Left-Right, dyslexia

[Aerodynamisist]

I have a student who has trouble with left and right, I'm trying clock wise and anti clockwise which seems to be working so far. I have in the past heard of that the condition of getting left and right mixed up has a name, but I can't remember what that name is. can any one shed some light on this or lend any suggestions for tackleing the problem ?

[AIRWAY]

G'day,

I think i have the same problem i sometimes mix up but the stange thing is that i know left and right in my native language the Portuguese.

Would be interested in hearing from others.

Cheers

[mazzy1026]

I have a friend who has this problem too. We decided that if he could associate something to his left and right hands, then he could then distinguish more easily. (jokes aside)!

For example, if you WRITE with your RIGHT hand: So next time you needed to distinguish RIGHT - you would remember your RIGHT (WRITING) hand ?

Does this make sense?

Regards

Maz

[Boss Raptor]

have it also - hold up left hand in front of you, palm facing away, and with finger and thumb make 'L for Left' :ok:

[Shaka Zulu]

there are different types of dislexia and the way it comes to the surface.
my girlfriend has got the same problem.she thinks she writes a complete sentence but leaves some key words out. she thinks about it she says, and has the full sentence in her mind but somehow her unconscious mind/conscious mind doesn't register and it doesn't get down on paper.
she also suffers from left and right problems.she means left but says right, very confusing.
the funny thing is, speakingwise she doesn't leave things out of her sentences...only confusing left and right.

[AIRWAY]

I like Boss Raptor's idea :ok: excellent :}

[126.9]

Green for Danger
---
Here lie the bones of Emily Bright
Who put out her left hand
And turned to the right.
---
See chapter 14 of The Naked Pilot by David Beaty
ISBN 1-85310-482-5

[Hansard]

I've always had a problem with "left" and "right", but never had a problem with "port" and "starboard".

[Dr. Bunsen Honeydew]

I had a student (probably the best and most naturally skilled of all of them) who had the same problem. We overcame it by using post-it notes for left and right with big arrows drawn on, and sticking them over unused instruments eg AH and ILS (VFR obviously!). After a few trips we lost the right one, but just having the left one did the trick. As far as I know, he still uses this today (don't know what they'll say if he ever goes for an airline job)!

In my far off days of UAS flying, one student annoyed the QFI so much with this little problem that he used a big magic marker to put L and R on the backs of her white flying gloves - not good for the Top Gun image!

I think the main CRM point to remember is that it is quite common and should not be made fun of, whatever method is used.

[spork]

Could be Dyspraxia? aka Developmental Co-ordination Disorder (DCD), Perceptuo-Motor Dysfunction, and (more simply) Motor Learning Difficulties. It was once known as Clumsy Child Syndrome, but in this PC world we could never call it that now. Males are four times more likely to be affected than females.

[ShyTorque]

I had a helicopter student once who had this problem.

It was potentially very dangerous because of the requirement to manoeuvre a big helicopter in small confined areas and to get the crewman to clear the tail of the aircraft. There was a case of a Wessex crew who got it wrong and the pilot went left instead of right or vice versa. The aircraft hit a mast by a helipad and rolled down the hill, killing at least one of the pax and very seriously injuring one of the pilots.

Similar to the UAS QFI who drew on the stude's flying gloves, (actually I think I did that once, too) I made 2 inch high letters "L" and "R" in sticky orange dayglo and put them on the back of his green leather gloves. It worked. He's still around! I think the stigma of having the gloves made him concentrate more and it cured him.

Now. Why do my wife's knickers say "C and A" in them? ;)

[JW411]

This reminds me of a story I heard many more years ago than I care to remember. An ancient Imperial Airways captain, who had served for years on the HP42 and the Empire boats, died.

Throughout his flying career he had this infallible habit of extracting a little walnut box lined with green baize from his flight bag, opening it and then studying the contents intensely, before he would even consider starting the first engine.

Lots of his colleagues were invited to the reading of his last Will and Testament. The solicitor duly read the will and asked if there were any questions. One F/O stuck his hand up and asked if there was anything in there about the walnut box and what on earth was in it.

The box was duly produced and when it was opened, there was an ivory coloured card secured to the bottom with a drawing pin. On it was written "Port - Left, Starboard - Right"!

