Can someone explain to me what the h*ll this is about??

[detroit diver]

NWGratefulDiver once bubbled...
To those who responded to my questions ... thanks for keeping it informative. I'm a recently-certified DM, and will be starting my instructor training shortly. I'd like to approach it with an open mind, and as many different perspectives on teaching methods as possible.

A question for those who said you learned OW in a DIR rig. Since GUE hasn't yet started teaching OW, who teaches this method? SSI perhaps? Or is this a particular shop's approach? And are the DIR rigs "rental" units, or do you require your students (or yourself, if you learned this way) to purchase a DIR setup in advance of the class?

Thanks again ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

My OW instructor was/is a PADI instructor (and now a GUE instructor). I started in a BC. He then showed us his BP/wing setup and asked if we'd like to try it. It was a no-brainer from there. It was far more comfortable than the BC, and became invisible in the water. I used his set after that and then put in an order for mine and my son's.

He is now only teaching classes in BP/wings. WJL's daughter was one of his students, and I can tell you she looked great during her OW dives. Really an amazing diffrence from the "common student" that you see in OW dives.

 

[GearHead]

sheck33 once bubbled...
i do know that 5th Dimension teaches the SSI open water class the DIR way. The students can rent BP/wing/long hose setup.

I can confirm sheck33's post. My wife took her SSI Advanced OW class through FifthD and chose to rent a BP/wing setup from them. She loved it so much in comparison to her back-inflate BC that she bought a BP/Wing just weeks later. For her it was mostly about the superior stability and comfort.

 

[jepuskar]

I am actually tossing around the idea of a BP/Wing setup....

Pioneer Wings...not sure which lift capacity...I dont want different wings for different climates.....7mm Cold water and 3mm warm water diving....also, the 6lb Steel backplate...I like that idea.

Well anyway...

Mike, I should be there in the early afternoon also...If you want I can videotape your students if you want to show them what they look like in the water.

Jason

 

[Whirling Girl]

NWGratefulDiver once bubbled...
A question for those who said you learned OW in a DIR rig. Since GUE hasn't yet started teaching OW, who teaches this method? SSI perhaps? Or is this a particular shop's approach? And are the DIR rigs "rental" units, or do you require your students (or yourself, if you learned this way) to purchase a DIR setup in advance of the class?

Dang, Bob. It's nice to see you're really interested. You were pretty peeved the last time we were in a DIR discussion on the NW Diver board.

GUE apparently has its OW curriculum finished and ready to go. As has already been posted, 5th D has been doing it for a while by teaching some of the DIRF stuff to to its OW students. Like most other OW courses, you only buy the usual setup beforehand (fins/mask/gloves/boots/snorkel).

Since you're in WA, you might contact RJ Myers (SSI OW, GUE DIRF instructor) and tell him about your research on different teaching methods, and I know that he would love to talk with you about it, and might invite you to observe a class. David Evans is also teaching OW and might also be more than happy to let you ride along. I'll be tagging along on his class too, just for fun.

NWGratefulDiver once bubbled...
DM's are expected to hover when demonstrating skills on OW dives. If you can't do it, you have no business calling yourself a "dive master".

Amen. Just curious; do you hover horizontal to do skills, or vertical?

I like that your LDS has such a low student-to-divemaster ratio. In my OW class, we usually had a 1-1 or 1-2 ratio and I think it made a huge difference in how much I learned in the class. My DIRF class was even better; 1 student to 2 instructors/divecons. Plus video. I felt like queen for a day. It was awesome!

Margaret

 

[o2scuba]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...


"Maybe I'm misreading this. Are you suggesting that I combine skills to save time? If so, that's not the case at all. Although laying a good foundation in buoyancy control and trim ( a side benefit od which is real comfort in the water) everything else does seem to go mach easier and faster."


