Skyhawk 172/Cutlass 172
Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Commercial; Flight Crew Flight Instructor
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 11; Flight Crew Total 2215; Flight Crew Type 1257
Workload; Troubleshooting; Situational Awareness; Distraction; Communication Breakdown; Training / Qualification
ATC Issue All Types; Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance
Air Traffic Control Issued New Clearance; Flight Crew Returned To Clearance; Flight Crew Requested ATC Assistance / Clarification; Flight Crew Became Reoriented
Aircraft; Human Factors
I was combining a personal IFR flight with cross-country training for my student; who is a primary; pre-solo student with about 10 hours of flight time. We departed GNV and were on the initial climbout; runway heading; but my student was having some trouble establishing proper pitch attitude and holding heading. He also told me he was having a very hard time hearing me. Tower handed us to Jacksonville Departure. I told my student to continue flying while I contacted Departure. I SHOULD have told my student; 'my airplane' and then contacted Departure. Departure gave me a simple vector to join the airway; but trying to get my student to turn; lower the nose so I could see traffic; and write down the frequency and airway number; I got saturated (as was my student at that point not being able to hear what I was telling him to do.) I realized I had forgotten the heading just given me and had to ask Jacksonville to say again; which he did. Because my student couldn't hear me; I pointed; trying to get him to turn; but by the time I returned to my paper to write the frequency; I had forgotten it again; and had to ask Jacksonville to say the simple clearance for the third time!From the perspective of the controller; I probably appeared to be an IFR pilot in need of remedial training; when in fact I was an instructor doing a poor job of managing the flight; not taking over when I needed to. It was a minor moment of task saturation and resulting brain freeze; which could have been avoided with prompt re-taking of the controls; when I realized we were both getting overloaded - him with flying the plane; me with troubleshooting the com problem; trying to get him to go where we needed to be pointed; and accepting the clearance.
C172 instructor pilot reported after takeoff he had trouble communicating with the student pilot. During this distracting event ATC had to repeat their clearance 3 times.