The complete pilot demonstrates:
- Mastery of control of the aircraft under varied conditions.
- Situational awareness, which I define as the ability to assess the overall conditions of flight.
- Behaviours that promote safety.
Each of these high level pieces is built from fundamental knowledge, skills, and attitudes. The link between these low-level things and the final product is understanding that in general there are three kinds of activities do during flight:
- Controlling
- Monitoring
- Planning
Further, while doing these activities we follow patterns of behaviour or habits. Understanding the nature of these activities, and applying appropriate habits in executing them is the key to becoming a proficient pilot. To figure out what are appropriate habits it is worthwhile to examine in some detail just what we are up against. As a start we will examine:
- The Nature of Flight
- The kind of activity we do.
- The Environment
- Where we do the activity; its physical properties.
- The Aircraft
- How the machine we use works, its strengths and limitations.
- The Pilot
- How the human is adapted to or compensates for the above.
- Factors in learning and performance.
- Pilot attitudes that influence the all-important behaviours.