Groundschool Instructor Tips needed

[seriousflyer]

Hello,

Long time reader with not much to say because I was new in the industry. But since I graduated three years ago I have been advancing steadily with one company. My roles with my current company have made we well rounded, Dockie, rampie, dispatcher, dispatch sup., twin otter FO, king air 200 FO, and now my CP has asked me to be a groundschool intrustor for the king air 200 grounschools.

I will be mentoured by him and two other training captains. For anyone with experience compiling information and producing an interactive powerpoint or have experience running groundschools in a small regional airline could you please help me out with some tips.

Also if anyone has any other ideas on what you found worked best for learning and keeping it stimulating enough not to get bored that would be much appreciated.

Thx,
SeriousFlyer.

[tired of the ground]

More talking and less reading. That should be the first thing on your mind throughout the entire process. There should never be a paragraph on your powerpoint unless absolutely necessary (i.e. having to quote cars or the manufacturer). The powerpoint should really only be for pictures/diagrams and to jog your memory of what to talk about.

BREAKS, BREAKS and more BREAKS. You should not be doing anything for more than an hour. After that, it's time for everyone to take at least five minutes. Don't be answering questions during those 5 mins either. Everyone needs to think of something other than airplanes to give their brains a rest.

The more you know about the subject and can talk without aids (long winded reading is bad, pictures are good), the better. Know your stuff cold and you will be an excellent and valued instructor. Reading slides to a group of pilots is a sure way to put everyone to sleep.

The more confident you are the more interesting it will be for everyone.

Good Luck

[costermonger]

Everything above is good advice. The importance of avoiding the wall-of-text cannot be overstated. You need to have a pretty good excuse to put more than 3 points on a slide, or more than about 10 words on a point. If you're teaching systems, a morning in the mx hangar with a camera and a helpful & patient AME is pure gold for the visual learners.

[Colonel Sanders]

Pictures are always better than words. At least
they are for me.

Involve the student as much as you can. The
worst courses are when the instructor drones on
endlessly.

Ahead of time, prepare questions to ask the students
after presenting a chunk of information. Not only
does this wake the students up, it also lets you find
out if they are absorbing any of what you're presenting.

If you think it's appropriate, prepare brief tests for
appropriate stopping points. This will also help keep
the students awake.

The more student involvement, the better the course.
This can be difficult to orchestrate if you've never done
it before, but try anyways.

[Ramjet555]

Great post by Colonel Sanders.
As he says, keeping them awake is a problem
so break it up with a lots of quizzes and never ending questions.

Try to have a story about each section.

Pull out every crash comic involving the type and link as many as possible
to the course.


Eg. Engine starting, improper starts can cook an engine and pop fuses,
and or end up with alternator starts in a flash with a momentary loss of concentration.

Your ops manager and or lame will give you a long list of screw ups that you can use
to keep them awake.

Enjoy the challenge.

[Colonel Sanders]

As well as a picture, use a short video. Youtube is a goldmine!

For example, when I am doing instructor groundschool, I love
to play the first minute of this clip:



Then ask the student what he did right and wrong during his PGI.

You can think of something similar, perhaps. A good video is not
only entertaining, it should show some practical applications of all
the hand-waving classroom theory, and people appreciate that.

[white_knuckle_flyer]

I've got nothing to offer but the student perspective, but to add to the great advice you've already been given :

1. If you need to use a whiteboard, get yourself some good markers !
2. Have a good syllabus or at least keep students in the loop as to what preparation they should undertake before the next class. It may be tempting to assume your students have the necessary background needed for the next lesson. Probably not the case for everyone.
3. Avoid the temptation to answer your own questions. If you pose a good question that you think they should know, then don't be afraid of the awkward silence that may follow. Force your students to constantly put their knowledge to the test.

These are trivial points, but the guys who know more than me took all the good ones.

[trey kule]

This may sound a bit off topic but it is not..join toastmasters..Learn to speak.

There is nothing worse than someone at the front of the room that sounds like this....

"""""uummmmmm, this is a ummmmmm airplane, OK?"
''''''ummmmmmm , we are going to learn all about it ...OK?"

Have a friend videotape you doing a few practice lessons and go through them. Watch for yourself repeating certain phrases like OK, if you understand me,, ummmmmm....you get the idea..

