Part 61 - Number of CFI's

[Clip4]

Quite frankly, yes. I am not exactly the brightest person in the room and I didn't have any exposure to aviation before I started, but even I was perfectly capable of reading and understanding the ACS before taking my first flight lesson. I may not have understood what it would feel like to hold an altitude +/- 200ft or even what the gauge would look like that would tell me how high I was, but I knew I would need to be able to do it. Perhaps I am just so used to learning things on my own that my viewpoint is skewed on this, but why wouldn't/shouldn't a student be able to judge his progress, even in the early stages, by the ACS? I am not saying he has to perform to ACS standards the first time he does a maneuver, but for me, it was very satisfying to watch myself get better and very motivating when I was able to perform within standards (and know it in real time) on my second or third attempt at something. It also enabled me to ask better questions when I was struggling with understanding something. Knowing more leads to better questions which leads to better understanding which leads to better flying.

Also, I am glad my instructor chose a more encompassing approach for my flight lessons than you are describing. If I struggled with something, we were able to move on and go back to it later. For example, I struggled with righthand steep turns for most of my training. I would nail a lefthand one and immediately flunk the righthand one. Instead of spending the next twelve lessons hammering at that until I got it perfect so we could move on according to the syllabus, we moved on to other things. After four or five lessons doing other things, we returned to steep turns and I was able to perform both directions quite well. If you're switching CFIs all the time, I guess I can understand why you can't allow the students that flexibility - but to me, that flexibility is one of the perks of going to a part 61 flight school or an independent CFI.

I have been doing this stuff for over 30 years. Done it the way you think is best, done it the way the FAA requires in a 141 school. Part 61 or 141, the best teaching method involves a syllabus the student receives and contains the lessons / standards and utilizes a training record. You are a good example.

Steep turns are a performance maneuver not required pre-solo in Part 61.87(d). Typically though, steep turns are introduced on Lesson 4 and reviewed in Lesson 7. Instructors don’t expect students to be proficient doing a maneuver once and we don’t keep doing steep turns until perfected - actually far from it.

The pre-solo performance standard 141 is to simply establish, perform and recover from steep turns - a rather low standard with no specific performance standards for altitude, airspeed or heading . The student is expected to be safe performing this maneuver.

If you thought you were expected to do steep turns “quite well” at this phase of your training, you set a false expectation for yourself from relying on the ACS. A syllabus provides the standard for the phase of training. There are specific performance standards for maneuvers in the syllabus and those standards change as the student progresses in training. A student doesn’t progress if they fail the specific performance standards and the student remains in that lesson until the standard is met.

The reason is simple, if you don’t have the core prerequisite skills for the CFI to intro a new task, the CFI can’t introduce the task. This is why we don’t teach landings lesson 2 and work on basic aircraft control first.

An active student in Phase I training will complete pre-solo training in 9 lessons and solo on Lesson 10 (~15 hours instruction). If you are the “average” student and able to fly 3 days a week, you will solo in less than a month. If you desire flexibility, it will cost you more time and money.

 

[dmspilot]

I have been doing this stuff for over 30 years. Done it the way you think is best, done it the way the FAA requires in a 141 school. Part 61 or 141, the best teaching method involves a syllabus the student receives and contains the lessons / standards and utilizes a training record. You are a good example.

Steep turns are a performance maneuver not required pre-solo in Part 61.87(d). Typically though, steep turns are introduced on Lesson 4 and reviewed in Lesson 7. Instructors don’t expect students to be proficient doing a maneuver once and we don’t keep doing steep turns until perfected - actually far from it.

The pre-solo performance standard 141 is to simply establish, perform and recover from steep turns - a rather low standard with no specific performance standards for altitude, airspeed or heading . The student is expected to be safe performing this maneuver.

If you thought you were expected to do steep turns “quite well” at this phase of your training, you set a false expectation for yourself from relying on the ACS. A syllabus provides the standard for the phase of training. There are specific performance standards for maneuvers in the syllabus and those standards change as the student progresses in training. A student doesn’t progress if they fail the specific performance standards and the student remains in that lesson until the standard is met.

