Aviation in the Classroom

Jordan Schave

Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota

Schools of Graduate and Professional Programs

Portfolio Entry for Wisconsin Teacher Standards One and Ten

EDUW 699 Curriculum Planning

Instructor: Lynda Sullivan

December 15, 2017

Wisconsin Teaching Standard 10: Teachers are connected with other teachers and the
community

The teacher fosters relationships with school colleagues, parents, and agencies in the

larger community to support students’ learning and well-being, and acts with integrity fairness,

and in an ethical manner.

Knowledge​. ​The teacher understands schools as organizations within the larger

community context and understands the operations of the relevant aspects of the system(s) within

which s/he works.

Dispositions.​ ​The teacher is willing to work with other professionals to improve the

overall learning environment for students.

Performances.​ ​The teacher participates in collegial activities designed to make the

entire school a productive learning environment.

Wisconsin Teaching Standard l: Teachers know the subjects they are teaching.

The teacher understands the central concepts, tools of inquiry, and structures of the

discipline(s) he or she teaches and can create learning experiences that make these aspects of

subject matter meaningful for students.

Knowledge​. ​The teacher understands how students’ conceptual frameworks and their

misconceptions for an area of knowledge can influence their learning.

Dispositions.​ ​ The teacher is committed to continuous learning and engages in

professional discourse about subject matter knowledge and children's learning of the discipline.

Performances.​ ​The teacher effectively uses multiple representations and explanations of

disciplinary concepts that capture key ideas and links them to students' prior understandings.
 Danielson Framework for Teaching

Domain 1: Planning and Preparation

Component 1c: Selecting Instructional Goals

Component 1e: Designing Coherent Instruction

Domain 3: Instruction

Component 3c: Engaging Students in Learning

Domain 4: Professional Responsibilities

Component 4d: Contributing to the School and District

Component 4e: Growing and Developing Professionally

 Self-Reflection of Guide Learning Process and Growth

In the May of 2017, I had the uniques opportunity to work with a high school teacher and

a community partner of the Baraboo area. We worked together to create an opportunity that

would allow students’ to obtain their recreational flying license during summer school. This was

an unique opportunity because I have zero experience in the field of aviation and there wasn’t a

known district in the state that offered this opportunity to students. This provided many new

learning experiences for me, the first being that I learned how to fly a plane. Second, I learned

how to work and communicate with a community partner to successfully create and fund the

class. Third, used materials to create a pacing guide and the learning outcomes for my class that

was appropriate for high school students, being a certified early childhood and elementary

teacher. The last experience that I gained was building lifelong connections with professionals

from around the state.

Going into this aviation course I had the smallest amount of background

knowledge in the field of aviation. I began my work with our community partner, Joe. Joe

owned a company in Baraboo that specialized in designing software and coding. He

worked with our high school teacher, Dan, in providing materials to help students further

their knowledge in coding. Joe is also a certified aviation instructor. He owns his own

plane using it for recreation and for his job. He was super excited to bring this opportunity

to the students. Aviation has entered a situation where there is a shortage of pilots,

mechanics, instructors and other workers. Joe purchased the materials through GLEIM

that allowed me to begin to be a successful instructor.

 Professional Implications

My first task was to teach myself and build my understanding in the field of

aviation. I was super excited but also very nervous because this was an extremely large

undertaking. I was given four weeks to teach eleven subjects that were critical in being a

successful pilot. To explain the magnitude of material that I needed to become an expert in

which then would allow me to teach my students to be successful consisted of six books

that ranged from 200 to 900 pages. After building my understanding of the materials that I

needed to teach with my students, I began to build a pacing guide of my topics of teaching

Artifact A and the learning objectives Artifact B. I worked closely with Joe and the

experiences that he had previously had in topics that were more challenging.

The aviation course was in one of the best location that we could have ever hoped

for. It was located at the airport, in a hanger, and under a plane. I don’t think that we could

have been any luckier for a such a great learning environment. This also allowed the

students to get a hands-on experience by examining and being able to go into the planes.

This allowed us to also learn about the different jobs at an airport and explore different

hands on experiences like walking down the runway and learning what the different lights,

and line striping mean.

Teaching the content to high school students was my largest undertaking. I

needed to read all of the materials and become the best instructor that I could with the

experience that I had. The course was approximately three hours long and we took a break

about halfway through. During the break I tried to get the students some hands on

experience, have a guest speaker come in or watch a video. Since this class was extremely
content heavy I decide with the high school teacher that it would be best to have the

students read a section and create a slide on it to teach the class. This made them an expert

in that section and they also taught the class so we cut down on the amount of reading that

they need to complete along with not having to listen to a three hour lecture. I made sure

that during their presentation they were talking about all of the required information and

that the students were asking the presenters questions.

Along with learning a extreme amount of new information over the course of one month I

was working with Joe on creating creating a fundraiser for the class. The fundraiser was a fly-in

breakfast. Joe also had a wide variety of business friend in the area that were able to partner with.

We partnered with Sysco foods to provide food at a reduced cost, a local church for tables, the

city to use the airport and some other organizations that helped with some smaller things. We

created advertisements to get the word around the city and Joe promoted the fly-in online.

The fly-in was an event that has been previously put on at the airport with the last one

being approximately five years ago. The goal was for us to rebuild this event each year to a point

that we would be above the record high. We surpassed the goal in the first attempt which was a

great success for the program. We had people that flew in from all over the state and we also had

a few that came from Dubuque, Iowa. I helped out during the event which allowed me to build a

variety of connections across the state.

