CFI checkride questions
Roy Smith
I've got my CFI checkride comming up in a couple of weeks. Any
suggestions that people might make?
Currently the one thing my instructor and I are at odds about is lesson
plans. I've done what I consider a pretty complete, detailed set. But,
they are not in the exact format shown in the FOI test. My instructor
insists that if I don't do it exactly as they show on the FOI, I won't
pass. Comments?
--
Roy Smith <r...@popmail.med.nyu.edu>
New York University School of Medicine
550 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Copyright 1997 Roy Smith
For-profit redistribution prohibited
Delaney2
Your instructor is probably right. Of course it depends on the examiner,
but the odds are that they will be looking for things in FOI format. As
an instructor on the University level in the Department of Education I am
also aware of the fact that FOI is often not the best way to present the
necessary information--it is however the FAA way. Give them what they
want until you pass--then do what is best.
Matt Dossey
Friend of mine just took his. he said it was word for word out of the
pts. 7 hour oral. not that big a deal for him, cause he's a very
experienced pilot, a US Army CW2, just long.
MD
LesSparks
>Currently the one thing my instructor and I are at odds about is lesson
>plans. I've done what I consider a pretty complete, detailed set. But,
>they are not in the exact format shown in the FOI test. My instructor
>insists that if I don't do it exactly as they show on the FOI, I won't
>pass. Comments?
I am in the same situation. I have found that some CFI's that have
trained several CFI students and used the same examiner have insight as to
what the examiner expects. Some examiners expect to see lesson plans
EXACTLY as shown in the FOI. My CFI has trained several CFI students but
the examiner comes from a pool of examiners at the local FSDO so you never
know who you are going to get. One thing is certain, you better be able
to regurgitate the FOI verbatim. I intend to use the FOI format at least
until after my checkride. :>)
Les Sparks
less...@aol.com
Delaney2
Margy Patterson
I think that's why certified teachers don't have to take the FOI test.
The FAA doesn't want people who know how to teach to have to endure the
stuff or tell them what they did wrong. I think a really good teacher
could probably present any lesson plan and explain to the examiner why
it was done that way and why it was better than the FOI way but if you
don't want to do that go with what is known and expected. Teachers and
testers are looking for the answers they know.
Margy
Ryan R. Healy
Roy Smith wrote:
>
> I've got my CFI checkride comming up in a couple of weeks. Any
> suggestions that people might make?
Know everything in the AVIATION INSTRUCTORS HANDBOOK.
Be able to explain all private and commercial pilot concepts from an
instructional standpoint.
Be able to explain all of the signoffs that you'll be authorized to give
as a CFI.
Be able to fly the airplane to commercial pilot standards while
explaining everything that you are doing.
Relax, and go slow.
> Currently the one thing my instructor and I are at odds about is lesson
> plans. I've done what I consider a pretty complete, detailed set. But,
> they are not in the exact format shown in the FOI test. My instructor
> insists that if I don't do it exactly as they show on the FOI, I won't
> pass. Comments?
Lesson plans should be constructed using the exact FAA recommended
format. Remember the nmeumonic: "LITTLE OLD ELVES STORE EGGS IN SQUARE
CONTAINERS". Translation...take the first letter of each word and it
stands for one segment of the lesson plan....LESSON, OBJECTIVE,
ELEMENTS, SCHEDULE, EQUIPMENT, INSTRUCTOR ACTIONS, STUDENT ACTIONS,
COMPLETION STANDARDS.
Other helpful CFI nmeumonics:
"REEPIR" for the the Laws of Learning: Readiness, Exercise, Effect,
Primacy, Intensity, Recency.
"RUAC" for the Levels of Learning: Rote, Understanding, Application,
Correlation.
"DIR" for the Theories of Forgetting: Disuse, Interference, Repression.
--
Blue Skies,
*************************************************************
* Ryan R. Healy, C-ASMEL-I, CFI-ASMEL-I, AGI, IGI *
* AOPA PROJECT PILOT INSTRUCTOR *
* E-Mail: rhea...@sprynet.com *
* Web Page: http://home.sprynet.com/sprynet/rhealy707 *
*************************************************************
DMorell Sr
OK, another dumb question. What is FOI? Never heard of it....
