Introduce Flying to Your Children

[cozy171bh]

UCAP Ambassadors,

The best place to start as an ambassador for aviation is with the family, specifically with your children. Catch them while they're young. I take my 6 and 4 year old children out to the hangar frequently. They have some toys out there they like to play with. They love running around out there. Our airport is a place where you can just "hang out" and I'm teaching them to enjoy doing that. So even on days when we don't fly, they enjoy playing in the hangar. I even give them simple things to do so that they can "help" daddy change the oil or whatever. But the best days are when I strap them in, put on their child-sized headsets, and go flying. I even cut out and installed a special window below the longeron in my CO-Z so that they can see out during flight because they are too short to see out the canopy. The love it, and they are forming a love for aviation.

Brian....

[PilotBillFromTexas]

I even cut out and installed a special window below the longeron in my CO-Z so that they can see out during flight because they are too short to see out the canopy.

That's just too cool. There's a reason not to go with a certified plane. You can do with your experimental what the heck you want.

I agree. I love to work with kids that are really enthusiastic about aviation. It is infectious.

[champguy]

Kids are infectous, even when you are old enough to be glad when their mother shows up to take over.
You have to introduce them to propellers, and then not let them see how worried you are as you keep an eye on them.

[PilotBillFromTexas]

I was chatting with a guy at my airport this weekend. He was letting his 16 year-old take some flight training with an 18 year-old CFI in his pretty cherokee. The wind had started to kick up by the time they were getting ready to leave. He said that as long as they both get back ok and the plane is still flyable afterwards that he'd be happy. He was glad that the CFI wasn't afraid of less than ideal conditions.