Building these connections at the fly-in provided me with the opportunity to meet some

people that have had or have fantastic connections in the field of aviation. I met a lot of pilots

that were from the Baraboo area that wanted to get the students up in the air. I had these students

up in the air several times over the four-week course on flights that were approximately an hour
long. Another connection I made was with the Civil Air Patrol. They have a program for teachers

that allows them to get up in the air and lessons with hands on activities to promote aviation

within the classroom. The pilot allowed me to use the knowledge that I taught myself over the

course to fly the plane my first time in the air. I was very nervous at first but I got the hang of it

after a few minutes and it was just like driving a car. He said that I did a fantastic job flying on

my first time. Another strong connection that I made with Andy Miller from Appleton, and his

company is working on curriculums that can be used as a high school course. He came in and

talked to our class about aviation. He also offered help to me creating another aviation course in

the Fond du Lac School District. The last connection that I made was with a person from the

national guard that runs a bombing range called Volk Field. He invited the class up to the range

to watch the National guard and Air Force drop bombs. This was a extremely unique experience

because we were able to watch from the command tower along with listen to their conversations.

The field is also closed to the public which also made this a very special experience.

Post-assessment: Reflection

What Worked

1. The class was a success, we had enough students sign up for the course. I successfully

taught the class, allowing them to take what they learned and walk through things with

the pilots and also fly planes.

2. The fundraising was a big success, beating the previous attendance record.

3. The students learned the materials.

What Did Not Work

1. The pacing was a little off and needed to be tweaked throughout the class.
 2. The pilots in Baraboo didn’t want to share their experiences as much as I was hoping they

would.

3. With this being my first time teaching a course on aviation, I didn’t always have the

answer and there were times that I wasn’t able to explain a process completely.

4. There was a ton of reading and materials to cover over four weeks.

My Next Steps

1. I would recommend teaching this course over at least a six-week period. There was a lot

of materials to learn and it felt like we were cramming it all in as fast as we could. This

would also have allowed us to use the online program that was needed for the students to

get their certificate of completing the program. I was unaware that they needed to

complete the online portion to obtain this certificate which the would allow the students

to take the test. After the class completed the student had to finish the online portion by

themselves.

2. I now have experience flying a plane so I can better explain more specific situations and

give better examples

 Artifacts

Artifact A: Pacing Guide

The pacing guide was my list of topics that I was going to teach over the course of four weeks. I
also work on trying to get as much hands on experience and as many presentators as I could to
have come and speak to the class.
Class Date Lesson Presenter/Hands on Activity
6-12-17 Intro to Materials, Rules, 1- Airplanes Tour of Hangar,
6-13-17 1- Aerodynamics* Explore plane - B-principal
6-14-17 2- Airplane Instruments, Engines Explore Plane- Instruments
6-15-17 2- Engines, and Systems Explore Airplane - Engine
6-16-17 3- Airports, Air Traffic Control Tour of Airport - markings/lights

6-19-17 3- Air Traffic Control, and Airspace

6-20-17 4- Federal Aviation Regulations*
6-21-17 4- Federal Aviation Regulations*
6-22-17 5- Airplane Performance* Tour of repair shop
6-23-17 5- Weight and Balance*
Stage One Knowledge Test

6- Aeromedical Factors and Aeronautical

6-26-17 Decision Making
6-27-17 7- Aviation Weather
6-28-17 8- Aviation Weather Services
9- Navigation: Charts, Publications, Flight
6-29-17 Computers
6-30-17 9-Navigation: Flight Computers

7-3-17 Holiday Holiday

7-4-17 Holiday Holiday
 7-5-17 Holiday Holiday
7-6-17 10-Navigation Systems
7-7-17 10- Navigation Systems Jim Neeb

7-10-17 11- Cross-Country Flight Planning***

7-11-17 11- Cross-Country Flight Planning*** Andy Miller -AOPA
Stage Two Knowledge Test
7-12-17 End-of-Course knowledge Test (On Site?)

Artifact B: Objectives
Below are the learning objectives and the minimum instructional hour requirements required for
each topic.
Less
on Topic
Stage One
1 Airplanes and Aerodynamics
Airplane Instruments,
2 Engines, and Systems
Airports, Air Traffic Control,
3 and Airspace
4 Federal Aviation Regulations
Airplane Performance and
5 Weight and Balance
Stage One Knowledge Test
Min.
Hours
Stage One Objective: To develop the student's
3 knowledge of airplanes and the aerodynamic
principles of flight. The student will learn about
the operation of various airplane systems, airport
3 operations, radio communications procedures, air
traffic control (ATC) radar services, and the
3 National Airspace Regulations (14 CFRs) and the
accident-reporting requirements of National
Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Finally the
student will learn how to predict airplane
performance and how to control the weight and
3 balance of the airplane.
Stage one Completion Standards: Stage One will
3 have been successfully completed when the
student passes the Stage One Knowledge test with
1 a minimum passing grade of 80%

Aeromedical Factors and Stage Two Objective:To develop students

6 Aeronautical Decision 2 knowledge of medical factors and the aeronautical
 Making
7 Aviation Weather
8 Aviation Weather Services
Navigation: Charts,
Publications, Flight
9 Computers
10 Navigation Systems
Cross-Country Flight
11 Planning
Stage Two Knowledge Test
decision-making process related to all flights. The
3 student will learn how weather affects flying. The
student will learn how to obtain weather briefings
2.5 and how to interpret aviation reports, forecasts,
and charts. Additionally, the student will learn
how to use navigation charts, platters, flight
3 computers, and flight publications for
cross-country flight planning. Finally, the student
2.5 will learn how to use various navigation systems.
Stage Two Completion Standards: Stage Two will
2.5 have been successfully completed when the
student passes the Stage Two knowledge test with
1 a minimum passing grade of 80%

End-of-Course knowledge
Test 2.5
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