You must be technically competent before you can teach others, but your technical competence must be supplemented by the ability to organize information, to present it effectively, and to arouse and keep the interest of your trainees.

You will find excellent general information on how to plan, carry out, and evaluate an instructional program in Military Requirements for Petty Officer Second Class, NAVEDTRA 12045, and in Military Requirements for Petty Officer First Class, NAVED TRA 12046.

Our discussion does not include the basic information given in these References. Instead, it deals with some of the difficulties peculiar to the training of the engine-room and auxiliary personnel and some of the ways in which you can overcome or minimize these difficulties.

What kinds of things cause special problems in the training of engine-room personnel? For one thing, the interrelationship of propulsion plant operations. Each person must be trained to perform not only as an individual but also as a member of a team. Take for instance the duties of the watch standers. They are very closely related, and the actions taken by one person depend in some way upon the actions taken by other persons. From a long-range point of view, however, the teamwork required for engine-room operations can actually be turned to a training advantage. As a person is being trained for one specific duty, he or she will naturally learn something about the other duties. As a rule, therefore, the first part of a persons engine-room training may take quite a while, but the last part will take much less time.

The procedures for training a new person in engine-room operations vary considerably, depending upon such factors as the ships steaming schedule, the condition of the engine-room machinery, the number of experienced personnel available to assist in the training, and the amount of time that can be devoted to the training. In general, however, you will probably begin by training the trainee to act as messenger. Then, before the trainee is assigned to any actual duty, he or she should be introduced to the engine room and become familiar with the location of all machinery, equipment, piping, and valves. The trainee must also be instructed in certain basic safety precautions and be specifically warned about the dangers of turning valve wheels or tampering with machinery. IF IN DOUBT, ASK QUESTIONS! is a pretty good rule for any new person in the engine room to follow.

A person ready to be trained in the duties of messenger should be shown all the gauges that are in use, told what the gauges indicate, and shown how to take readings. The trainee should understand why the readings are important, exactly how often each gauge must be read, and how to make accurate entries in the engine-room log. When you are sure the trainee understands everything about gauges, teach the trainee how to check lube-oil levels and how to clean metal edge-type filters and basket strainer-type.

For a while you will have to keep a close watch on the trainees performance of these duties. When the trainee becomes proficient in the duties of messenger, start the training in the throttlemans duties. Fist, let the trainee observe the throttleman Then, if conditions permit, let the trainee start and secure machinery.

As far as manual skills are concerned, the throttlemans job is probably easier than the messengers job. But the throttle watch requires the utmost vigilance and reliability, and a new person will have a lot to learn before being trusted to stand the throttle watch alone. Personnel should always start out under the supervision of an experienced throttleman and should remain under this supervision until the petty officer in charge of the engine room is fully satisfied that the trainee is completely qualified for this duty.

In training engine-room personnel who have not had previous engine-room experience, remember that an engine room can be a complicated and confusing place to someone who walks into it for the first time. A lot of equipment is crammed into a small space, and a lot of complex actions are going on at the same time. When training new personnel, try to think back to the time when you first went into an engine room. What aspects of engine-room operations were most confusing to you at first? What kind of training would have made your learning easier and faster? By analyzing your own early experience and reactions, you get a bearing on what a new person may experience and you may be able to provide more effective training.

When you train new personnel, remember that they vary widely in their methods and rates of learning. Some people will learn most effectively if you give them an overall view of main engine operations, including a certain amount of theory, before going into the details of the hardware and the manual operations. Others will learn most effectively if they are taught some manual skills before getting too involved with theory. Some people learn manual skills rapidly but take a long time to absorb the theory; for others, the reverse is true. And, of course, some people learn everything slowly. Some trainees benefit from patient, almost endless repetition of information; others may become bored and restless if you go over the same point too often. The important thing to remember is that your training efforts will be most successful if you are able to observe and allow for the individual differences that are bound to exist.

Closely related to this point is another: Dont make snap judgments about peoples abilities until they have had a chance to DEMONSTRATE them. You may turn out to be very wrong if you make snap judgments on the basis of a general impression, such as appearance, or the rate at which they learn when they first come into the engine room.

When training personnel who have already had some engine-room experience but who have been on some other type of ship, you may find that a certain amount of retraining is needed before the individual can qualify as an engine-room watch stander on your ship. No two engine rooms are precisely alike in all details, and no two main engines that appear to be identical behave in precisely the same way under all conditions. Each engine has its own individuality, and operating personnel must adjust to the engine to obtain the best results. Practically all Enginemen learn this sooner or later; you can speed up the learning process by encouraging engine-room personnel to notice and to discuss differences between engines.