Studying for the CFI

A

Acechris89

New Member
Hey everyone,

I've been studying for my CFI for the past few months. I was told by the school I plan to conduct the training with that it breaks down to about 30 hours of ground instruction and 15 hours of flight instruction (I understand these to be minimums). I decided that prior to starting the ground-school, I would do my best to study as much as possible, so that the ground portion goes as smoothly as possible. I also figured that it would be beneficial to get the writtens out of the way before the starting up the ground-school. It's my understanding that there are around three that I need to take (FOI, CFI, and BGI/AGI).

In hindsight, looking back on my college training, I would often direct a lot of my attention to the flight portion, and admittedly, a lot of knowledge preparation often felt like an afterthought. I feel like my classmates and I all had this approach as everyone seemed to get the required written tests done at the end of the course just prior to the checkrides.

I decided that this time around that kind of mentality is the wrong way to approach flight training and this rating especially. I've been studying almost non-stop for the past few months. With my learning style, I use a lot of flash-cards. I've also been condensing the info presented in the Flight Instructor's handbook into a typed outline format for a quick, direct, reference to what I read in the chapters. With all of the work I've done, I only have the first 2 out of the 9 chapters of the FOI understood and committed to memory.

With the nice weather approaching, I would love to start work on the rating sooner rather than later, but I'm a little frustrated with my progress. I know that I also need to account for the knowledge/regulations aspect of the oral, and haven't really touched upon that material in any great depth yet. I'm also studying out of the ASA Written Test-Prep and Oral Exam Guide(Which I understand to be just a guideline of the potential questions asked), and I'm expecting delivery of the Handbook of Aeronautical knowledge (I know it's free online, but I'm a prefer a tangible book to work out of).

Needless to say, I'm feeling a little overwhelmed by the amount of knowledge I'm expected to learn. The nice aspect of this rating is that since my graduation from my Part 141 collegiate flight program back in August, I decided to pursue the rating through a Part 61 flight school. Without having to worry about semester timelines, re-enroll fees, other classes and the like, I feel like I can focus exclusively on this rating alone.

Before I get too long-winded here, I just wanted to gauge the community perspective on this rating. What kind of studying techniques did you use? How did you go about studying for it? How was your checkride? Etc. Also, I received a flyer in the mail regarding an American Flyers CFI-A course. I don't live anywhere near one of there facilities, but I see that they offer an online course. I was thinking of getting it to supplement my study-sessions and to provide some structure, but I don't know much about it and I was wondering if anyone has tried it.


TL;DR-I'm just looking for advice on how to study for my CFI-A rating. I understand that the oral portion of the test is pretty lengthy and imagine that most people fail this aspect of the test.


Thanks for any help you can provide!

-Chris
 
Acechris89 said:
TL;DR-I'm just looking for advice on how to study for my CFI-A rating. I understand that the oral portion of the test is pretty lengthy and imagine that most people fail this aspect of the test.
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I don't think that it is really as overwhelming as some can make it out to be. So, a few points to put things into perspective:

  • If you bomb the test, you still typically get retested only on some small subset of the PTS.
    • Caveat: Unless you do so poorly that you shouldn't really be teaching anyway.
  • Anything is fair game on the oral. But it is mostly material you should know in the first place.
  • You are not really being tested on your flying abilities.
For the oral, the new stuff you need to learn is fairly limited. Advisory Circulars, required endorsements, what to do on a Flight Review.
The often overlooked, and most important skill to demonstrate is PIC authority. Ability to teach and critique is a close second. You won't learn much about either from a CFI. Find some students, take them up for a ride, teach them something. Treat the examiner in exactly the same fashion on your ride, you will do fine.
 
drunkenbeagle said:
I don't think that it is really as overwhelming as some can make it out to be. So, a few points to put things into perspective:

  • If you bomb the test, you still typically get retested only on some small subset of the PTS.
    • Caveat: Unless you do so poorly that you shouldn't really be teaching anyway.
  • Anything is fair game on the oral. But it is mostly material you should know in the first place.
  • You are not really being tested on your flying abilities.
For the oral, the new stuff you need to learn is fairly limited. Advisory Circulars, required endorsements, what to do on a Flight Review.

