What problems do you face when teaching cadets aerospace related subjects, and what are sone of the more effective methods of teaching these principles you have found? Any practical ideas?
I’ve found that the way to overcome any problems teaching aerospace subjects in a classroom is to wear a flying suit.
Being serious though, can you be a bit more specific? What sort of problems might we be talking about?
I’m not sure that I’ve ever considered there to be any specific ‘problems’ other than having instructors with a suitable knowledge the subjects.
I’ve never encountered any specific problems other than cadets not understanding an initial explanation - after re-explaining they alll seem to get it. The main aid I use is 19 years experience as an avionics engineer and breaking things down to simple steps then building the small ideas up to get to the desired end learning point.
And a blue lanyard. Then regale your audience with how hard it was to gain said lanyard and what you had to do to get it. Blood, blah blah sweat, blah blah tears. Before you know it, the 40 minute period is up and you say: ‘got all that? Fantastic, right, your next lesson is…’
Walk away to pour yourself that hard-earned coffee, look at yourself in the mirror and reflect on what a terrific lesson you’ve just delivered.
Job done!
I know my post is of absolutely no use to you at all but I thought I’d say it anyway.
I’m going to buck the general trend here and actually try and be helpful!
Firstly if you haven’t had any training in teaching / methods of instruction, I would strongly recommend trying to get yourself on a course. All wings should be offering this to both staff and cadets (how elese do you get your instructor cadet lanyard?).
For the Aviation syllabus, the challenges are firstly to engage cadets and get them interested, and understanding why this is relevant / important to them. Secondly to break down what are sometimes quite complex matters into simple terms. PN is right that sometimes you can only do this with sufficient subject knowledge. Thirdly, you have to put the material across in a way that is memorable… Don’t rely on powerpoint. Have them looking at actual objects. Make models, do experiments, etc.
Wherever possible make it fun! If you are enjoying the lesson, then the students probably are too!
MW
MW has it, try and vary the type of delivery.
PowerPoint can be good for some things, but gets very boring very quickly.