Hmm...... I think I agree, in theory.
In practice, though, we teach primary effects of controls in exercise 4a (if not exercise 3). At this stage, the student will have no understanding of AoA. What they
will understand is attitude, so relating elevators to attitude seems to make sense, even if it's not true for every single phase of flight. Also, remember the aim of exercise 4a is to use the controls to select the datum attitude - so it's necessary to relate elevator to attitude to achieve the aim.
The student will get the complete picture as they go through the course. In exercise 4b they will discover that there are other things which can affect the pitch of the aircraft (power and flaps). In exercise 10b they will discover the stall, where, as you say, elevator can no longer be used to cause a direct pitch change, and we need to think of AoA. By that time, the student will have gained enough knowledge to understand what we're trying to teach him.
alot of new students I talk to do not seem to have a full understanding of stalling or angle of attack
How "new" do you mean? As I said, I wouldn't expect a student to understand these things properly until they've completed exercise 10b. In fact, there might even be a good argument that a student doesn't understand them
properly until he's done a few hours of aeros.
FFF
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