Simviation Forums

Hello all,

I teach high school ESOL (English as a Second Langauge).  Today I was working with some of my students and realized a great lesson that would include real-life materials and math.  The students were learning how to calculate slopes.  I was thinking (don't know why I didn't think of this earlier) that I could use approach plates to roughly calculate the slope in the glide slopes and ascent after take-off.

I could easily find approach plates for my local airport (KBWI), but I was wondering if there are any CFIs here that have approach plates that are easy enough to follow for instructional purposes.  Examples of terrain avoidance would be great as well, but I want students to be able to connect the glideslope of the planes they see landing every day to the math in the classroom.

Any help that could be given would be greatly appreciated.  Many thanks.

Mr. Chris Wren
ESOL

That's a great idea. Kids are fascinated by flying and linking interest to math works every time. Approach plates however, are difficult even for some pilots to read and for the most part would represent the same mathematical problem/solution (3% slope). Some DME-arcs and step-downs would be the exception; but again, not well represented on standard approach plates and not easily read or very good graphical presentations.

I'm not a CFI (will be soon) or a teacher, but I think you could use a few plates to demonstrate the 3% standard. Then, present the problems giving a distance between two, different sized obstacles; solve for for maximum runway length between them. Or... solve for which obstacle needs to be reduced and by how much, for a needed runway length and so on.

Depending on your students' level... You could even make several obstacles, some of them unchangeable and throw in a maximum (30 degree) turn on one of the approaches so they'd REALLY have their hands full. Having to maintain a 3% descent to clear the obstacle nearest the runway while approaching 30 degrees off runway heading to avoid another... solving for maximum runway length given a minimum distance to be on runway heading.

Geez.. now my head hurts  :P

hehe.. that's why I wanted to keep it simple.  It would merely be an introduction of real-life into their current math lesson.  If I try going that far into approach, I'm likely to lose some of their interest.  So, I'm just trying to keep it simple.  

I knew the charts could be difficult to read even for experienced pilots, that's why I was wondering if anyone had access to 'easier' to read charts that were still real.  

Thanks for your reply.  I really hope I can pull this off.  I'll be the envy of the math dept.  And I don't even teach math (technically).

Perhaps this;
....might help

Check the lower right corner of the profile view "GS 3.6..."

...since I can't seem to get the image to cooperate and the fact that.....it's after 2am and I'm out of coffee....if you're really interested; go to www.fltplan.com and register (it's free) and retrieve the airport info for Rifle, Colorado ILS-RWY 26..... :-/

Thanks for the link.  I'll take a look.  I agree, these charts are not terribly difficult.  But then again.. some people can't read a road map to save their...