How useful is OATS feedback

[Desk-pilot]

Hi guys,

Not long to go till groundschool exams. Have been swotting up with manuals etc but struggling to hold it all in my head. Would like to know from those who have been there how useful the OATS feedback is and whether I'm better focussing my energies on further reading of course materials or going mad with the feedback questions?

Would appreciate advice from those who've been there...

Desk-pilot

[Chintito]

Hi, i didnt go to Oxford but I did have OATS feedback for some of the subjects and I must say found them to be extremely useful revision aids.
You didnt say which subjects you are going to sit but for me i found the OATS feedback on PofF , Ops Proc, Met, and Performance to be spot on. almost 70-80% of the feedback questions cropped up on teh actuals. That said, DO NOT rely on learning the feedback to get you through... you wont pass.

feedback can be used usually to get a sense of the areas you dont need to be an expert on and that saves time and energy during revision. Dont leave practicing feedback questions til the end and dont forget to practice feedback nearer exam time.

[Jinkster]

very very very very very useful

[Future Pundit]

Feedback Qs from OAT are superb. I read through manuals 2-3 times then did all feedback Qs. No problems with exams.

[Desk-pilot]

Thanks for the advice guys and pleased to hear the feedback is useful. I have been trying to learn the manuals but there's so much I'm struggling to get high marks in tests. I have of course done end of chapter questions as I've gone along but the reality is that I've kept putting off the feedback until I had 'learned' the material. Reality is there's too much to 'learn' in the time you get to revise and some stuff I learned as I went along doesn't seem to have been retained.

Ergo the feedback may be my saving grace!

Thanks for the advice,

Desk-pilot

[Keith.Williams.]

Feedback should be neither the main focus of study nor something that is left to the last couple of weeks. It should be used throughout the course to back up your main study material.
This is why most schools continuously update their progress tests to include feedback questions. If you get to the end of part of the study material but cannot answer feedback questions on it then your studies of that area are incomplete.

To develop a thorough knowledge and understanding of a subject and to keep the relevant information in your working memory, you must use that knowledge, understanding and memory as frequently as possible. After studying each section of material you should conduct question and answer sessions using feedback material. Most people gain far more from trying to answer questions than from simply reading their notes.

There is no point in developing what you think is a thorough knowledge of a subject only to find that you cannot answer any of the exam questions. This is what people mean when they say " I know all about the subject but failed the exams....those exams are all a load of ......." The real problem here is usually that they have developed the ability to regurgitate data from text books but cannot apply that knowledge to solving problems.
By using feedback on a regular basis you will be able to fine tune your study efforts in the correct manner to store knowledge and be able to use it in the exams.

The vast majority of students find that they learn more during the last two weeks of their course than at any other time. It is no conincidence that this last two weeks is usually devoted almost exclusively to practicing answerring feedback questions.

Make sure you get the balance right.....study the notes AND practice with feedback questions. If you limit your efforts to either one of these activities you will probably fail. But don't just learn the ANSWERS to those questions, learn WHY THEY ARE THE CORRECT ANSWERS and how to answer DIFFERENT QUESTIONS on the same subjects.

[hdaae]

I have to totally agree with that last post!

Ive passed all 14 exams and did it thru Oxford.

I found their textbooks to be EXCELLENT, and their feedbacks just as superb!

I went thru all the books a couple of times, but when I finished the last book I had forgotten what was written in the first i read :) so this is were the Feedbacks comes into play.
They refresh your memory quite effectivly.

When I did my groundschool and the following exams, several people failed MISERABLY coz they depended on feedbacks only and didnt really bother to read the books beforehand.

The Feedbacks makes you do problems in a manner you havent thought of before (espesially Navigation) that will save your day since your pressed on time, but it require that your quite familiar with the theory beforehand.

[WX Man]

Very good advice from Keith Williams there (not the first time either ;) )

I found Oxford's PoF feedback quite good, but only in that it got me thinking about how I could use the knowledge that I had to solve CAA style questions. The questions in their feedback booklet (and I went through EVERY SINGLE ONE (about 870 q's)) didn't crop up much in the PoF exam that I took last week, but I still found it useful for this reason.

My school's instruments feedback was superb. Law was OK, and I have to say that Big Red Jumbo helped a lot in that respect. Comms feedback was pretty good, and helped a lot, because they can ask some pretty abstract questions.

[witchdoctor]

The feedback is good, but don't know how it compares to other sources. However, it is not the 'be all and end all'. Remember, this feedback is exactly that - feedback from students like you who have just sat an exam and are trying to recall accurately questions and answers that they saw with brains of deep-fried goo!!! The feedback is incomplete, contradictory and confused at times, so beware. The questions you have are often the instructors' best guesses at what the real questions and answers may have been.

If you are struggling now, you really ought to consider how you will cope with the content of a type-rating. Hardly the most riveting bed time reading and there is even less time to take in the detail and understand it than there is for the ATPLs. And failure is not an option.

Still, best of luck. Sorry to sound so negative.:ok: