Definition
A category in instructional technique referring to specific kinds of questions that flight and ground instructors should not use when teaching, because they fail to test understanding, encourage guessing, or confuse the student. The Aviation Instructor's Handbook identifies these as: puzzle questions (so convoluted the student spends effort decoding the question itself), oversize questions (covering too much material at once), toss-up questions (offering two choices where either could be defended), bewilderment questions (vague or so broad the student doesn't know what is being asked), trick questions (designed to mislead), and irrelevant questions (unrelated to the learning objective).
Plain English
A list of question types instructors are warned not to use, because they don't actually check whether the student has learned the material. They either confuse the student, let them guess, or test something other than the lesson.
Context Anchor
Seen in flight instructor training when learning how to ask clear, fair, useful questions during ground lessons, preflight discussions, and postflight reviews.
Why Pilots Care
Using better questions improves student understanding and reduces training frustration or dropout.
Intuition Check
Do not read this as “avoid difficult questions.” A useful question can be challenging; the point is to avoid questions that are unclear, unfair, unrelated, or built to trap the student.
Example Sentence 1
During the lesson on questioning technique, the CFI candidate reviewed the types of questions to avoid so he wouldn't fall into asking puzzle or toss-up questions during his own debriefs.
Example Sentence 2
Recognizing types of questions to avoid helped the new CFI keep students engaged during the preflight briefing.