"Newps" wrote:
We need more information. Exactly where were you and exactly what did the
controller say? If you were VFR and practicing approaches while VFR then it
doesn't matter what he said because the last thing he'll say is maintain
VFR. When you are VFR it is not necessary for the controller to follow the
regs as if you were IFR.

From a purely instructor-centric point of view, I would prefer that
controllers treat VFR practice approaches *exactly* like IFR ones. It's
a training exercise; the more things you do differently from real life,
the less effective the training is.

One thing I see fairly often is controllers not assigning altitudes on
VFR practice approaches. You end up with one of two scenarios, neither
of which is very useful:

1) You stay high until you're so far above the charted descent profile
that you can't possibly make it down in time.

2) You ask the controller for lower and get back, "altitude your
descretion, maintain VFR". A not so sharp student might start to think
that the altitude is ALWAYS his discretion in a situation like this.

In any case, you end up eating up brain cycles sorting out how high you
should be, when the issue would never come up on an IFR flight.