Sorry Mike, I guess that came out wrong. My point is that as long as you have the time, there is nothing wrong with teaching the skill first, then adding in the challenge of combining with bouyancy demands. The opposite is also true, a lot can be said for developing bouyancy skills, and then adding the challenge of performing skills while hovering. I like to do both. for example, be sure a student is proficient in the alternate air source skill while stationary (on bottom). Then Have students practice bouyancy skills (pivots, underwater swimming, trim etc)(or vise-versa).Once they have practiced these skills independantly
then begin to combine the tasks. I think the only thing we are not totally in agreement with is that teaching certain skills in a stationary position at first CAN be beneficial.

Sometimes a student can be overwhelmed by trying to do it all together right away. All it takes is one bad experience (a snoot ful of water) and a student could drop out percieving that the tasks are harder than they actually are. Wheras a slower approach (step by step) may be less challenging, and build confidence. Thiis is certainly not the case with all people, but some.




Minimizing risk is a big motivation for me. I was really tought to expect OW dive one to be a cluster. You know one student shooting up while another is dropping down. I thought that was the way it had to be because that's all I ever saw. Once I gave it some thought it seemed silly and I changed the way I do things. OW dive one is now easy and enjoyable.

I agree 100% ow 1 should be a confidence building, fun dive.




When students are proficient I think the risk is greatly reduced. The instructor does need to have control and be prepared to step in if the situation becomes dangerous but I don't feel you need to be overweighted and on the bottom to do that. It might be the easiest way but I don't feel it's the best.

I never said anything about overweighting, just risk management, common sense and a progressive learning process. Frankly I don't think that using a line is "easier", but in a worse case senario it is one more step that presents prudent behavior by an instructor, and thus beneficial if one had to defend his/her actions. Surely you must agree that using a line (left leg wrapped as illustrated in the instructor manual) offers far more control in the event of a student bolting or ascending too fast.

 

[roakey]

o2scuba once bubbled...
But teaching new divers this skill on the platform/sand DOES introduce them to the skill making them more comfortable (and successful) doing the same thing later in mid-water later.

How many pool sessions before the OW checkout dives?

The students should have been weaned off the bottom in the pool; the shallow depths of the pool makes it the MOST difficult place to do those skills, going deeper for the OW checkouts will actually make things easier on them!

And as for ANY kind of demo for a technical class, they should NEVER touch the bottom -- the divers that enter any kind of class at that level should have stopped using the bottom as a crutch long, long ago so there's be NO reason to demo a skill kneeling on the bottom.

Roak

 

[roakey]

I was talking to an instructor from the San Diego area (DIR shop) about a year ago about an experience he had on an open boat. As his class ascended, they did a modified safety stop, 1 min @30, 1 min @20 and 2 min @10 near, but not holding onto the downline.

When they climbed back on board another diver asked what technical class he was teaching. He smiled and responded:

Open water.

Instructors, this isn't hard to teach! You've been saying it's hard for so long that you believe yourselves now.

Perhaps you should take a vacaction, DM for FifthD and learn the ropes.

Roak

 

[diverbrian]

roakey once bubbled...
I was talking to an instructor from the San Diego area (DIR shop) about a year ago about an experience he had on an open boat. As his class ascended, they did a modified safety stop, 1 min @30, 1 min @20 and 2 min @10 near, but not holding onto the downline.

When they climbed back on board another diver asked what technical class he was teaching. He smiled and responded:

Open water.

Instructors, this isn't hard to teach! You've been saying it's hard for so long that you believe yourselves now.

Perhaps you should take a vacaction, DM for FifthD and learn the ropes.

Roak

In general, I agree with the posters here about kneeling on the bottom in a technical class. I have no intention of going this way to learn tech diving anyways, so PADI's Central Office wants to make their divers look clueless, let them. Let the divers that have PADI cards tell them what they want.

I happen to know that there are many good divers and instructors out there that happen to have PADI cards, but I have other instructors here that I trust and they happen to be from other training agencies.


