In the field of aviation, air traffic controllers must be able to adapt to and act upon continuing changes in a highly advanced technological work environment. This position paper claims that explicit training of self-directed learning skills (i.e. the ability to: formulate own learning needs, set own learning goals, and identify learning tasks that help to achieve personal learning goals) is important for future professionals in aviation. In this paper, we present an adaptive training system in which the system and trainee share control over learning task selection and which can help trainees to develop their self-directed learning skills.