K.I.S.S...Dont overteach a subject and try and impress the new students with your awesome knowledge of everything aviation related. Remember the level your students are at.. It is good to have that awesome knowledge. It is even better to know when it is not necessary to share some of it.
And keep the war stories to a minimum...Nothing worse than an hour of ground school that could have been taught in 5 minutes if the personal stories were omitted.
Humour is good, but ground school is not the comedy club.
And make certain what you teach is correct.. I had the opportunity a few years ago to watch an online ground school.. The instructor ended every sentence with OK. He did not know that there was a standard pressure setting region in the north of Canada...but he had some great stories for the new pilots about flying a king air...not sure he had ever done that by some of his comments. And that ground school was being marketed by one of Canada's most reputable FTUs!

The military has some great templates for lesson planning..Lots of those guys on here, so maybe one of them will PM you with a template...kind of a workbook for lesson planning. Prepare the whole course in advance.

if you can watch some of the videos from people like King..they have spent a huge amount of money to teach things simply..You can learn a lot by watching how they teach a subject. And if you can get hold of any of the old Sanderson/Cessna slide ground schools. They show how to present the different topics in a systematic way to enhance learning and keep everything tied together.. To many ground schools consist of separating everything...Teach only air law. Then instruments, then weather..
Sometimes it is better to combine them to keep student interest up and allow them to learn a bit at a time on a subjcet.
Think about the subject.. Do you want to teach how an altimeter and an ASI works before students understand that pressure decreases with altitude? TC's little guide is not a ground school syllabus.

Now that I have wondered, back to your original question..You are teaching transition training on the king air...the only thing to add, is dont BS....and keep the personal stories to a minimum unless you have 2000 hours on type.

Lastly, help you students to enjoy and learn.

Now having said all that

[Lotro]

I've not taught in aviation, but I have done some teaching of adults, and attended a number of training sessions for junk through work. In addition to the solid advice you've been given, I'd add the following:

1) Be consistent - pick the few things that you're going to do EVERY CLASS and stick to them. Whether that be opening a class with a quick quiz, or with a video, or always taking a break at 9:15 or 45 minutes or whatever. Consistency is important, humans like patterns, and it allows them to frame their experience accordingly.

2) Silence is an important teaching tool. A lot of teachers are afraid of silence. They ask a question and when no one replies they give the class the answer. People don't really learn that way. Ask a question and wait for an answer. If the silence goes on for too long, tell the class that you're just going to wait for someone to try an answer. Set the expectation early that you're expecting everyone to participate.

3) With regards to participation, try to get everyone involved. Don't always rely on the know-it-all in the front row.

4) The best instructors I've ever had are adept at accepting nearly every answer to a question given. They never say "no, that's wrong" they have a great ability to take the right nugget from the answer and convert it into another question which yields another answer closer to the one they were looking for.

5) Lastly, teach concepts, not memorization. In my experience people's memories are sketchy, but once they understand the concept, they can solve almost any problem.

Have fun! and Good luck!

[Colonel Sanders]

Instructing is easy to do badly, really hard to do really well.

In addition to knowing the topic, you have to learn all the
tricks above. At least, I had to. Maybe some people are
natural instructors - like most people, I sure as hell was not.

[photofly]

TC's Flight Instructor Guide is here. You might be able to get some juice out of the first fifty pages.

http://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/CORP-SERV-GEN/2 ... rce=istore

[200hr Wonder]

A few tidbits I can offer:

Time required to create the groundschool is somewhere around 1:5. So if it is a one hour ground school it will take 5 hours create.

Utilize the notes section, for example say you where talking about approved fuels, the slid should look something like:

Code: Select all

Approved Fuels:

Jet A, Jet A1, Jet B

Emergency Fuels:

100LL, 100/130, MOGAS

**Emergency Fuel use requires consultation with Maintenance**

And the in the notes you would have all the wonderful tidbits about mixture, time between overhauls, boost pump statues, cross flow status.

The important part for the student to take away and remember: What fuels am I allowed to use. What if I am in an pinch and what I need to do about it. The other stuff is great to know and they can make notes on it but really you would be calling maint. and consulting with them before you do it so you don't screw it up. At least that is what is required at my company.

[DanWEC]

TC's Flight Instructor Guide is here. You might be able to get some juice out of the first fifty pages.

http://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/CORP-SERV-GEN/2 ... rce=istore

+1 on the FIG. Gets into learning factors and details but the first section will be of help.... But....the
bottom line is that those nitty details listed won't be much help if you aren't comfortable or streamlined as a presenter. The only way to be comfortable is to REHEARSE, more than once.
Teach your cat about the fuel system, give your girlfriend a free seminar on the PT6. Etc. My wife knows every damn PGI from my instructor rating. This is the only true way to be prepared in front of the herd.