Some years ago, I was doing a club checkout on a day when the cross-wind was pretty close to the club limits. On the first circuit I flew, on very short final when I set up for my preffered touchdown configuration of wing-down-opposite-rudder, the instructor said "Oh no. I don't want you to do it that way. I have control" and proceeded to land us with crab-into-wind-kick-off-at-touchdown method. I was a bit upset as in my opinion the situation at the time was not dangerous. The instructor then insisted that we carry on using his method, the end result being that given the relatively unfamiliar method he wanted me to use, my touchdowns were a little all over the place and he was almost reluctant to sign me off. I'm quite happy to learn and refine alternative methods, but on that occasion I'd have performed much better if left to my own (safe) way of landing in a crosswind.
I learned my lesson from that experience though. Now, if I fly with an instructor in a cross-wind, before we even get in the aeroplane I pre-brief the instructor on how I like to fly the approach and landing. And if the instructor disagrees, well at least there's time to discuss the relative merits of each of our views whilst we're still on the ground!
The list goes on, with an entire range of other things - I've flown with instructors often enough over the years to know that preferences for the use of things like carb-heat, fuel-pumps, landing-lights, flaps, blah, blah, blah vary from instructor to instructor. Whilst I don't pre-brief on all of these things, I'm aware enough now of some of the "differences" that [for example], when flying an approachy I might say something like "I normally take the carb heat off just before touchdown - is that how you teach it?" and if not, we can have a brief debate about the merits or otherwise of each method. I see checkouts as part of the ongoing learning process, and I find they work well particularly when we both have opinions and can bounce around ideas in an open way.
A