The often overlooked, and most important skill to demonstrate is PIC authority. Ability to teach and critique is a close second. You won't learn much about either from a CFI. Find some students, take them up for a ride, teach them something. Treat the examiner in exactly the same fashion on your ride, you will do fine.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice, I think I heard from a few people that the 'High' failure rates are a bit inflated. Of course, I'm trying not to dwell on that aspect too much. The way I see it, if I'm well-prepared, the statistics should be largely irrelevant. About the writtens, I'm worried I'm wasting my time/valuable nice weather by holding off on the training while I prepare for the writtens. Then again, in the past I felt like when I was immersed in the flight training (with a full college course-load) I didn't have as much time to dedicate to the writtens, so I'm aiming to change that. I also want to get a good grade, because I feel like that would create the first impression to the examiner.
 
The PTS is where you should focus. Follow that to the letter as far as what to expect for the Oral. If you don't know something, know where to find it quickly. Don't try to BS your way through.

The flight portion boils down to talking through what you are doing, what to look for as far as common mistakes and knowing what the expectations are for every possible maneuver.

When I taught CFI candidates I had the advantage of knowing they were taking that path from the beginning. The talking through maneuvers, I started day one of PPL with them. By the time of the checkride it was second nature to them.

Most of all be confident and don't over think it. It's not as bad as you think.
 
desertdog71 said:
The PTS is where you should focus. Follow that to the letter as far as what to expect for the Oral. If you don't know something, know where to find it quickly. Don't try to BS your way through.
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While you should obviously know and be prepared to teach everything in the private and commercial PTS, those topics were a fairly small subset of what was covered on the CFI rides I have done, with different examiners.
 
I assume this is initial CFI and with the FSDO. I have not known any of the fine folks at the Wichita or Lincoln FSDO to deviate from the PTS on mine or any of my CFI students. You sit down and the inspector opens the PTS and right into the FOI.

I'm not going to argue the point though. Everybody has different experiences. As an instructor here is Kansas, I know exactly what to expect from this FSDO. They follow the PTS to the letter. 3.5 Oral and 1.5 flight on average.
 
Thanks to everyone for the timely and relevant replies. I'll pick up a current copy of the CFI PTS. It's also been suggest that I get current copies of the Private and Commercial PTS as well. How much is typically covered in these two resources? And to answer your question, this will be the CFI initial, most likely conducted at the Boston FSDO at KBED.

Also, while I understand that you can look up answers if you need to, but I would hesitate to consider the oral "Open Note" how exactly does it work. Obviously you want to know a majority of what's asked, but you also have the option to look certain things up. Though I bet they don't appreciate going to the FARs for every question either.
 
I have found that they will not expect you to know everything. They will expect you to admit if you don't know and know where to find the answers, just like you would for a student. I used the AIM and FAR's some for my oral and they did not have a problem with it.
 
Good to know. I was thinking of tabbing my FAR/AIM pretty extensively to make looking up certain areas easier. Any advice in that regard?
 
Acechris89 said:
Good to know. I was thinking of tabbing my FAR/AIM pretty extensively to make looking up certain areas easier. Any advice in that regard?
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You use it enough, it actually gets pretty easy to remember.

Put tabs on part 61 for private pilots, commercial pilots, etc.

It might look like a huge, useless book. But really, it answers a lot of simple questions that come up all of the time
 
Acechris89 said:
Thanks for the advice, I think I heard from a few people that the 'High' failure rates are a bit inflated. Of course, I'm trying not to dwell on that aspect too much. The way I see it, if I'm well-prepared, the statistics should be largely irrelevant.
Click to expand...
I would say a lot of the failure rates depend of the local FSDO and your training institution's relationship with them. I did mine with the Birmingham FSDO back in 2008/09. Not only was it a nightmare just getting the ride scheduled (6 weeks), but the going rumor was that no applicant was to pass on the first attempt, and the apparent reason was that they wanted instructors to understand failure because they would one day have a student fail. And it's worth mentioning that the only guy I know of passing on the first attempt actually got lost while teaching a diversion. The only reason I could see why he passed is that both him and the examiner are veterans.

It is not my intent to scare you with my post but rather to educate so that you can learn from my experience. It was a huge mistake on my part and had I known of their reputation I would have chosen a program with a school such as American Flyers who has a good working relationship with the FSDO and puts applicants through on a regular basis. Plus with all of the spending cuts coming into effect I would want to rest assured knowing that I was training in a program that can get the checkride scheduled with a minimal wait time. After all you are dropping some serious coin on this rating and you want to be able to go take the ride whenever you're prepared and ready for it. Just my two cents.
 
