CFIs: THE IMPORTANCE OF LANGUAGE!

When we were doing touch and goes during a complex checkout yesterday we had
an incident right after touchdown because of a blue heron in our immediate
path. The CFI said "to your detriment you already had the flaps at one
notch...", which confused me.

Later, he pulled the power on me approaching the pattern. During the
debrief he said "You see what happened? You forgot to do your third GUMPs
check but to your detriment you remembered to do it on final." To my
detriment I remembered to do one last GUMP check? I think he meant to my
CREDIT. (Unless there's some reason you wouldn't want a notch of flaps in
an Arrow II during short-field TnGs or wouldn't want to do the last "three
green, prop forward" before touchdown.) I might have gone home thinking he
was telling me it's incorrect to have a notch of flaps had it not been for
his later mistake.

My instrument instructor used to like to say, in reference to the DE, "one
of his pet peeves is to..." "One of his pet peeves is pattern B." If his
pet peeve is Pattern B, why are we spending so much time on it? "His pet
peeve is to keep you in a holding pattern." Apparently, she believes that
"pet peeve" means "things he likes to do." Entirely excusable, but another
example of language inaccuracy which might be potentially counterproductive.

It's important not to confuse your students. Using correct terminology and
language is important to that end. Please remain vigilante. ;

-c