Funny strategies for written exams

As with most of these stuff, there always exists an odd, arbitrary and unwritten assumption of theoretical nature behind them. It’s all due to lack of pedagogical skills. Moving CG rearwards would do nothing for a modern fighter (within limits at least). Answer “d” would be correct. My wife is a teacher. She is now working with pedagogical stuff concerning math. She has lots of stories about the same thing, things that seems natural at first, but makes no sense to lots of kids.

For instance, one question for second or third grade or something used in the national tests. You are walking in the woods and find a stick that is 1 meter long. You use your knife and cut in in 10 equal pieces, how long will each piece be? The “correct” answer is of course 10 cm. But, a kid that has actually ben cutting sticks would have an experience that contradict the 10 cm. First, it is damn hard to cut a stick with a knife to start with for a little kid, not to speak of 10 equal pieces. The stick could be bent and so on, and it’s thicker in one end, how could they be equal?. Also, if you cut the first one at 8-9 cm or thereabout, and use that as a yard stick for the rest, you could still get 10 equal pieces, just throw away the last stub, if any (which is what a professional little stick cutter would do). When you cut with a knife, a lot of the stick gets cut away and so on. It’s a type of question that confuses the ones that has tried it, and they will most likely not get it “correct”. The ones that have never cut a stick will most likely get the “correct” answer. Others may be confused because their mom would never let them into the woods to cut sticks with a knife.

It’s the same with that CG question, only it’s taken to an even higher level. What is wrong is that the question is not defined. The CG could originally be way forward for instance. It’s the kind of question a person who does not have any theoretical, practical or pedagogical knowledge would write, by simply writing them down while reading in a text book.The question does not require understanding at all, it only requires the person to read a specific book. It’s as meaningless as asking how many times the word “aircraft” was used on page 43 in the same book.

I get the stick in the woods example, but get this: other people would complain if the question was put like: 1 m / 10 = ? cm.

Re. the aviation theory questions: none of this is something that would not have been covered in your theory syllabus. So all it is asking is questions relating to what you have been taught in class. If you didn’t get it in class, you probably won’t get it in the exam either.

LeSving wrote:

What is wrong is that the question is not defined. The CG could originally be way forward for instance.

I think this point is moot. No, it isn’t defined that this all takes place on planet earth, that we are talking about an aircraft, that it isn’t a canard aircraft, a hovering jet fighter or whether the aircraft is flying supersonic.
I don’t see how your point would change the correct answer. Perhaps I don’t understand the theory behind shifting CG… please explain

I have just been told by another pilot from eastern Europe that his country had a full list of PPL questions published openly by the CAA, in which, conveniently, the first answer was always the correct one

This was the default state for the JAA CQB. When the questions are put into an exam, the order is shuffled!

Peter wrote:

When I was doing the JAA IR exams in 2011 I found a really obvious correlation between which was the right answer and which answer was the longest (the most verbose). Specifically, this strategy would probably enable your grandma to pass

First of all this is my first post. I have been a reader for some time and am very excited about the professional level of discussion on Euroga and did finally join whilst still being a student!

Some of your ideas get it quite right but you still need some kind of basic knowledge to eliminate the answers seeming wrong. I just passed all 9 subjects of my PPL(A) today with a result of 96.1%. I attended the classroom lectures during the winter time but didn’t really study or solve questions and was quite lazy. I started about two weeks before our internal final exam in the flight school which you have to pass to get a permission to attend the official EASA exam but working 8-10 hours/5 days a week this mostly was a weekend task. With a basic knowing and being able to remember the key facts you can solve 80% with knowing 20%. But this needs some ability to 1.) identify what is essential, 2.) remember that and 3.) combine it with other facts.

I did a test about a week ago with my wife who doesn’t know nothing about aviation and is technically not very interested and talented but has a masters degree and some post university education. She was able to solve Human Performance and Air Law at almost the required level of 75%.

Cheers,
Neal