I agree with some of the others, get more dives than 20 before doing your AOW, when it comes to diving nothing can substitute for experience!
AOW course feedback
- Thread starter chip104
- Start date
Please register or login
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
- Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
- A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
- You can make this box go away
Spoon
Contributor
experience is the best teacher i have friends that dive like dive masters without aow certification. Aow is useless without the experience. i honestly feel ripped off after taking mine. if you feel good about having a plastic certification card then go for it. had i known earlier i wouldnt have taken it.
clgsamson
Koya Kap
yup that's what I did. Took the course after 45 dives and I learned more.
Spoon
Contributor
clgsamson:
remember the controversy i told you about? people selling course after course ? i dont know how these instructors can sell an A open water course to some divers immediately after OW certifications. whats next rescue course after 10 logged dives?
shugar
Contributor
we're seeing a difference here... personally i was advised to get at least 12 dives under my belt before taking the AOW... i was lucky too because i did more than 12 (16 i think) before the course and they included some pretty racy "advanced" dives because of work... some deeps, a couple of drifts, a rabid drift...
what i hated about the course was how "rote" some of the lessons were... so by-the-book that didn't really focus to see if you actually learned something... if you showed that you were able to do the exercise underwater ok ka na...
as a teacher though i figured i had to understand the principles behind it... so even if the teacher sucked, if i understood the lesson then i should be able to learn
my PPB was another issue... i never did find out if i "hovered" properly or did stuff well... i got an "ok" for the backflip and other stuff (hovering daw etc.) but since my rental reg freeflowed somewhere at the beginning of the dive (at 60'), i got a little thrown off my groove... the fact pa that it was so freaking humid that weekend didn't help one bit...
so what did i learn from all this? the AOW is what you get out of it... if i could do it over i'd ask my instructor to spend a little more effort on fixing my bouyancy and trim... i'm happy i can "legally" do a night dive and deep dive now...
was it a rip off? it wasn't the best 5k i spent but it wasn't a total waste... sayang lang pala if i waited diba axua? hehehehehe
Jag
what i hated about the course was how "rote" some of the lessons were... so by-the-book that didn't really focus to see if you actually learned something... if you showed that you were able to do the exercise underwater ok ka na...
as a teacher though i figured i had to understand the principles behind it... so even if the teacher sucked, if i understood the lesson then i should be able to learn
my PPB was another issue... i never did find out if i "hovered" properly or did stuff well... i got an "ok" for the backflip and other stuff (hovering daw etc.) but since my rental reg freeflowed somewhere at the beginning of the dive (at 60'), i got a little thrown off my groove... the fact pa that it was so freaking humid that weekend didn't help one bit...
so what did i learn from all this? the AOW is what you get out of it... if i could do it over i'd ask my instructor to spend a little more effort on fixing my bouyancy and trim... i'm happy i can "legally" do a night dive and deep dive now...
was it a rip off? it wasn't the best 5k i spent but it wasn't a total waste... sayang lang pala if i waited diba axua? hehehehehe
Jag
shugar
Contributor
TRUE!
more importantly i think - AOW is useless without understanding what it's for... too little experience might not give you the prior knowledge to understand what the real-world application of skills would be like
on the other hand too much experience (e.g. 100 dives) - would mean that you require a lot more out of "aow" than what the books might say, it's your responsibiltiy to tell your instructor to tailor-fit the course content to your skill level
may sense ba?
Jag
more importantly i think - AOW is useless without understanding what it's for... too little experience might not give you the prior knowledge to understand what the real-world application of skills would be like
on the other hand too much experience (e.g. 100 dives) - would mean that you require a lot more out of "aow" than what the books might say, it's your responsibiltiy to tell your instructor to tailor-fit the course content to your skill level
may sense ba?
Jag
Spoon
Contributor
shugar:
you have a point. what i was trying to point out is that aow would be quite useless to someone who hasnt really tinkered around with their OW course. would be a waste for someone newly certified to jump into AOW without racking up more practical experience. if that happens then the ppb and drift dive, multilevel, navigation, night etc would be too much overtasking of a already overtasked diver.
simply put its a case to case basis here and different divers have different comfort levels and learning curves in regards to the ocean environment. i was immediately sold an aow course after like 3 logged dives and told the instructor to slow down a bit. i took the aow after around 20 dives and it helped me a lot. had i taken it way earlier i may have had a redundant time learning stuff i already knew but had a hard time applying in the water.
main reason why i took the AOW course was to get the deep dive under my belt so i could go deep. this is one of the reasons why most take the aow course. in fact one of my friends was aow certified after 5 dives and the instructor immediately took him deep and he almost had a close call. experience is the best teacher and although anyone now can take an aow course soon after, it is recommended to wait a bit more and reack more dives to prepare you for the worst and to make the most out of your hard earned tuition fee.
my experience was soo bad that id rather do this via pm
btw your poseidons are waiting for you. there nicely tucked in the bag with your name on it.
shugar
Contributor
Spoon:
ya great... tempt me why don't you ... get thee behind me temptation! hahahahahaha
Jag
PS
don't know if you need it but will gladly exchange my services as an ex-deal on the regs
(hell i'll even throw in the numbers of a few of my students if you want) 
Spoon
Contributor
shugar:don't know if you need it but will gladly exchange my services as an ex-deal on the regs
tempting mmmm......... like you im trying to be good though.
clgsamson
Koya Kap
rescue/efr after my 90th dive and that's it for me.
Similar threads
