"Steve Bonine" wrote in message
...
In a week I will begin teaching an entry-level class that the local radio
club is offering. I would love any words of wisdom from experienced
instructors of this material. I suspect that it has been at least a
couple of decades since I last taught such a class, and things have
changed a bit in that time grin.

The basic issue I'm wrestling with is walking the tightrope between
teaching the actual questions from the pool and teaching concepts. It's
not fair to the students to ignore the existence of the pool; after all,
one of the goals of the class is to prepare them to take the written exam.
But another goal is to get them ready to actually be an active member of
the ham radio community, and memorizing pool questions doesn't contribute
to that objective. So I'll try to do both -- cover concepts and review
the actual questions.

Another issue is the scheduling of the class. There are proponents of the
weekend method -- cover the material in a day or so. While there are
advantages to that, I favor multiple shorter sessions. I think that
learning is much better in that environment, but in today's hectic world,
getting people to commit to multiple sessions is problematic. We've
decided on six session spread over three weeks. Maybe that was a fatal
error; time will tell.

I wish we still had something like the Novice license. I'd like to be
able to get past the pressure of the written exam and get prospective hams
some real experience so they understand what I'm babbling about in class.
For example, you can lecture about repeaters, but if the students have
actually *used* a repeater, they have a whole different understanding of
what you're saying.

73, Steve KB9X


The ARRL license manuals do a pretty good job of explaining the material
that goes into the questions. Also try to squeeze in some demos such as
using the repeater. A few, but not too many, anecdotal experiences of your
own can be productive too. Perhaps the first time you "let the smoke out"
of a radio or tuner or whatever.

Dee, N8UZE