Unless your school has examining authority for an in house ride (such as ERAU or Aerosim) or if the FSDO is too busy and gives it to a DPE, this ride IMO has certain politics involved. Another reason for my troubles was the FSDO had it out for the FBO that owned the Arrow I was using for the ride. I was essentially caught in the middle of a political storm. Stemming from this experience are my only two checkride busts (for which I take responsibility) but the environment certainly did not help any.
 
Acechris89 said:
Hey everyone,

I've been studying for my CFI for the past few months. I was told by the school I plan to conduct the training with that it breaks down to about 30 hours of ground instruction and 15 hours of flight instruction (I understand these to be minimums).

I decided that this time around that kind of mentality is the wrong way to approach flight training and this rating especially. I've been studying almost non-stop for the past few months. With my learning style, I use a lot of flash-cards. I've also been condensing the info presented in the Flight Instructor's handbook into a typed outline format for a quick, direct, reference to what I read in the chapters. With all of the work I've done, I only have the first 2 out of the 9 chapters of the FOI understood and committed to memory.


-Chris
Click to expand...

I passed my CFI two months ago. What really helped me was the ASA oral prep CFI guide. It basically has everything you need to know. I spent a week memorizing the FOI chapter (complete torture) but now it makes a lot of sense when I am doing primary instruction. Mark up your FARs with tabs and a highlighter. Make a binder of lesson plans, helpful aids, different AC's especially 61-65E and the Flight Review/IPC one. I think it is 91-74. I did all my training at a 141 school but did the CFI 61 so I only flew to where I felt comfortable in the right seat of a bonanza (at the most 7 hours).
 
Know the material in the PTS. Read it cover to cover. There is a lot of good info in it.

Be able to explain the material as if the Inspector knows nothing about it. Most people can recite the litany, but can't explain or teach what they're saying.

If you're not a flight instructor when you walk into the ride, you won't be one when you walk out.
 
Some of the best material is the least used. I would read "Stick and Rudder". It's still the best book written about aerodynamics.
 
I did mine at an accelerated school. If you are truly that nervous e, I would suggest doing the same. They prepare you very well for the checkride,and they know the examiners and their tendencies. I went to Double Eagle Aviation in Tucson, AZ. I know it isn't close to home, but the 9 day course will prepare you, and they will work with you until you pass. It is worth it!!!
 
cezzna said:
Some of the best material is the least used. I would read "Stick and Rudder". It's still the best book written about aerodynamics.
Click to expand...

I'll check it out. It came up in my Amazon recommended list.


Mark Z said:
I did mine at an accelerated school. If you are truly that nervous e, I would suggest doing the same. They prepare you very well for the checkride,and they know the examiners and their tendencies. I went to Double Eagle Aviation in Tucson, AZ. I know it isn't close to home, but the 9 day course will prepare you, and they will work with you until you pass. It is worth it!!!
Click to expand...

I always hear about these accelerated schools, but given how much I've studied in the last two months and my current progress, I don't think that for myself it's the best option.I'm taking this rating especially seriously. After all, I plan to transfer my skills to someone who is totally new to aviation. I know a lot of people think of it as a stepping-stone in their career, but it's still a serious responsibility.

at1024 said:
Unless your school has examining authority for an in house ride (such as ERAU or Aerosim) or if the FSDO is too busy and gives it to a DPE, this ride IMO has certain politics involved. Another reason for my troubles was the FSDO had it out for the FBO that owned the Arrow I was using for the ride. I was essentially caught in the middle of a political storm. Stemming from this experience are my only two checkride busts (for which I take responsibility) but the environment certainly did not help any.
Click to expand...

If you don't mind my asking, you mentioned two checkride busts; were they both as a result of the school you attended?
 
Acechris89 said:
If you don't mind my asking, you mentioned two checkride busts; were they both as a result of the school you attended?
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I take responsibility for the busts but the school did not exactly do a good job in setting me up for success. Nothing is more frustrating than feeling prepared and ready for the test and then waiting around for six months because of an airworthiness issue. Like I said in an earlier post, you are the one paying for it so go to a school that puts applicants through on a regular basis and knows how to properly prepare AND submit applicants for the checkride. It will save you time and money in the long run.
 
Since you'll be doing a lot of primary instruction, make sure that you know the Private Pilot PTS inside and out. Not just the particular subject areas of operation, but all the stuff in the front, too. Here's a link to an interactive PTS that is a lot easier to work with than the .pdf version:
www.2012pts.com/pts
 
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