Soaring course - summary

What do you want to achieve?

Over the course of one week it is posssible to substantially raise a student's standard - if you are working one to one in a two seater.

I find when flying with a student that it takes several days to get to know how they fly, find out what they are doing wrong and why, and to correct it. Before the coach can make any changes he has to get to know the student - who is probably nervous, clumsy and likely to be very overloaded. Several flights in reasonable conditions are necessary to allow the student to relax, the coach to understand the problems and demonstrate the correct techniques. Changing weather conditions or difficult weather just lengthen the process and students have very different abilities when it comes to mainaining a high workload in the air.  However I generally expect that a one - to - one student will leave a soaring course a measurably better pilot.

Not so with group courses. It is possible to make a big difference when right at the start of a learning curve - for instance a mountain soaring course for flatland pilots, an aerobatic or even an instructor course. But most soaring pilots on soaring courses can already do the job to some extent, and they have well established habits and modes of thinking. WIth a group course it is simply not possible to spend enough time flying with each student to change the way they fly.
However you can demonstrate in the air that there are better ways to do things - for instance you will normally be able to out climb and outrun them - and you can show them in the classroom that there are things they need to know to fly well. You will also be able to point out instances where there theory and practice are faulty due to incorrect teaching or incorrect application of theory - for instance use of MacReady speed to fly theory. In other words, in a week's course you can show them what they are doing wrong and give them the information necessary to learn how to do it right, but they won't have chance to actually make the improvement. That will come later - if they work at it.

Course format
Students should prep gliders at the start of the day, wx briefing at about 0930 / 1000, theory briefing if there is time, task briefing just before take off, debrief in the classroom after flying and before hitting the bar! 
This regime makes things happen in the right order and mainains the flexibility you need to cope with changing wx.

In the air
Two seater flying is vital at some stage in the course for each student. But you cannot really run lead and follow flying from a two seater when coaching a student as well.
It is also impractical to run lead and follow groups of more than about three gliders in total - too clumsy.
A method we evolved in the BGA  was to have two coaches and to send the two seater off first with a student on board, to make a start on the task. The other student would fly the single seaters and the second coach would help them to prepare and launch - pushing them into the air and making sure that the launches did not straggle. The second coach would then get into his own single seater, find the students and run out on the first leg, helping them to get going. The rest of the flight the second coach shadows the task group, dropping in on any students that need a tow and doing a segment of the flight as a lead and follow exercise. We called this "sheepdogging" and it works really well. Good use of radio and a clear frequency to operate on is a must!

Student / coach / glider ratio

Each student needs to have a chance to fly with the coach in a suitable two seater, so an absolute maximum is one student per day of the course.
Ideally one would run the course over seven days, five days is too short and nine generally too long. Especially if the weather is bad - there is only so much talking you can do!
 
Soaring course syllabus

Pracitcal stuff:
Can they all actually fly safely - can they climb in lift and land safely where they choose too? Don't take it for granted!
Airspace and site brief, launching method - currency? 
Short briefing at some stage on lead and follow type flying.

Theory subjects in approximate order:
Core subjects are
Thermal structure and formation
How to climb in thermals - centering
Reading clouds 
Patterns in the sky (how to cruise and selecting thermals)
Speed to fly theory and how or not to apply it
Cross country strategies
Final glides

As you can see it's not rocket science. I find that it's the obvious stuff that students don't know! Or often think they know but have the wrong idea about.

Bonus subjects for wet days...
Variometers, total energy systems, netto (can be followed up by a practical leak check session)
use of water / c g control
soaring weather and tasksetting

I suggest you would be better able than me to talk about the pure competition subjects - rules, start / tp's  final glides etc, gaggle flying, use of water in competition flying and also the local stuff especially using the ridges / local weather and task setting. 

I suggest as well that we should talk about the basics of sport psychology - goal setting, arousal / performance curve etc.

I've made up a rough set of lecture notes for each subject just to give you an idea of the flavour of what I like to cover. Generally though I try to be fairly loose and to take my cues from the students. As far as visual aids are concerned I like the flexibility that you have using just a whiteboard - don't tend to use powerpoint or anything like that for soaring courses. More formal training like instructor courses are different.