[jayteeto]

Shytorque, didn't the board of enquiry find the pilots 'not guilty'? They reckoned the crewman was facing backwards in the door and got his left/right wrong??
There was a student at a unit I instructed on who had this problem and we chopped him because he often turned towards danger when we called it. We made the mistake of calling him dyslexic on the suspension report. When he produced a medical report showing he wasn't dyslexic, he was reinstated and gained his wings.
From here, I do not know the exact details, but he was removed from the SAR force after some time on the squadron. It is said that when hovering close to a cliff, the crewman called 'right one' and he moved left!!
He now flies in another capacity!!
I now believe that a problem like this should mean suspension from flying, harsh but necessary.

[square leg]

Hold up both hands in front of you with the palms facing away from you.



Left hand: LEFT is where the thumb is right.



Right hand: RIGHT is where the thumb is left.



That should help:D

[caramel]

My wife seems to do this especially when driving, we get to a junction she asks where to go I say left she goes right.

Being right she then tells me I don't speak clearly enough pulls over and tells me to drive which I have no problem at all with!

[Spearing Britney]

Laterality disorder is the name I believe, I know BA's computerised micropat tests include a guy with a briefcase who looks at you, turns away, turns upside down etc and you have a speed and accuracy assesment of which hand it is in.

Don't know how to solve it, but for lights and seafaring terms theres the reminder - theres no RED PORT LEFT...

[normal_nigel]

I hope there's no journalists reading this.

[ShyTorque]

JT2,

I think you are correct but couldn't be sure, that's why I said "crew" rather than "pilot".

[Aerodynamisist]

Thank you all for your input, I will be flying with the student this weekend and will most likely try "postit" notes on the panel with left and right written on them.

[batninth]

This is one of those silly little problems that doesn't really cause harm but is exceptionally embarassing - did the left for right trick several times learning to drive but kept it together on the test. Coaching youth baseball is also fun - number of times I have pointed authoritively out and said something like "Out in Left Field" only to get a voice saying "Coach...that's Right Field!"

Aerodynamisist - I find that it works better having just one side posted, I can work out the other much more quickly. Having two post-its just adds to confusion - if I think "Left" and look and see "L" then fine - but if I think "Right" and see "L" then I need more time to work it out in my head.

Good way is to get one of those blue plasters that they put on staff in supermarkets, restaurants etc. Put one on my left hand and now I have "Left" and "Not Left". Alternatively - write on my hand or use my watch so I have "Watch" and "Not Watch". I know these seem pretty purile but they work for me.

[Old Smokey]

This is no laughing matter.

I knew 2 pilots with the same problem, who, after years of managing to disguise the problem, and numerous failures along the way, made it to airline flying. Their subsequent careers were plauged with incidents, including one near-fatal occurance. Both are now out of the aviation business. Thankfully, they killed no-one.

Now for the cruel, tough, politically incorrect response - DON'T FLY! Unless a cure which guarantees normalcy can be found which has a high certainty of success, stay on the ground!

So easy for me to take such a stance? - NO!. My daughter loves flying with a passion as great as mine, but has a condition which is occasionally debilitating. She could have disguised it, but took the adult, responsible approach, abandoned flying, and found a new profession. I'm proud of her for it.

If I am temporarily debilitated, I call in sick. If I ever find myself with a long term condition averse to flying, I will hand in my licence.

[jayteeto]

Old Smokey.... Agreed!

Batninth, I am afraid it is not a silly little problem. When I heard about my ex student who nearly hit the cliff, I felt sick. I should have pushed harder for him to be chopped again.

[batninth]

Jayteeto - Let's take this thread in the context that it was started in: Aerodynamicist asked for advice for helping a student pilot with Left-Right problems. My posting was put up in the context to say that, for me, working with Left/NOT Left works better.

OK, so maybe the word "Silly" could be read out of context, but it certainly feels silly getting lost in hotel corridors or the offices of clients. For me the answer to anything more complicated - taking the controls of a flying machine, driving on the continent etc - requires planning, planning and more planning with visualisation.

If we take it to the context of flying - I must declare that I am a wannabe PPL here - I think about the lecture that we had from the safety team when I worked at British Aerospace about the momentum of our fast jet-powered flying machines and the kinetic energy that is within them. If you take charge of that much kinetic energy then I agree with Old Smokey that it is really a matter of working out whether or not you are capable of safely handling that much KE.

Looking at your posting it's not clear to the circumstances, but if flying visual surely the decision is not so much Left/NOT left as more Cliff/NOT Cliff? If it was in IMC then it's more worrying, as Old Smokey says it comes down to deciding to throw away the licence if you truely cannot cope with this. Should I ever attain the lofty heights of trying for an IMC rating, then it will be my decision of my L/R problem whether to continue or stick to visual flying.

Anyway we read very similar tales from perfectly able people in ILAFFT