A beginner may start with a stick plane rather than a proper trainer plane, PROVIDED that, the control throws must be set within reasonable range to the trainee reflex.

I am of the opinion that, based on previous training experience given to new pilots, they ACTUALLY were having difficulty with some of the trainer planes as the planes do not response accurately to their intended direction or control and this has some sort of making them less confident with the control of the plane. I believe this could be due to the large diheadral on those trainer plane which in some cases caused the plane to self correct on every control inputs.

Whereas the stick response is quite accurate to the direction as intended by the trainee. No doubt that the plane could not 'float' as good as a trainer plane, but the character of 'trainer floating' has actually caused concern by some trainee as they find it even difficult to direct the plane to landing. The floating tendency of the trainer has also caused landing procedure to be much influence by the slight varying wind condition, as compared to stick plane which has/no float tendency. With a proper elevator setting, a stick can land by itself if the altitude and the descending degree and the throttle is cut at a right approach time.

BUT my personal advise DO NOT get a Hangar 9 Super Stick 40 as it is by far the worst ARF I have experienced as the tail section of the plane is too fragile especially for beginner opting for a stick plane to take up flying. This problem is impounding if you make it tail dragger instead of having a main wheel.

Get a World Model Stick 40 or even better the 60 size (bigger is better).

However, to even make a learning fast go and get someone to build a SPAD plane for you or find it yourself at spadtothebone.com or in the SPAD forum.

Attached is my self built SPAD CAP and it really flies fantastic.