Becoming an AFF instructor-advice

[pinkeyquiezo 0]

Hi all,
I do post on here occasionally but have created a new id to ask about preparation for becoming an AFF instructor. The reason for this is that in the UK where I currently jump, I have asked several people but they all say the same, "come back when you have 900 jumps and then we'll talk" (BPA AFF instructor needs 1000 jump min).

I have 500 jumps which I know is the min for a USPA AFF rating. I want to gain more experience first so won't be going for either rating before I reach at least 1000. But please could I have some advice on what sort of things I should be working on during my jumps? 90% of my jumps are belly (4-way and bigway) and I have around 40 hours in the tunnel split about half between FS and FF (I have the FF1 and 2 stickers but rarely jump FF as we are usually team training).
I fly fairly often so are there any drills I can practice in the tunnel too?

I assume that to convert to a USPA licence and get my USPA rating when I eventually move out to the States in a few years, I would need to do water training for the B and sit the exam for the USPA C even if I have a BPA D licence?

[cpoxon 0]

I don't really see why you needed to create another account to ask the question, but never mind.

Since you aren't using your regular account, I can't tell if you have a static-line rating or an FS coach rating.

These would be a good start. AFF course examiners will emphasise mistakes made on the ground and not picked up. Getting experience as a static-line instructor will give you experience with teaching, making you more comfortable and familiar with what you are teaching so you are less likely to get caught out on a course, not to mention it will get you experience with actual students, for which there is no substitute. You will see everything students do and as they progress you can follow them out. The same with FS coaching.

As for the USPA licences, as far as I'm aware the BPA licences are recognised for jumping in the US, but as soon as you start to talk about intructing, USPA licences are required.

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[djmarvin 2]

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As for the USPA licences, as far as I'm aware the BPA licences are recognised for jumping in the US, but as soon as you start to talk about intructing, USPA licences are required.

FAI equivalent licenses are accepted for USPA ratings.

edited to add "licenses", some might have read ratings into that

DJ Marvin
AFF I/E, Coach/E, USPA/UPT Tandem I/E
http://www.theratingscenter.com

[mpohl 1]

Some 15 yrs ago, the requirement for AFF-I w/ USPA was the equiv of 360 jumps.
Also, at that time the courses were considered pretty "demanding"; no Facebook/ social network ppl needed to apply!! Membership on drop zone.com would not get you a rating in those days; unlike today!

My wife, at exactly 360 jumps, did a one-week pre course w/ the late Terry Goode, and passed her AFF-I w/ one of the five USPA examiners on the first try. In her time she was a very successful AFF-I, TI, and Rigger. Students just loved her.

My point: when you are ready, you are ready. If you have doubts about yourself, you are not ready!

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Hi all,
I do post on here occasionally but have created a new id to ask about preparation for becoming an AFF instructor. The reason for this is that in the UK where I currently jump, I have asked several people but they all say the same, "come back when you have 900 jumps and then we'll talk" (BPA AFF instructor needs 1000 jump min).

I have 500 jumps which I know is the min for a USPA AFF rating. I want to gain more experience first so won't be going for either rating before I reach at least 1000. But please could I have some advice on what sort of things I should be working on during my jumps? 90% of my jumps are belly (4-way and bigway) and I have around 40 hours in the tunnel split about half between FS and FF (I have the FF1 and 2 stickers but rarely jump FF as we are usually team training).
I fly fairly often so are there any drills I can practice in the tunnel too?

I assume that to convert to a USPA licence and get my USPA rating when I eventually move out to the States in a few years, I would need to do water training for the B and sit the exam for the USPA C even if I have a BPA D licence?

[demoknite 0]

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I don't really see why you needed to create another account to ask the question, but never mind.

The social scene in the UK is a bit finicky. He might go to his normal DZ and get bollocked if they knew he was asking on here when he has been told no by his overlords.

[djmarvin 2]

First you need to hold or have held a USPA Coach Rating or higher. USPA does not currently have any jump number requirement. It is 6 hours of freefall and a USPA C license or FAI equivalent. You also need a current USPA membership. USPA has the Instructional Rating Manual (IRM) Essentials available to download on their site. This has the basic information you need to know to qualify for a course. You will need to buy a full copy of IRM for your course. You can also find the requirements listed here http://www.theratingscenter.com/aff.html

I recommend 4 way and smaller. Jumps that demand the most of your flying skills. Getting bigger than that you start playing more waiting than flying. The guys and gals who come into a course with ample four way experience typically nail the flying part. If you are going to be in a tunnel I recommend tell the coaches there your desire and most will help you with solid belly skills to apply towards AFF.

