Aviation Instructor's Handbook

by U.S. Federal Aviation Administration

Designed for ground instructors, flight instructors, and aviation maintenance instructors, the Aviation Instructor’s Handbook was developed by the Flight Standards Service, Airman Testing Standards Branch, in cooperation with aviation educators and industry to help beginning instructors understand and apply the fundamentals of instruction. This handbook provides aviation instructors with up-to-date information on learning and teaching, and how to relate this information to the task of teaching aeronautical knowledge and skills to students. Experienced aviation instructors will also find the updated information useful for improving their effectiveness in training activities

226 pages, Paperback

First published April 3, 2013

Reviews

[Skeeter Bungus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Basically an entry level psychology textbook. Very dry at parts but all in all it does what it set out to do.

[Kiri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rounding up from 3.5 stars. I collected a good-sized list of useful advice about being an organized and effective instructor. Many of these lessons pertain to teaching in general, but some are unique to the flight instruction setting. Thinking this through caused me to reflect on how learning to fly differs from learning anything else in a classroom. Instructor and student spend a LOT of one-on-one time together, often in cramped and stressful settings. The instructor has to find a good balance between instruction and mentorship. One instructor referred to this process as "compressed parenting," in which the instructor cultivates student growth from the initial, entirely dependent stage to one in which the student is (literally) willing to leave the nest and fly solo. What a rush that must be, as an instructor! And yet what a responsibility!

I'm reading this book not because I want to become a CFI but because I am interested in being a ground instructor - and also because I love to see how different fields approach their own kind of pedagogy. Reading this book also inevitably caused me to reflect in a productive way on the instruction I've received.

I would have given the book a real 4 stars if it hadn't started out in such a poor fashion. Chapter 2 is a terrible mishmash of educational theories with no larger organization and very little to connect any of it to flight instruction. It reads like someone was obligated to do a literature review, parked it in Chapter 2, then moved on to more interesting things. The content improves from there as we move on to individual communication and teaching skills related to flight instruction and assessment. I particularly liked the emphasis on collaborative critiques involving the instructor and student together. Chapter 8 is where we finally get into "how to teach someone to fly." Neat stuff to read!

[becca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for CFI training, most enjoyable aviation textbook there is. Psychology is fascinating. Lots of self reflection to be had after this one.