RANT WARNING, RANT WARNING

But, as a non-DIR representative, I would like to give some (admittedly unsolicited) advice. Read Roakey's last sentence and see if that would attract you to a way of doing things or make it sound like GUE/DIR divers in general happen to be a little arrogant. I have read so many comments here lately that make DIR divers sound like they are thumbing there noses at the unenlightened among us. If not for some PM's with another DIR diver here (the person knows who they are, thanks for the invite! I may take you up on it yet!) and some posts by the DIR people that are trying to think about what they say before hitting the POST button (I will not claim to be perfect in this area either, so there you go. Also, the "reasonable" DIR divers on this board are known to the people that frequent the board.) , I may get the impression that the bulk of the DIR crowd is arrogant, inflexible, and wants to make diving a chore instead of fun. So, how is this going to give you the opportunity to get people to learn your system if they feel that your style of diving is about being around these kinds of people?

We have two dive instructors at our LDS who have been teaching for years and long before DIR was started. They have evolved their style over the years. They teach buoyancy control first then the skills are done as if by magic in the last two pool sessions because the students have those skills down. There is some initial kneeling in the pool when they have students get comfortable, but the last three pool sessions are neutral. They are NOT trying to graduate cave divers, but our divers do not kick up silt (and most of them flutter kick) as they are taught to angle their bodies and legs so that there fins don't go below their bodies (also known as "watch your fin wash"), they have good buoyancy control as witnessed by watching other classes at the same time in the quarry. I get tired of people making it sound as though if you aren't graduating people whose ambitions are to do strictly open water diving, you are doing them a disservice. To re-iterate, GUE/DIR did not invent good dive training and good skills. Some us get tired of some of the people here making it sound like they did.

They are always learning like any of us. But please read what you are posting. As well, my skills and those of everybody around me are develping in their own time. When you speak as a DIR diver you "represent" your style? Do you really want to be an thought of an elitest, arrogant organization, or one willing to educate people and learn from others? I am sure that most of you are not as elitest as your posts make you sound. Just keep in mind that it is extremely difficult to keep people from taking things literally when the word is written and there is no voice inflection or facial expression to tone what you are saying.
And PLEASE notice, I repeatably use the phrase "make them sound like" or "make you sound like", NOT "they are" or "you are"! This is NOT (repeat NOT) about namecalling, this is an observation from someone who would like things to STAY civil.

RANT OVER

Now, that my rant's over, I will agree that this position of instruction is entirely unsuitable for a technical class and reflects poorly on PADI. If PADI knows what it is doing, they will take a closer look at this and fix it before they lose all kinds of business to other agencies.

 

[MikeFerrara]

o2scuba once bubbled...


I never said anything about overweighting, just risk management, common sense and a progressive learning process. Frankly I don't think that using a line is "easier", but in a worse case senario it is one more step that presents prudent behavior by an instructor, and thus beneficial if one had to defend his/her actions. Surely you must agree that using a line (left leg wrapped as illustrated in the instructor manual) offers far more control in the event of a student bolting or ascending too fast.

Certainly a line can be a good idea and is required for conducting the ESA. However I've seen way too many students bolt or otherwise be unable to control an ascent or descent. IMO, the best way is to prevent it by making sure students are comfortable and competant before going to OW.

 

[o2scuba]

roakey once bubbled...
How many pool sessions before the OW checkout dives?

Usually 3 sometime 4. 4 hour sessions, in some cases a little longer, but pool is only used during our winter season.
I am a PADI Instructor so we don't do "check-out dives". PADI's term is "Open Water Training Dive"

roakey once bubbled...
The students should have been weaned off the bottom in the pool; the shallow depths of the pool makes it the MOST difficult place to do those skills, going deeper for the OW checkouts will actually make things easier on them!

Gee wiz. Really?

We are all aware of this fact. That is the point isn't it. We are discussing teaching skills. Teaching skills is done in the confined water portion of the program. Surely you are not suggesting taking students on open water dives prior to learning all of the nessessary skills.

Was there a point to this post? ANy reason you quoted me?

roakey once bubbled...
And as for ANY kind of demo for a technical class, they should NEVER touch the bottom -- the divers that enter any kind of class at that level should have stopped using the bottom as a crutch long, long ago so there's be NO reason to demo a skill kneeling on the bottom.

???????????????? I made no comments regarding tec divers. My post addressed the discussion regarding ow training.