The Differences Between PPLicensing And Learning

In rec.aviation.student WJRFlyBoy wrote:
On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 14:32:07 -0600, Michael Ash wrote:

Maybe I misunderstood. You are relating the advanced disassembly of a
glider with post flight travel arrangements of motorized aircraft as
comparable deficiencies in training?

Sounds like you are unfamiliar with glider assembly/disassembly. There is
nothing "advanced" about it. It's something that all glider pilots are
allowed to do and all should be able to do. On the average day when my
club operates with good soaring conditions, there are several gliders
assembled in the morning and disassembled in the afternoon after the day's
flying is done. The average glider takes two or three people 15-20 minutes
to assemble or disassemble.

Never done one, seen it done only.

Just out of curiosity, what did you see which made you term it as
"advanced"? Certainly I've seen difficult assemblies. There's a big
difference between a couple of experienced people assembling a single
seater for the Nth time and a group trying to assemble a heavy two-seater
which might get this treatment twice a year. Maybe you just got "lucky"
and saw a painful one.

And yes, I am comparing it to the non-flying portions of traveling using a
powered aircraft. If you feel the comparison is not apt, perhaps you could
elaborate.

You said:

Of course this is pretty glider-specific. The equivalent for "normal"
flying would, I imagine, be how to travel with a plane, how to deal with
courtesy cars and arrange transportation at the destination and so forth,
which I've seen talked about here as lamentably un-discussed during
training.

I don't see the comparisons between a manual task that requires physical,
hands-on work and picking up a telephone or using a computer. Relative to
capabilities, the glider would be world's different than the travel
arrangements for me. Others, maybe you, if you were stunted socially, I can
see the latter being more difficult. I am stunted mechanically.

The comparison isn't on what you actually do, it's on how it relates to
your training. Both are highly "practical" knowledge which don't relate
directly to flying. Technically speaking you don't need to know how to
assemble or disassemble a glider to fly one (although the PTS does require
a small bit of knowledge here), just like you don't need to know how to
deal with the logistics at the destination when travelling in an airplane
to fly one. But in both cases, you'll have a tough time doing too much
with your certificate without this knowledge.

In case I didn't explain myself too clearly, here's a post made to this
group a couple of months ago by one of the instructors talking about this
sort of logistical knowledge, and lamenting that it isn't generally
covered during training:

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.a...48afef1266fbff

--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software

On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:48:36 -0500, Dudley Henriques wrote:

Which comes back to my thinking that the higher the academic pursuit, the
greater exposure there is to the undeniable facts. The physics is physics,
it's your physics and mine and they are the same. There is no luck involved
if you defy the physical sciences, or the mechanical ones (checklist,
regular maintenance, pre-flight structural inspections, etc) and
vulnerabilities don't choose people unequally.

Jay Honeck made a good point, he said I was making too much out of flying,
it was easier and it was settling to have that thought.

Now I can go back to obsessing on the educational part. Now that I will be
much less likely to f**k up ( the task is easier than anticipated) and I
will be sooo far ahead of any potential complacency syndrome. lol

I am now working directly with professional members of the air show
demonstration community as an adviser on human factors relating to
accidents in our venue. That coupled with a 50 year background in flight
instruction and flight safety have given me at least a bit of expertise
on the topic you are discussing.

First of all, I would like to respectfully submit to you that you might
be approaching this issue seeking entirely too much structure.

I have to agree with that, mof, it's is purposeful (if not eventually
wasteful). Throttle back, looking for cruising, something I'm not charmed
at. Nice checkpoint, I appreciate the observation.

Although the learning curve involved in flying (and driving a race car
for example) might seem structured if one takes a look at the FAA
suggested procedures for flight instructors teaching you to fly,and
considering the fact that a certain path must be taken to achieve the
certificate, contrary to all this"structure", in reality, these
activities involve a constantly changing lifetime learning curve
achieved both on the ground and in the highly dynamic atmosphere of a
machine in motion.

A given, no argument there.

What all this pedantic text above amounts to is simply that when you
enter this arena to learn, it's optimum for you as a student to
seriously consider an integrated learning curve rather than the black
and white...1...2...3..method.

There are two ways to look at getting your license. You can crash it
through by getting the "steps" out of the way quickly, or you can enter
relaxed and integrate your flying with your other requirements.

You can do it either way.

