Dive Master in training

[Davey Diverson]

GQMedic once bubbled...

I do remember buoyancy being one of my weaker subjects though during my OW class.

So, lemme ask you this. You have two instructors that are telling you you wouldn't have made it to OW in their class.

A. How do you feel about it?
B. How have you resolved it?

(I know the answer to B, I just like hearing it from the troops.)

 

[MikeFerrara]

Davey Diverson once bubbled...


So, lemme ask you this. You have two instructors that are telling you you wouldn't have made it to OW in their class.

A. How do you feel about it?
B. How have you resolved it?

(I know the answer to B, I just like hearing it from the troops.)

That is NOT what we are telling him. I am telling him that since buoyancy control and propulsion is diving my classes spend a lot of time practicing it as apposed to just a 1 minute swim accross the pool without hitting the bottom and another five minutes hovering. The mechanics of trim is tought to them in class and they practice it in the pool. They later apply it to the OW environment where it's a little harder because of a full wet suit. We get it squared away over a platfor (or similar area) before we go tooling around. It's all very simple.

 

[MikeFerrara]

GQMedic once bubbled...


Mike,

Good question, I honestly don't remember spending too much time on buoyancy control in my OW class. That's not to say we didn't spend adequate time, I do remember buoyancy being one of my weaker subjects though during my OW class.

It's almost every students weaker subject in the beginning. Shouldn't the weakest skill get the most time devoted to it? All the skills are easy when overweighted and planed on the bottom but that's not diving and it doesn't count.

Davey Diverson once bubbled...

I have no idea. All I'm telling you is there is a high correlation between lousy vis and OW classes.

Just the facts, man. Just the facts.[/B]

You're right there is. I'm saying there isn't any excuse for it and it doesn't need to be that way. It's not diving and it isn't teaching diving.

 

[Davey Diverson]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...


That is NOT what we are telling him.

Then perhaps you should clarify:

"If my students are crashing the bottom in the pool they don't go to OW. If they can't do simple skills off the bottom they don't go to OW."

This guy said his bc skills suxed, which is typical of new divers. He said it took him over 40 dives just to get comfortable.

So, did you mean something else?

I am telling him that since buoyancy control and propulsion is diving my classes spend a lot of time practicing it as apposed to just a 1 minute swim accross the pool without hitting the bottom and another five minutes hovering.

"If my students are crashing the bottom in the pool they don't go to OW. If they can't do simple skills off the bottom they don't go to OW."

 

[MikeFerrara]

Davey Diverson once bubbled...


Then perhaps you should clarify:

"If my students are crashing the bottom in the pool they don't go to OW. If they can't do simple skills off the bottom they don't go to OW."

This guy said his bc skills suxed, which is typical of new divers. He said it took him over 40 dives just to get comfortable.

So, did you mean something else?



"If my students are crashing the bottom in the pool they don't go to OW. If they can't do simple skills off the bottom they don't go to OW."

I thought I was pretty clear but I'll try again. During the time we spend in the pool one of our primary goals is developing buoyancy control skills. By the end of our pool sessions the student are able to control position in the water. Then we go to OW. It does take practice and instruction. We do this in the pool with our students rather than certifying them and telling them that they'll learn it later on their own. In OW they gain experience applying the skills they learned in the pool to a real diving environment.

Having bc skills that stink may be typical of some students but it is not typical of my students (at least not when we finish). It only makes sense to square away basic skills in confined water before going to OW and, in fact, is a requirement within the standards (at least in the two agencies I teach through). We don't take students to OW until they've mastered confined water skills. The term "Mastery", BTW, is defined in the training standards (PADI). To do otherwise is , in fact, a violation of standards and at the very least a violation of the intent of the standards.

Are you advocating the intentional violation of training standards or just using the wiggle room allowed by some of the subjective language used?

Buoyancy control isn't that hard. Students will learn it up front if it's tought to them up front. To not teach it and then say it's typical for new divers to ruin the vis is a self fulfilling prophacy if I've ever seen one.

 

[Big-t-2538]

Davey Diverson once bubbled...

Then perhaps you should clarify:

This guy said his bc skills suxed, which is typical of new divers. He said it took him over 40 dives just to get comfortable.

So, did you mean something else?

I think you're missing the pint....

What mike and others are saying is that before they will take their students to open water, they have to display good Bouyancy Control in the pool.

Not enough people teach classes in this manner....I about crapped my pants when I was on the dock at an un-disclosed OW location and I heard "this is your BCD...you use this to control your bouyancy"....yep I turned, looked, and there were 6 students in the water, one guy who looked like a guide next to them...and this intstructor standing in fins and full gear on a wet wooden dock "teaching" them. (frankly I wanted to do one of my bull-headed maneuvers on land...but decided that since I was with a class that was a bad idea)

Long story short, there are good instructors and bad instructors....I would say the majority of divers come out of OW with poor bouyancy skills, then they make a buch of dives doing one of two things

1 - working on their skills and getting better or
2 - continue to muck up the place and wreck viz/coral/etc.

In an ideal world, this wouldn't be an issue, but not enough people out there believe that bouyancy control can be taught in BOW.

 

[Davey Diverson]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...

I thought I was pretty clear but I'll try again.

You were abundantly clear. You said

"If my students are crashing the bottom in the pool they don't go to OW. If they can't do simple skills off the bottom they don't go to OW."

And he said:
"It took me about 40 dives just be to "decent" at buoyancy control."

Seems clear to me, unless you meant something else.

Are you advocating the intentional violation of training standards or just using the wiggle room allowed by some of the subjective language used?

I'm not advocating anything. I want to know how this guy feels about your stated passing requirements.

Buoyancy control isn't that hard. Students will learn it up front if it's tought to them up front.

Well, here is where we disagree. BC is a skill, and it's mastered through practice, not instruction. Some folks nail it right away, others take 40 dives or so. In fact, my experience is that the latter, to some degree or another, is the norm.

It's like saying you can teach someone to hit a major league fastball. You might be able to teach swing, grip, and stance, but getting wood on Randy Johnson takes time.

 

[Davey Diverson]

Big-t-2538 once bubbled...

I think you're missing the pint....

I rarely miss a pint. Points, on the other hand, have been known to fly right over my pointy head.

What mike and others are saying is that before they will take their students to open water, they have to display good Bouyancy Control in the pool.

I get that. What I'm saying is that this guy took 40 dives to get it right. Mike and others have said they wouldn't put the guy in open water. I want to know how he feels about that.

 

[Big-t-2538]

I love it when I mis-spell something and it comes out funny (you should see what I posted in the women's only forum one time....)

As for taking 40 dives to get it down, don't you think it would have been a little easier in a class with an instructor who started him off in that fashion...or had someone there with him on each dive to work with him on bouyancy control....

sure I can learn a new thing all by myself, but it is going to take me a lot longer to get it down if I don;t have someone with more experience than myself there helping me out along the way.

 

[Big-t-2538]

Davey Diverson once bubbled...

It's like saying you can teach someone to hit a major league fastball. You might be able to teach swing, grip, and stance, but getting wood on Randy Johnson takes time.

ohh..I'm gonna have fun with this...

See what a lot of OW instructors are teaching is slow pitch softball...of course it is going to take a lot of time to work up to that 100+ mph cheese the unit can throw if you have never seen it.

However, if you have only seen good ol #1 from your instructor that whole time, you are going to be able to put wood on that ball a whole lot sooner than the dude who only sees 20mph tricklers.