The reason is simple, if you don’t have the core prerequisite skills for the CFI to intro a new task, the CFI can’t introduce the task. This is why we don’t teach landings lesson 2 and work on basic aircraft control first.

An active student in Phase I training will complete pre-solo training in 9 lessons and solo on Lesson 10 (~15 hours instruction). If you are the “average” student and able to fly 3 days a week, you will solo in less than a month. If you desire flexibility, it will cost you more time and money.

Where did she say she was expected to master steep turns prior to first solo?

 

[SkyChaser]

I have been doing this stuff for over 30 years. Done it the way you think is best, done it the way the FAA requires in a 141 school. Part 61 or 141, the best teaching method involves a syllabus the student receives and contains the lessons / standards and utilizes a training record. You are a good example.

Had a syllabus. Called the ACS. And a training record. Called my logbook.

Steep turns are a performance maneuver not required pre-solo in Part 61.87(d). Typically though, steep turns are introduced on Lesson 4 and reviewed in Lesson 7. Instructors don’t expect students to be proficient doing a maneuver once and we don’t keep doing steep turns until perfected - actually far from it.

The pre-solo performance standard 141 is to simply establish, perform and recover from steep turns - a rather low standard with no specific performance standards for altitude, airspeed or heading . The student is expected to be safe performing this maneuver.

If you thought you were expected to do steep turns “quite well” at this phase of your training, you set a false expectation for yourself from relying on the ACS. A syllabus provides the standard for the phase of training. There are specific performance standards for maneuvers in the syllabus and those standards change as the student progresses in training. A student doesn’t progress if they fail the specific performance standards and the student remains in that lesson until the standard is met.

I never said it was pre-solo and I don't know where you got that from??

The reason is simple, if you don’t have the core prerequisite skills for the CFI to intro a new task, the CFI can’t introduce the task. This is why we don’t teach landings lesson 2 and work on basic aircraft control first.

An active student in Phase I training will complete pre-solo training in 9 lessons and solo on Lesson 10 (~15 hours instruction). If you are the “average” student and able to fly 3 days a week, you will solo in less than a month. If you desire flexibility, it will cost you more time and money.

I get that stuff is introduced in a certain order and that there are many good reasons for it especially in the beginning. I totally understand and agree, for instance, that basic aircraft control should be taught long before landing (and that's how I was taught as well). I was talking about some flexibility in later stages of training, like doing dual cross-country training before the lessons on crosswind landings are finished if the student is struggling with those and needs a mental break - not teaching students how to do pylons-on-8s before they learn how to hold altitude.

I'd like to think that it was because I wasn't what you call an "average student", in that I was working full time instead of flying during the week, but truth is, I am not a talented pilot. I think I'm a fair pilot *now*, but it came through stubbornness and not natural grace. When you're not naturally good at flying, being able to switch things up a bit when frustrations reach critical levels is very relieving and helps the learning process a lot. Maybe I am the only one who ever experiences that, but when I was a student going through training, I was very, very glad that my instructor was willing to play a little loose with her expected lesson sequence some days.

 

[Clip4]

Where did she say she was expected to master steep turns prior to first solo?

He didn’t, but his accusation was there was no flexibility in a syllabus to allow a task to be improved later. Steep turns aren’t required to meet specific standards until stage 3 in any 141 syllabus I have used. They aren’t even a maneuver on the Phase II stage check.

 

[Clip4]

Had a syllabus. Called the ACS. And a training record. Called my logbook.

I never said it was pre-solo and I don't know where you got that from??

I get that stuff is introduced in a certain order and that there are many good reasons for it especially in the beginning. I totally understand and agree, for instance, that basic aircraft control should be taught long before landing (and that's how I was taught as well). I was talking about some flexibility in later stages of training, like doing dual cross-country training before the lessons on crosswind landings are finished if the student is struggling with those and needs a mental break - not teaching students how to do pylons-on-8s before they learn how to hold altitude.