The reason I suggest the less structured and less rigid path is because
flying itself, as well as driving a race car for that matter, is itself
the antithesis of structure. It's true you need the "checklist" type of
structure and that doesn't change all through your flying career, but
the very act of flying an airplane requires that you be able to preempt
and react to a constantly changing dynamic in real time.

I can only speak with experience to racing, having a great deal of seat
time in cars on courses that turn both left and right. Good, surviving
drivers either are blessed with mechanical expertise or hire it or both.
The approach to every race is highly structured followed by the dynamics,
ever-changing, of the car, driver, competition, track, weather, blah
squared.

So the optimum way to approach this endeavor is to start right at the
beginning in realizing that it is this world you will be in while
flying. So the stress on your learning curve right from the start should
be pointed directly at training to be able to think and act on the fly.
Training in this way points to a relaxed and integrated curve that mixes
ground school with flying so that things mesh together naturally.

Yes, would agree again.

When you look at flight training as this never ending learning curve I'm
describing to you here, you might begin to see that it's not getting
through the program that will keep you alive in the air, but what you
RETAIN and form into HABIT PATTERNS that is the important factor.

I always tell a new pilot one thing that I hope they never forget;
that is that what they learn that might save their life one day while
flying might very well NOT have been learned yet.

--
Dudley Henriques

The definition difference between intelligence and wisdom.

I appreciate your comments.

Not a better duck, a different duck, I come from several fields of endeavor
all of which I started from little experience to very advanced tasking. I
have been blessed with the finest pro bono and paid instruction in these
fields and as the subject of this thread suggests, I am frustrated with my
inability to find a suitable CFI. Or CFIs actually. My goals for flying
don't stop at singles, I have built enough "attaboys" for as much VLJ time
as I can muster. Middle 50s, how much longer will I have? To me, every day
is a truly wasted one if progress is not made to that end.
--
Remove numbers for gmail and for God's sake it ain't "gee" either!

On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:45:05 -0600, Michael Ash wrote:

Sounds like you are unfamiliar with glider assembly/disassembly. There is
nothing "advanced" about it. It's something that all glider pilots are
allowed to do and all should be able to do. On the average day when my
club operates with good soaring conditions, there are several gliders
assembled in the morning and disassembled in the afternoon after the day's
flying is done. The average glider takes two or three people 15-20 minutes
to assemble or disassemble.

Never done one, seen it done only.

Just out of curiosity, what did you see which made you term it as
"advanced"? Certainly I've seen difficult assemblies. There's a big
difference between a couple of experienced people assembling a single
seater for the Nth time and a group trying to assemble a heavy two-seater
which might get this treatment twice a year. Maybe you just got "lucky"
and saw a painful one.

lol I went looking for videos of ass/disass and found nothing advanced
about them. Relative, I did see a guy putting tape on a unmanned glider,
which to me, is advanced.
--
Remove numbers for gmail and for God's sake it ain't "gee" either!

On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:45:05 -0600, Michael Ash wrote:

I don't see the comparisons between a manual task that requires physical,
hands-on work and picking up a telephone or using a computer. Relative to
capabilities, the glider would be world's different than the travel
arrangements for me. Others, maybe you, if you were stunted socially, I can
see the latter being more difficult. I am stunted mechanically.

The comparison isn't on what you actually do, it's on how it relates to
your training. Both are highly "practical" knowledge which don't relate
directly to flying. Technically speaking you don't need to know how to
assemble or disassemble a glider to fly one (although the PTS does require
a small bit of knowledge here), just like you don't need to know how to
deal with the logistics at the destination when travelling in an airplane
to fly one. But in both cases, you'll have a tough time doing too much
with your certificate without this knowledge.

In case I didn't explain myself too clearly, here's a post made to this
group a couple of months ago by one of the instructors talking about this
sort of logistical knowledge, and lamenting that it isn't generally
covered during training:

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.a...48afef1266fbff

NOW it comes clear, good link to set me straight on with you.

I particularly felt kinship with:

"This is one of the funny things about flight training. Here is
something every pilot needs to know, but it is not in the PTS and most
instructors don't cover it. You get your certificate and they turn you
loose and you have absolutely no concept of how to turn flying into a
practical tool. And then people wonder why so many pilots quit flying
right after they get their certificate."

Another line item entry in a lengthening list of "The Differences Between
PPLicensing And Learning"

I travel frequently (one reason I am learning to fly) and planning ahead is
not only 2nd nature, my wife does it.
--
Remove numbers for gmail and for God's sake it ain't "gee" either!