Dan
Roy Smith
Freedom of Information Act :-)
No, actually, it's Fundamentals Of Instruction. It is the stupidest damn
test I've ever seen. It tests your knowledge of the FAA Flight
Instructor's Handbook.
The FIH is not, in and of itself, such a bad book. It's a bit dull and
stuffy, but in essence it has a lot of good stuff to say about the
psychology of learning and teaching methods. A lot of it is psychobabble,
but such is the nature of the material.
What is totally assinine is the FOI test. It does NOT test your teaching
ability. What it tests is your ability to recall, by rote, trivial
details from the FIH book. If the FOI has any educational value
whatsoever, it is that it serves as a sterling example of how *NOT* to
design a test. In fact, in many ways, the design of the test exactly
contradicts what the FIH teaches.
For example, the FIH says multiple choice questions are, in general, not a
good way to test knowledge. Their one redeeming feature is that they are
easy to grade. The FIH then goes on to say that if you must use multiple
choice, use 4 or 5 choices. Questions with 3 choices are too easy to
guess. So, what does the FAA do? They make all of their tests 3-answer
multiple choice questions. Wonderful.
Another example, the FIH teaches you (and rightly so) that rote learning,
and the ability to recall facts, represent the lowest levels of learning.
So, what do they do? They show you a sample lesson plan in the FIH, with
8 or so sections labeled things like "introduction" and "equipment", and
then on the FOI, they show you the same plan again, with the section
titles missing and ask you, in a series of questions, to pick the correct
section headings. Bad, bad, bad. First, they are testing recall.
Second, they are testing rote learning, not understanding. What's
important about a lesson plan is that you really do plan the lesson (not
try to wing it) and the plan serves a guide for you to use while giving
the lesson, to make sure you cover everything you intended to. It doesn't
matter one whit what you call the sections. If I want to call my first
section "goals" and you want to call it "objectives" and somebody else
wants to call it "purpose", it's totally meaningless that we picked three
different, essentially synonymous words. Yet, the FOI test insists that
you memorize their choice of words, forcing people to come up with silly
little nmemonics such as "LITTLE OLD ELVES STORE EGGS IN SQUARE
CONTAINERS", which is very clever, and helps you pass the test, but
doesn't really go very far towards making you a good teacher.
The sad fact is, most CFI's that I've met are very bad teachers. I'm sure
the FIH/FOI was an attempt to solve that problem, but, based on the
results I've seen, it was a failure.
John O'Loughlin
On 24 Feb 1997 14:03:20 GMT, dmor...@aol.com (DMorell Sr) wrote:
>OK, another dumb question. What is FOI? Never heard of it....
Fundamentals Of Instruction
>
>Dan
*************************************************************
* John O'Loughlin jo...@ici.net *
* http://www.ici.net/cust_pages/johno/johno.html *
* http://www.ici.net/cust_pages/johno/fish.html *
*************************************************************
Ryan R. Healy
Roy Smith wrote:
> Yet, the FOI test insists that
> you memorize their choice of words, forcing people to come up with silly
> little nmemonics such as "LITTLE OLD ELVES STORE EGGS IN SQUARE
> CONTAINERS", which is very clever, and helps you pass the test, but
> doesn't really go very far towards making you a good teacher.
Ah, but I see that you've remembered it...and isn't that what learning
is all about anyways? I'd bet that if I asked you about the segments of
a lesson plan 20 years from now, the "little old elves...." will come
right to mind.
Gail Allinson
Dear Ryan,
I printed your message about FOI mnemonics out -- there were a few I
didn't know. Thanks!
I also like PPAR
preparation, presentation, application and review
Gail Allinson, CFIG
Garner Miller
In article <19970224140...@ladder02.news.aol.com>,
dmor...@aol.com (DMorell Sr) wrote:
> OK, another dumb question. What is FOI? Never heard of it....
Fundamentals of Instruction. It's a smaller (30-question) written test
based on the Aviation Instruction Handbook. If memory serves, it took me
9 minutes to get 100 on the thing. I finally found something that burned
$60 quicker than flying. :-)
--
Garner R. Miller, Flight Instructor
Hawthorne Aviation - Ocala, Florida
FAA Aviation Safety Counselor
Remove the capital letters after ".com" to send me e-mail.