I'd like to think that it was because I wasn't what you call an "average student", in that I was working full time instead of flying during the week, but truth is, I am not a talented pilot. I think I'm a fair pilot *now*, but it came through stubbornness and not natural grace. When you're not naturally good at flying, being able to switch things up a bit when frustrations reach critical levels is very relieving and helps the learning process a lot. Maybe I am the only one who ever experiences that, but when I was a student going through training, I was very, very glad that my instructor was willing to play a little loose with her expected lesson sequence some days.

Do you mind posting a photo shot of your logbook showing where your CFI graded your performance?

 

[midlifeflyer]

Do you mind posting a photo shot of your logbook showing where your CFI graded your performance?

Maybe @SkyChaser self-graded. That would fit with an "all I need is the ACS" viewpoint.

 

[Clip4]

Maybe @SkyChaser self-graded.

Maybe he had an instructor said nothing and just figured it out. He did have the ACS.

 

[Salty]

Just remember you're talking to a guy that will fire you as a student for pretty much anything he feels like.

 

[dmspilot]

Just remember you're talking to a guy that will fire you as a student for pretty much anything he feels like.

He has a lot of mixed up ideas about things. In this thread he insisted there is no such thing as "solo flight training." I asked why the FARs (Part 61 and 141) use the phrase "solo flight training" dozens of times. Never answered.

 

[SkyChaser]

Do you mind posting a photo shot of your logbook showing where your CFI graded your performance?

You said it was training record, not a gradebook. My logbook is a training record. Grading was discussed in flight when necessary and in post-flight briefings and did not need to be written down as both my instructor and I possessed brains with functioning hippocampi.

Maybe @SkyChaser self-graded. That would fit with an "all I need is the ACS" viewpoint.

I did "self-grade" a lot, but not exclusively. After we landed for the last time in a flight, my instructor would ask me what I thought I did well and what I thought I did poorly during the lesson, and then we'd talk about it and she would tell me what she thought of my performance. I think it helped me really internalize and comprehend a lot of stuff that I might not have otherwise really paid attention to, and because I had read the ACS (and the AFH, PHAK, POH, etc), I could do some self-analysis and self-correction. That's what worked for me. I don't think there is an issue with instructors using syllabi, but I do hold to my idea that they are not strictly necessary if both instructor and student know what is in the ACS.

He didn’t, but his accusation was there was no flexibility in a syllabus to allow a task to be improved later. Steep turns aren’t required to meet specific standards until stage 3 in any 141 syllabus I have used. They aren’t even a maneuver on the Phase II stage check.

Maybe he had an instructor said nothing and just figured it out. He did have the ACS.

I assume these quotes are directed at me, but since I don't have the biological capacity to grow a beard, I am a little unsure. If they are, my accusation of no wiggle room in the syllabus came from this assertion of yours:

A syllabus provides the standard for the phase of training. There are specific performance standards for maneuvers in the syllabus and those standards change as the student progresses in training. A student doesn’t progress if they fail the specific performance standards and the student remains in that lesson until the standard is met.

I read that as you must fulfill a lesson, no matter what, before being able to move on, even if the student would be better served to take a breather and come back after lessons on a different subject for a short time. If I read that wrong, or if those posts weren't aimed at me, I apologize.

 

[Salty]

to my knowledge there is no such thing as a grade. You meet the standard or you do not meet the standard.

 

[MauleSkinner]

to my knowledge there is no such thing as a grade. You meet the standard or you do not meet the standard.

A training program can assign a grading system. Where I work, we have 4 grades we can give that range from “meets standard” down to basically “go home and don’t come back.”

 

[Gilbert Buettner]

to my knowledge there is no such thing as a grade. You meet the standard or you do not meet the standard.

We grade each part of a lesson as follows: A - exceeds standards. B - meets standards. C - needs improvement. If a maneuver is demonstrated, we mark it as a D. In addition to the grade, we usually make notes explaining the reason for anything that needs improvement.

 

[Salty]

A training program can assign a grading system. Where I work, we have 4 grades we can give that range from “meets standard” down to basically “go home and don’t come back.”

Sure, but skychaser wasn’t in that program.