"Jay Honeck" wrote in
news:yvDxj.1287$TT4.1154@attbi_s22:

I don't understand. For the most part, I see people who want to get x
hours
in y (shortest) time to get their license.

You say that like it's a bad thing.

I know you're not a pilot yet, and that this is all very exciting and
intoxicating. Flying IS the best thing you can do, head and shoulders
(literally!) above every other human endeavor, =


You are a complete moron.


Bertie

On Mar 1, 8:30*pm, WJRFlyBoy wrote:


I can only speak with experience to racing, having a great deal of seat
time in cars on courses that turn both left and right.

Are you gay Ricky Booby?

Cheers

On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:09:45 -0500, WJRFlyBoy
wrote:

On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 16:21:56 -0500, Roger wrote:

5) Carelessness, lack of fear, lack of details - injury

In #5 I'd look at it in a more general way such as attitudes, however
both get us to the same point. These are the same attitudes that get
pilots and drivers in trouble. Invulnerability, antiauthoritarian are
two that come to mind. IOW It always happens to the other guy, not me,
and don't tell me how to do things, I've done it this way for years,
or the rules are for other people......
Even after leaving the nest with their newly minted PPL they still
tend to defer to that instruction. Once out on their own they enter a
new learning curve and start developing more confidence. As time
builds some become complacent in their confidence. It's now in an area
where the invulnerability and antiauthoritarian attitudes coupled with
complacency rear their ugly heads.

Your analogies are right on and almost laughably correct. I mentioned auto
racing, same thing, skiing, same thing, flying...all high(er) risk
activities or at least high fatality activities (in terms of percentages of
deaths to catastrophic mistakes. All of this behavior in the face of
obvious fact is pride driven, imo.

Which comes back to my thinking that the higher the academic pursuit, the
greater exposure there is to the undeniable facts. The physics is physics,
it's your physics and mine and they are the same. There is no luck involved
if you defy the physical sciences, or the mechanical ones (checklist,
regular maintenance, pre-flight structural inspections, etc) and
vulnerabilities don't choose people unequally.

Jay Honeck made a good point, he said I was making too much out of flying,
it was easier and it was settling to have that thought.

Now I can go back to obsessing on the educational part. Now that I will be
much less likely to f**k up ( the task is easier than anticipated) and I
will be sooo far ahead of any potential complacency syndrome. lol

I agree with Dudley though in the learning, student, and instructor
have to be flexible. Be careful on being too structured as it's easy
to become mired in the structure rather than pursuing the learning.
Again, as Dudley said far better than I, learning to fly is a very
dynamic situation in a dynamic environment.


Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

WJRFlyBoy wrote:
On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:48:36 -0500, Dudley Henriques wrote:

Which comes back to my thinking that the higher the academic pursuit, the
greater exposure there is to the undeniable facts. The physics is physics,
it's your physics and mine and they are the same. There is no luck involved
if you defy the physical sciences, or the mechanical ones (checklist,
regular maintenance, pre-flight structural inspections, etc) and
vulnerabilities don't choose people unequally.

Jay Honeck made a good point, he said I was making too much out of flying,
it was easier and it was settling to have that thought.

Now I can go back to obsessing on the educational part. Now that I will be
much less likely to f**k up ( the task is easier than anticipated) and I
will be sooo far ahead of any potential complacency syndrome. lol
I am now working directly with professional members of the air show
demonstration community as an adviser on human factors relating to
accidents in our venue. That coupled with a 50 year background in flight
instruction and flight safety have given me at least a bit of expertise
on the topic you are discussing.

First of all, I would like to respectfully submit to you that you might
be approaching this issue seeking entirely too much structure.

I have to agree with that, mof, it's is purposeful (if not eventually
wasteful). Throttle back, looking for cruising, something I'm not charmed
at. Nice checkpoint, I appreciate the observation.

Although the learning curve involved in flying (and driving a race car
for example) might seem structured if one takes a look at the FAA
suggested procedures for flight instructors teaching you to fly,and
considering the fact that a certain path must be taken to achieve the
certificate, contrary to all this"structure", in reality, these
activities involve a constantly changing lifetime learning curve
achieved both on the ground and in the highly dynamic atmosphere of a
machine in motion.

A given, no argument there.

What all this pedantic text above amounts to is simply that when you
enter this arena to learn, it's optimum for you as a student to
seriously consider an integrated learning curve rather than the black
and white...1...2...3..method.