For teaching skills, get a lot of solid coach jumps under your belt. Take time to properly teach each student and this will help tremendously. One of the biggest pieces of advice I give is "get more experience". Also shadow some of the Instructors at your DZ and learn not only the information they give out, but learn from the way they present. Of course ask their permission first, you never want to come off as a stalker :)

When I first started jumping I wanted to be an Instructor one day. I still hear that dream from others. Stay humble and learn as much as you can from everyone around you. Good luck with your goals and keep learning!

DJ Marvin
AFF I/E, Coach/E, USPA/UPT Tandem I/E
http://www.theratingscenter.com

[Andy9o8 0]

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I don't really see why you needed to create another account to ask the question, but never mind.

The social scene in the UK is a bit finicky. He might go to his normal DZ and get bollocked if they knew he was asking on here when he has been told no by his overlords.

Once again, revealing the same unfortunate undercurrent about UK skydiving. Sad, really.

[Ron 7]

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Once again, revealing the same unfortunate undercurrent about UK skydiving

The advice about getting an AFF rating has been good. This is off topic, but interesting side bar material.

The thing I find interesting, is that here in the US we are trying to find a way to prevent canopy deaths. One of the most popular suggestions is 'education and peer involvemnt'. I can easily see how some would think that these steps would be making advisors into 'overlords' that you could not ask a question since you would be ostracized.

So the question... How can you have a strong peer influence without being seen as an 'overlord'?

In addition, another recommendation to help stop the deaths has been rules from the governing body.... Last I checked, the BPA was often refered to as the 'ban parachuting association'.

It seems either track is likely to piss people off and be seen as overbearing.

So, which do you think works better?

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[popsjumper 2]

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Take time to properly teach each student and this will help tremendously.

THIS^
Key word: Properly

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Also shadow some of the Instructors at your DZ and learn not only the information they give out, but learn from the way they present.

I have to disagree with this to an extent and here's why.

Above I said "properly" is key.
I don't know about the UK, but here in the states we have a plethora of people with AFFI ratings that are really poor instructors. My thought here is to advise that those instructors that you will be shadowing may, or may NOT, be setting good examples for you. You will want to shadow good ones.

But that implies that you know the difference between good and poor....knowledge that you don't have as yet.

Those poor instructors....
- Have little to no teaching skills
- Do not teach what is required
- Have a large deficiency of general skydiving knowledge
- Make up shit as they go along
- Do not follow established safety procedures.
- Focus entirely on air skills and provide little to no instruction on canopy skills
- Focus entirely on air skills and provide little to no instruction on book knowledge.
- Come up with off-the-wall ways of doing things that do not follow published training methods. Much of that is ego driven...."Look at me. I have a better way of doing things!"
- ad infinitum

So, what do you do?

Pointers for teaching:
1. Attend as many first jump courses and you can with different instructors to get a feel for how they teach. You will see major differences between them. The caveat is that what you are seeing may or may not be good teaching methods. Take it all with a grain of salt and understand that you will be later learning about good teaching methods in you Coach course and the AFFI pre-course.

2. Learn the subject matter. You will be teaching young jumpers. You HAVE to know what your talking about. Learn the requirements and methods for each and every training jump you will possibly be doing.

3. KNOW the book stuff. There's much more to skydiving than freefall skills. If you don't know what you are talking about, you can't teach properly. Even worse, you may find yourself making up screwball shit trying to cover up that lack of knowledge. Not good.

4. Take the Coach Course first and spend a while teaching and jumping with students. Learn how to teach and then APPLY that knowledge. All too any take the CC and then promptly forget what they learned about the learning process and how to teach and do not apply that knowledge to the training of students.

You can help yourself to become a good instructor by actually applying and using those good teaching techniques and methods.

Pointers for flying:
Your major goal for AFFI flying is to stay close. That means no more than arms length away...regardless of what the student is doing in the sky. You can't help them if you are too far away from them.

1. 4-way and tunnel time are both good recommendations....to a point.

They will help you with proximity flying but they will not help you with staying with a student that is sliding all over the sky.

To develop those skills, have someone jump with you that will slide all over the place and make you chase them around with your goal to stay right by their side no matter what they do. Once you can do that with comfort, have them very radically change fall rate, roll over on the back, spin like a top and just plain do everything wrong. Again, with you having the goal of staying right by their side.

Once you can do that, you just may be ready for AFFI...maybe.

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

[djmarvin 2]

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Also shadow some of the Instructors at your DZ and learn not only the information they give out, but learn from the way they present.

I have to disagree with this to an extent and here's why.

