Very good post Rat5
The latest generation of young training captains have been trained in the electronic age. They conduct line training the way they've been trained. Utilization of automation to their fullest degree.
There are but a handful of us oldies out there that flew the trusty 731s, 727s, and DC9s. Nothing more than a multi-engine aircraft with dual Nav-Coms with a coupled autopilot with the old reliable RCA CRT weather radar. When we flew NDB approaches... we flew NDB approaches. Today... when an NDB approach is generally an RNAV overlay approach which to me is not an NDB approach.
As a trainer, I enjoy imparting what I've learned over my years of flying. I encourage my students to hand fly as much as they want during the climb and descent below RVSM. I have no problems with them wanting to turn off the FDs. Turn them back on and engage the automatics if things start going pair shape. But hey...that's what the learning process is all about. After all what's going to happen if all the automatics fail?
I can only hope that more line trainers will encourage manual flying. I would like to hope that the Asiana incident would be the turning point on the total reliance of automation... but I do have my doubts.