There are two ways to look at getting your license. You can crash it
through by getting the "steps" out of the way quickly, or you can enter
relaxed and integrate your flying with your other requirements.

You can do it either way.

The reason I suggest the less structured and less rigid path is because
flying itself, as well as driving a race car for that matter, is itself
the antithesis of structure. It's true you need the "checklist" type of
structure and that doesn't change all through your flying career, but
the very act of flying an airplane requires that you be able to preempt
and react to a constantly changing dynamic in real time.

I can only speak with experience to racing, having a great deal of seat
time in cars on courses that turn both left and right. Good, surviving
drivers either are blessed with mechanical expertise or hire it or both.
The approach to every race is highly structured followed by the dynamics,
ever-changing, of the car, driver, competition, track, weather, blah
squared.

So the optimum way to approach this endeavor is to start right at the
beginning in realizing that it is this world you will be in while
flying. So the stress on your learning curve right from the start should
be pointed directly at training to be able to think and act on the fly.
Training in this way points to a relaxed and integrated curve that mixes
ground school with flying so that things mesh together naturally.

Yes, would agree again.

When you look at flight training as this never ending learning curve I'm
describing to you here, you might begin to see that it's not getting
through the program that will keep you alive in the air, but what you
RETAIN and form into HABIT PATTERNS that is the important factor.

I always tell a new pilot one thing that I hope they never forget;
that is that what they learn that might save their life one day while
flying might very well NOT have been learned yet.

--
Dudley Henriques

The definition difference between intelligence and wisdom.

I appreciate your comments.

Not a better duck, a different duck, I come from several fields of endeavor
all of which I started from little experience to very advanced tasking. I
have been blessed with the finest pro bono and paid instruction in these
fields and as the subject of this thread suggests, I am frustrated with my
inability to find a suitable CFI. Or CFIs actually. My goals for flying
don't stop at singles, I have built enough "attaboys" for as much VLJ time
as I can muster. Middle 50s, how much longer will I have? To me, every day
is a truly wasted one if progress is not made to that end.

I have a friend who was a VP for Dupont. He was a specialist head hunter
and one of the best.
He had a criteria concerning the hiring of 4.0 people. When he recruited
out of colleges, he passed on 4.0 people. The intensity to maintain at
that level resulted in a burn out rate the company couldn't justify.

This is an interesting observation coming from someone seeking the best
of the best, and it has a degree of parity in flying.

Flying most certainly is a multi-tasking environment, but peaking in
this environment can be deadly. What can happen is that by crashing the
program hard, you reach an early peak and the learning curve can
stagnate or even begin a decline as learning gives way to practical use
of what has already learned. Notice the past tense "already learned".

This stagnation/declining plateau can be dealt with more effectively by
students (we're all students) approaching their flying learning curve as
being open ended. Not only is this a much more relaxed curve, it's
geared toward fluidity. There is no pressing need to peak and the
learning becomes more linear and exhibits a more extended line.

Approached correctly, it's possible to achieve the perfect learning
curve for a pilot; that being the changing from a curve that peaks to a
linear line that goes to infinity.

At your age, flying is not only possible but easily doable. It's fine to
have a positive goal oriented incentive and structure to reach that goal.
Once in the system however, separate the strategy goal from the tactical
approach involved in achieving that goal. Get into an integrated
program that allows interfacing between ground school and flying the
airplane. What you are reading in the books will make much more sense as
that plays out in the air and visa versa.

Just remember, when you reach your strategic goal and begin to use your
flying for the purpose intended from the beginning, don't peak at that
point. This is the danger area for pilots. You peak there and stagnate
and the learning declines. It won't stop completely if you do this, as
even a Chimp as I'm sure you're aware, if left at a typewriter long
enough, will eventually write War and Peace :-)



--
Dudley Henriques

In rec.aviation.student WJRFlyBoy wrote:
On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:45:05 -0600, Michael Ash wrote:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.a...48afef1266fbff

NOW it comes clear, good link to set me straight on with you.

Good, I'm glad that made sense. It's much better when it's explained by
someone who knows what he's talking about.

--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software

On Feb 29, 5:44 pm, Steve Hix
wrote:

This one takes years...

Oh hell. All it takes is a headset and a chart to get started...and pen and
paper keeps the school happy.

To get started...

I think you're in mildly contentious agreement with danmc61 here. :}

Yep.. the gear progression is:
1) not enough
2) too much
3) way too much
4) headset and pen (use scrap paper under seat)