will have been completed when the student goes for their checkride.
 
Larry in TN said:
If you have a set of lesson plans for a particular rating, they will all be used with each student who goes from start to finish with you in getting that rating. What changes, from student to student, is how long you spend on each lesson and how parts of more than one lesson may be combined into a single ground and/or flight lesson.

For example, I start lesson plan #1 with a brand new private pilot student. We complete the ground, preflight, and engine start but the weather deteriorates and prevents us from flying. On our next lesson, we'll move on to lesson plan #2 for the ground, preflight, and engine start then pickup where we left off on less plan #1 to complete those objectives. In any case, by the time we are done, all lesson plans will have been completed when the student goes for their checkride.
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That sounds more like a syllabus to me.
 
WannFly said:
I am willing to scare ya like I have successfully done to all my CFI’s from the left seat
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So you are volunteering to be the stunt student where you trade scaring me to death with me yelling “right rudder” all the time.

Let me find my crash helmet and I’ll meet you at your hangar
 
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Larry in TN said:
If you have a set of lesson plans for a particular rating, they will all be used with each student who goes from start to finish with you in getting that rating. What changes, from student to student, is how long you spend on each lesson and how parts of more than one lesson may be combined into a single ground and/or flight lesson.

For example, I start lesson plan #1 with a brand new private pilot student. We complete the ground, preflight, and engine start but the weather deteriorates and prevents us from flying. On our next lesson, we'll move on to lesson plan #2 for the ground, preflight, and engine start then pickup where we left off on less plan #1 to complete those objectives. In any case, by the time we are done, all lesson plans will have been completed when the student goes for their checkride.
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I hear you, but I'd say that isn't a series of "lesson plans" it's a syllabus. The FAA used to detail lesson plans just like I posted. They referred to maneuver descriptions as "flight instruction breakdowns" or some such similar verbiage. Those are what I think everybody means by saying "lesson plans". What you are describing reminds me of a Cessna Pilot Center combination logbook/training syllabus. Maybe they called them lesson plans, I don't remember. But I taught by them for awhile. They were like checkbooks with tear-off stubs or something like that. Lots of little boxes for checking too, IIRC. Cheap little paper things. I didn't like them at all.
 
dtuuri said:
The real lesson plan format I remember (it's been years, but I have a mnemonic):

Objective
Elements
Schedule
Equipment
Instructor's Actions
Student's Actions
Evaluation
​
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"OESEISE"? That's a hard-to-remember mnemonic... :)

I made up a little "one page per maneuver" cheat sheet for each of the maneuvers. Each one had a description of how to do it, the ACS standards, and "common errors" which is a big thing the FAA wants to see you know these days.
Some of them had either a little "one-liner" about why it's important or relevant (for instance, the one for power-off stalls says something like "Oh God! I'm gonna land in the trees!") and/or a little "one-liner" about the lesson to be learned (for instance "Use power, not the yoke, to avoid the trees").
I printed them out on kneeboard-sized pages. Only used one of them during the oral, but I think the point was my DPE could see that I'd given it all some thought and effort.
 
kath said:
"OESEISE"? That's a hard-to-remember mnemonic... :)
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Maybe it's a 'nuther kind of "donkey bridge" (my Dutch copilot used to say that). It was a sultry summer day at Kent State University in 1973 where I attended a FIRC put on by the FAA and AOPA. The subject of discussion was "Lesson Plans". There was an upcoming test, so I had to improvise. The environment was all the rage back then: air pollution, global cooling (probably), clean water, etc., and colorful posters to that effect were plastered all over the walls. To trigger my memory I came up with, "Over Every Single Exit Is A Sign About Ecology". Still works and I intend to start using it again soon.
 
AggieMike88 said:
So you are volunteering to be the stunt student where you trade scaring me to death with me yelling “right rudder” all the time.

Let me find my crash helmet and I’ll meet you at your hangar
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My favorite was putting in LEFT rudder on take off, and when the nose started diving to the grass, me sitting there and wondering what the heck is going on and the CFI looking pale when he took controls. Lol.
 
Just buy them if your worried about it. I never once touched a lesson plan after a checkride and I don't think any of my CFI buddies did either. A syllabus was the only thing I found helpful. Not to mention some detailed lesson plan doesn't really help you teach it cause you'll end up reading it. Don't bother wasting time writing a novel for lesson plans.

Honestly just make it checklist like as a reminder to hit some points
Heres what the pts says
Objective: To determine that the applicant exhibits instructional knowledge of the selected maneuver by:
1. Stating the purpose.
2. Giving an accurate, comprehensive oral description, including the elements and common errors.
3. Using instructional aids, as appropriate.
4. Describing the recognition, analysis, and correction of common errors

My lesson plan for:
Steep turns.
what is it/why we doin this. (1,2)
configuration (rudder trim power) (2)
Look outside(2,4)
seriously if you look outside it will work (2,4
quit chasing needles (2,4)
I'm gonna cover the instruments if you don't look outside(2,4)
watch balloon on rollout(2,4)
for instructional aid use a whiteboard or cockpit poster (3)

A bit tongue in cheek but not by much.
 
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