Maritime Professional Development UK’s radar simulator has been developed to directly support the RYA Radar Course. This document has been written to give RYA Radar Instructors guidance as to how best to use the simulator to teach the course and develop a student’s competence and confidence using radar.
The simulator has been designed to sit at the heart of the RYA Radar Course. As you will see when you log on to the simulator there are nine exercises. These exercises have been designed to develop a student’s understanding in a structured way and it is considered essential that the exercises are run in order and instructors utilise the structure suggested in the Lesson Plans for each exercise.
As a guide, Exercise 1 – ‘Basics of Using Radar’ has been created to focus on developing the real basics of the radar and doesn’t seek to go into any detail as to how the features introduced in this exercise are used. For example, the Lesson Plan for Exercise 1 suggests showing how to switch on/off and adjust VRMs and EBLs. We’d advise at this stage not to try to show how these features are used as that’s scheduled to be covered in later exercises. Doing so at this stage risks overloading the students and compromising their learning and the subsequent exercises.
Theory teaching time Vs Simulator time
The aim of using the simulator is to put this at the heart of the student’s learning. From running numerous trial courses, based on a course running 0900-1700 the theory element should amount to no more than 90 minutes in total spread throughout the day. It’s suggested that the theory sessions relevant to each exercise should be delivered as a lead into the relevant exercise. This ensures the student can make the most of the exercise. The simulator can be used by the instructor as a means to teach the theory relevant to the exercise either by using the exercise or using the ‘Explore Map’ feature to ‘Teleport’ to a location on Training Chart 4 to run a demo.
Please do not hesitate to contact us for advice about using the simulator. Your suggestions for improvements to the simulator are always appreciated too.
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Regards, Pete