Above I said "properly" is key.
I don't know about the UK, but here in the states we have a plethora of people with AFFI ratings that are really poor instructors. My thought here is to advise that those instructors that you will be shadowing may, or may NOT, be setting good examples for you. You will want to shadow good ones.

But that implies that you know the difference between good and poor....knowledge that you don't have as yet.

Those poor instructors....
- Have little to no teaching skills
- Do not teach what is required
- Have a large deficiency of general skydiving knowledge
- Make up shit as they go along
- Do not follow established safety procedures.
- Focus entirely on air skills and provide little to no instruction on canopy skills
- Focus entirely on air skills and provide little to no instruction on book knowledge.
- Come up with off-the-wall ways of doing things that do not follow published training methods. Much of that is ego driven...."Look at me. I have a better way of doing things!"
- ad infinitum

So, what do you do?

Pointers for teaching:
1. Attend as many first jump courses and you can with different instructors to get a feel for how they teach. You will see major differences between them. The caveat is that what you are seeing may or may not be good teaching methods. Take it all with a grain of salt and understand that you will be later learning about good teaching methods in you Coach course and the AFFI pre-course.

2. Learn the subject matter. You will be teaching young jumpers. You HAVE to know what your talking about. Learn the requirements and methods for each and every training jump you will possibly be doing.

3. KNOW the book stuff. There's much more to skydiving than freefall skills. If you don't know what you are talking about, you can't teach properly. Even worse, you may find yourself making up screwball shit trying to cover up that lack of knowledge. Not good.

4. Take the Coach Course first and spend a while teaching and jumping with students. Learn how to teach and then APPLY that knowledge. All too any take the CC and then promptly forget what they learned about the learning process and how to teach and do not apply that knowledge to the training of students.

You can help yourself to become a good instructor by actually applying and using those good teaching techniques and methods.

Pointers for flying:
Your major goal for AFFI flying is to stay close. That means no more than arms length away...regardless of what the student is doing in the sky. You can't help them if you are too far away from them.

1. 4-way and tunnel time are both good recommendations....to a point.

They will help you with proximity flying but they will not help you with staying with a student that is sliding all over the sky.

To develop those skills, have someone jump with you that will slide all over the place and make you chase them around with your goal to stay right by their side no matter what they do. Once you can do that with comfort, have them very radically change fall rate, roll over on the back, spin like a top and just plain do everything wrong. Again, with you having the goal of staying right by their side.

Once you can do that, you just may be ready for AFFI...maybe.

This expands on what I mean by learn from the way they present. Sometimes we learn from the good, sometimes we learn from the bad. I just tend to type responses when my wife is waiting on me and end up shortening some of my posts. Solid post Andy, too bad you needed your glasses and a large print keyboard :P

DJ Marvin
AFF I/E, Coach/E, USPA/UPT Tandem I/E
http://www.theratingscenter.com

[popsjumper 2]

We need bigger fonts here.

Oh wait....there's always, Ctrl-scroll.


About the, let's say, less-than-ideal Coach...
Just yesterday we had a student needing a coach jump for his Dive (Swoop) and Dock sign-off on the A license progression card. Now you know and I know that this is a Category H jump.

I set him up with a Coach who took him up on her own dime for the Dive and Dock. Good stuff.

So, he comes down and said he did the jump. The Coach verified. I quizzed him to see what he did, how he did and what he learned.

What I discovered from his description was not a Dive and Dock jump so I tracked down the Coach and she verified all that he said.

So, I was discussing this with her telling her that what she did was a Cat G re-dock jump and she was adamant that she did what her Coach Director told her to do for a Dive and Dock because she got 100 feet separation and that made it a Dive and Dock. An experienced jumper butted in saying that yes, indeed what she did was a Dive and Dock jump.

Rather than argue with them, I pulled out the SIM and showed her that what she actually did was a Cat G re-dock with fall rate jump, not a Cat H Dive (Swoop) and Dock jump for the sign-off. She wanted to argue that what she did was what her Coach Director told her and I finally had to just tell her point blank that I didn't care what she was told, her job as a Coach was to do the training program as it is written and that since she didn't know, she should go get her own SIM and study it some more because she was not familiar with the program....'nuff said.

Then I took it to the experienced jumper, showed him, and asked him kindly to please refrain from interjecting into training processes. He admitted his mistake, apologized for butting in and thanked me for teaching him something.

Ahhhhh...the things we have to deal with.

I love it when someone wants to argue with me about the contents of the SIM.
Over the years, my batting average is running right at .999.

Oh, BTW. I didn't sign off on his card and I told him that the next time he comes back I will make sure that the Coach that goes with him takes him on the proper jump. I will supervise the ground prep training myself.

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239