Dave Beal
Roy Smith wrote:
>
> dmor...@aol.com (DMorell Sr) wrote:
> > OK, another dumb question. What is FOI? Never heard of it....
>
>
> No, actually, it's Fundamentals Of Instruction. It is the stupidest damn
> test I've ever seen. It tests your knowledge of the FAA Flight
> Instructor's Handbook.
I used the Gleim book to study for the FOI. My favorite
was a question that had two single word answers that were
synonyms. Gleim's explanation was that "B is the correct
answer because the FAA says it is."
The only good thing about the FOI is that there are only
about 180 potential questions. Using a book like Gleim,
you can simply memorize all the correct answers. I'm not
proud of this approach, but with a test as worthless as the
FOI, it seems justifiable. (I read the FAA's Instructor's
Handbook, too.)
- Dave Beal
PP-ASEL, AGI
Roy Smith
d...@DELETE.THIS.mcdata.com writes:
> I used the Gleim book to study for the FOI. My favorite
> was a question that had two single word answers that were
> synonyms. Gleim's explanation was that "B is the correct
> answer because the FAA says it is."
Are you sure about that? The FOI (the other FOI, the Freedom Of Information
Act) requires that the FAA release all the questions, which is how Gleim
gets them. But, they are not required to release the answers. All of the
answers in the Gleim study books are Gleim's own opinion of what the right
answer is. There is no guarantee that the FAA agrees with him on every
single one.
--
Roy Smith <r...@popmail.med.nyu.edu>
New York University School of Medicine
Anton Verhulst USG
In article <garner-2502...@ptp68.praxis.net> gar...@net21.com.REMOVE.CAPS.TO.SEND.EMAIL (Garner Miller) writes:
>> OK, another dumb question. What is FOI? Never heard of it....
>based on the Aviation Instruction Handbook. If memory serves, it took me
>9 minutes to get 100 on the thing. I finally found something that burned
>$60 quicker than flying. :-)
I took it more recently (2 years ago) and it was then a 50 question test -
selected from a total of 160 (approx) questions. When studying for this
test, you learn what the issues are in making up a good multiple choice exam.
This makes taking the test a little more interesting because you now recognize
It's the only FAA exam that I've gotten a 100 on (but it took me more
than 9 min :-).
Tony V. CFI-Glider, AGI
Gail Allinson
Dave Beal <d...@DELETE.THIS.mcdata.com> wrote:
...snip...
>The only good thing about the FOI is that there are only
>about 180 potential questions. Using a book like Gleim,
>you can simply memorize all the correct answers. I'm not
>proud of this approach, but with a test as worthless as the
>FOI, it seems justifiable. (I read the FAA's Instructor's
>Handbook, too.)
>
>- Dave Beal
> PP-ASEL, AGI
Yes, and I had to take it twice!!! No, not what you're thinking (shame
on you).
Even though the opportunity for "the paid by someone else rating"
dried up, I took balloon ground school and was intending to go for a
commercial LTA in hot air balloons in 1992. Since LTA (lighter than
air) commercial pilots also instruct, the FOI was on that test too.
At the time I was a PP-ASEL, CFIG and A-IGI and so did not have the
required powered commercial rating in order to skip the written.
The good news is that by the time I took the FOI on the balloon
written, I actually understood what the heck the principles involved
were.
I believe, except for some nonsense here and there (I have a friend
who always cites "seven ways to use a chalkboard" as the ultimate in
nonsense) the Aviation Instructor's handbook is probably one of the
more concise texts around on teaching. If I remember correctly, we
have Harold Holmes to thank for making sure aviation instructors
actually have a clue as to how to teach.
BTW, I any one does a follow up an I don't respond to a question, this
server seemed to skip part of this thread. I'm very new to
newsgroups, and am still configuring my newsreader, too. Although I
had this marked as a "watch thread" and I haven't deleted any headers,
I'm evidently missing part of this thread -- that's why I'm mentioning
it.
Gail Allinson, CFIG
gai...@gv.net
gai...@delphi.com
http://www.gv.net/~gailla
http://people.delphi.com/gailla