Flight Instructors, are you having problems teaching or need guidance or advice from an experienced flight instructor to help you using real life flight training experience and not just FAA textbook stuff?
Student Pilots, are you struggling to understand and searching for the information that will make sense of it all? Are you feeling overwhelmed and wondering if you’ll ever be able to get your private pilot license?
If you have flight training questions or comments, let me know! I want to give you good information. I want to write about what you want to read. It makes it hard without feedback. There are a lot of people visiting this site and only a handful that communicate. You can comment on any of my posts so that others may learn from your questions. Many send emails but if you use the comment section under each post then it will give others more to read and learn about.
Student Pilots:
Are you a student pilot struggling to understand something?
Do you not understand what your instructor is trying to tell you?
Are you looking for an easier way to remember things?
Are you unsure how to prep for your private pilot checkride?
Flight Instructors:
Are you a new CFI and not sure how to get started?
Do you have problems communicating your message to your students?
Have you run into a problem with a student that you don’t know how to solve?
Do you struggle making things easy to understand?
Not sure how to prep private pilot students or how to use scenario based testing?
Do you know how to prep a student pilot for their private pilot checkride?
I’m open to pilots too that may have questions. I just need your feedback so I know what you guys want.
I hear students many times say, “Do I have what it takes to be a pilot?” or “Am I good enough to learn how to fly”? These questions usually come when a student realizes how much hard work is really involved in getting a pilot license. They start getting overwhelmed after the first couple of lessons and start wondering whether they even have the capability of being able to do it.
When a student gets to this point, many times they quit flying without giving it enough of a chance. There is so much new information coming all at the same time that they can’t imagine the possibility of ever being able to grasp it all. They get frustrated and begin to question things. Some students are very hard on themselves which adds to the stress.
Some students look to put the blame elsewhere because they don’t want to fail at something. These are usually pretty smart people that have always been successful at things and the thought of failing at this is too much for them. They will find something or someone to blame. In many cases they either quit flying or switch flight instructors just to find out that their problem didn’t go away.
Here’s the good news for student pilots
It is normal to feel this way and if the students would just realize that it is a natrural part of learning to fly, then they can move on and give it their best shot. Everything falls into place eventually. The flight instructors know it because they’ve been through it themselves and have seen it a million times. You have to accept that you don’t have all the pieces of the puzzle and you are forming opinions based off missing information.
I’ve watched stressed out students go from almost quitting to becoming awesome pilots. I’ve had students leave me for another instructor, thinking things would be better, just to quit flying a few lessons later when they realize it wasn’t the instructor causing their issue. There are too many new things happening at the same time and it takes dozens of lessons for a student to start feeling comfortable with them. You can’t break down a lesson small enough to try to master only one piece at a time because there are several things that happen at once whether you want them to or not.
Here is my advice to new student pilots
My advice to any new students out there is to stop worrying so much because, confusion, the feeling of things happening too fast, fear, anxiety, not feeling smart enough, etc. all pass with time. It is natural. There is no perfect solution to stop it. There is no perfect book that explains every little detail just the right way. Trust that your instructor knows what he is doing, do the best you can and study as much as possible and it will all become second nature in the end. The instructors job is to fill in the blanks for you and you have to trust that he will. Follow his advice and keep communicating and it will happen. You must trust that.
Remember, the experienced instructors and pilots that you see that seem to do this so easily all started exactly where you are and were going through the same thing. Can anyone learn to fly? Probably not everyone is cut out to handle all the work that is involved, but most can push their way through with a little trust and a lot of studying!
Lately I have been getting a surge of people signing up for emails and buying some of my flight training products. Some of you have come back a second and third time to get more which I really appreciate. This is a good sign because if the material wasn’t good, you wouldn’t come back for more.
I have gotten emails thanking and complimenting me on how easy to understand my e-lessons are which I appreciate, but it would be really helpful if you could also use the comment section so that others can read them too. It’s natural for people to be hesitant about buying anything online but if they saw feedback from people that have purchased the lessons already it may put them at ease and help them feel more comfortable about what they are getting.
I tried to come up with material for the most common problem areas but I am open to suggestions for more. I’m thinking about putting together a video series to help prepare people for their private pilot oral exam. It would walk you through how to present the information from the PTS to the FAA Examiner. It would also talk about scenario based testing and thinking outside the box to come up with solutions to problems. I’d love to hear your feedback on whether this would interest anyone.
So, THANK YOU again for your support. Feel free to send a comment or email any time if you have questions or suggestions.
If you’re an instructor please don’t give away the answers. Please “Like” this or “tweet” it for me. You can send in your answers using the comment form below or go to our facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/flightinstructorjoe and answer there! Pass this on to a pilot friend and see who knows more. Have fun!
Have you gotten your FAA Medical or Student Pilot Certificate yet?
UPDATE: Since this post and video were published, the FAA separated the student pilot certificate and the medical certificate. The video below is the process you will go through to get your medical certificate only. You must apply for the student pilot certificate through the IACRA website. See your instructor for details on how to fill out the application.
If you’re not aware of it, you now have to fill out your medical information online before you go to the FAA Medical examiner. In this video I will show you the steps you will take to set up an account so you can start filling out your medical form. The form will stay in the system for 60 days once you submit it.
If you have questions, there are examples to help but if you get stuck on something related to medication type your doctor will be able to fix that. Make sure you check the application for mistakes because once you submit it, you won’t be able to reopen it and may have to complete another one. When the application is finished, it will give you a confirmation number. Be sure to write this number down because you will need to bring it to your appointment with you so they can open your application.
If you are a student pilot make sure that you apply for a STUDENT PILOT CERTIFICATE. You don’t need anything higher than a 3rd class medical on your student pilot certificate because 1st class and 2nd class are for more experienced pilots. When you are done you can click on the exam summary button where you can save a PDF version on your computer or print out a copy which I believe has your confirmation number on it. Ask the examiner for a copy of the completed form for your records.
Make sure that you change the quality of the video to HD and open up to full screen so you can read everything better.
Please send any pilots you know to this website that you think may like to see this video or any other information here. I hope you enjoy it.
