I have to say BEagle that I disagree. All Air Law is top quality sh+t. Whilst it is not unreasonable for pilots to learn air law, it
is unreasonable for the CAA to test it in the way that they do.
Questions like:
Anti collision lights on fixed wing aircraft under 5700kg registered on or before 1st Aptil 1988:
a) Are not allowed
b) Are advisable but not required
c) Are mandatory
d) Are optional
incite a need to learn what the questions are. In the above example, I ask you to explain the differences in (b) and (c)- as far as I'm concerned (and I am a very literate person), 'advisable but not required' is pretty much the same as 'optional'.
Questions like this are designed to catch people out, and this is just not a fair method of assesment.
Simililar questions which have to have been designed by an utter b'stard who wants to catch people out are ones like that asking what the 'glide clear' rule is (2000ft above congested areas(?), I don't know, I always fly as high as I can). Then a question is asked presenting the possible answers as 1500ft, 600m, 1000ft and 1000m. That is also a very counter productive method of assesment- seeing as I have never, and I never intend to, refer to altitude in metres.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. Air Law is riddled with 'catch-em-out' questions. For this reason I believe that the assesment of air law is, at all levels, very much an assesment of how much you don't know, rather than if your level of knowledge reaches the required standard. For this reason I can fully justify my action in learning air law parrot fashion from the confuser for my PPL, and doing as many practice q's as poss for my PPL/IR.
The CAA really need to look at their methods of assesment- as far as a fair test of someone's knowledge goes... well, let's just say if OFSTED were to go through it with a fine toothed comb, they would have a field day.