Sky’s the Limit

I banked the plane gently over Livermore and stared down at the small specks four thousand feet below: cows. It was the first time in twenty or so minutes that I’d really taken a hard look at the ground, and it surprised me just how high four thousand feet really wasn’t. Sure, the sound was different – none of the city noise, just the hum of the propeller and the air rushing past at 120 knots – but the cows weren’t that small, and as I leveled the wings and brought my gaze back inside, I became suddenly terrified of all that awaited. And it hit me so clearly in that moment in a way that it never has before: this is how my students feel.

I’ve been learning to fly, and the first thing I figured out is that flying a plane is easy. It’s the doing anything else with it that’s so difficult. Starting, taxiing, communicating, taking off, navigating, and, critically, landing – these are the areas that baffle. My cow experience came on my first flight, and while I was technically flying the plane at that point, I was doing the absolute easiest thing you can do – straight and level flight. When my attention returned to the inside, with the dozens of dials and instruments I did not understand, I realized that were my instructor to ask me to do anything remotely difficult with this plane – like land it – I would panic. 

Most of my students feel the same about standardized tests, school, or both. The stakes are high and the enormity of the challenge is daunting. And while bombing the SAT or failing chemistry won’t result in death by fiery crash, it feels like it will. Their whole, young lives up in flames at the edge of the runway – that’s how terrified they are. 

Learning to fly is all about incrementals, small pieces that snap into place through practice. Now, six months into the process and on the eve of my first solo, the hard parts of flying are, if not easy, at least understandable and manageable. I still practice my traffic patterns while doing dishes, and more than a few times I’ve walked around late at night doing a pre-flight inspection of an imaginary plane in our living room. But the terror that seized me over Livermore has subsided, replaced with a calmness that comes from a strong knowledge base and the trusted guidance of my ex-Navy flight instructor. 

It took me 9 hours of flying before I even tried to land a plane, and after 20 hours we started doing 7 or 8 landings every time I went up. Last lesson I notched 10 landings in a pretty heavy crosswind, and it’s because of the fundamentals and the long game. So many students think they need to “land” at the outset. Nope. It’s about running the simple, easy stuff nonstop until it’s burned in. Taking things that you “know” that take 45 seconds to do and whittling that down to 5. Knowing the procedures and processes cold. Or, as my instructor says, putting in the groundwork. 

Flying is more fun than the SAT, though it requires about as much math. And I’m lucky to have an instructor to whom I literally trust my life. If your teen is terrified of standardized tests, remind them that greasing the landing comes at the end. Now is the time to practice the simple stuff, and to do the dishes.