Diver Training, Has It Really Been Watered Down???

[They call me Tater]

I was originally certified back in 1980. 16 week college course 3 hours per week for BASIC SCUBA DIVER.
We spent half of that time in the pool and it included all kinds of 'skin diving' and swimming skills. Took almost 30 years off.

The shop I now teach at is making the transition this year to not only allow but to prefer the online class. We will still have our class time to review, but won't need the breaks and test times etc. We will use the extra day to increase the time in the pool. Since we are a cold weather shop, we won't see any results until mid summer but I am eager and optimistic to see how that works.

My experience is that most of our students do their studies an pass the test pretty easily. There are always a few that read the book in the class and have to re-take. I would rather they do that on their own time.

 

[Trailboss123]

When the eLearning first came out, the director of instruction in the shop where I was working was dead set against it, so we didn't do it at all. Then he reluctantly agreed to it, and the results were shocking to everyone. The students came in really knowing their stuff. I think I went through a dozen students myself before I had the first one miss a single question on the exam. It was not long before the shop totally flipped and required ALL instruction to be done with the online class because they felt the students were that much better prepared.

When you do the online class, it is not instructor-free. The students still have to come in, meet with the instructor, and take the exam. We always made that meeting long enough to allow the instructor to add all the stuff that instructors normally add to the class. That way, nothing was lost.

This has been my experience as well. I was biased against the e-learning method initially. But, after watching student after student come in so well prepared and knowledgeable, I was forced to change my tune.

 

[Bob DBF]

We were expected to be fully independent divers, to be able to plan and execute our own dives (which emphatically did include gas planning), and to take full responsibility for the outcomes, once the ink was dry on the C-card

According to the RSTC, it is still the standard.

http://wrstc.com/downloads/03 - Open Water Diver.pdf


Bob

 

[boulderjohn]

According to the RSTC, it is still the standard.

http://wrstc.com/downloads/03 - Open Water Diver.pdf

The dive planning, at least for PADI, has been greatly improved in the most recent version of the class. Gas planning is part of the academic material. Students plan and execute a "mini-dive" in the pool sessions. Dive #4 is now supposed to be planned and executed by student team, with no intervention by the instructor unless it becomes necessary. The instructor just observes.

 

[CT-Rich]

I am not really going to compare the dozen plus classes I had in 1980 to the online class my daughter had two years ago. Tons of stuff taught today were not known then, like safety stops. Dive tables were huge, but computers were skipped...

I will say that how people retain information has not changed. You really need to hear something three times to retain it and the old school classes were probably better because the discussion of physic was on par with what I would teach a general science student today. I doubt a OW student today retains that much from a single pass through the OW training material. Today there is a much bigger emphasis on continuing education after your initial classes and is good because a diver with ten dive and his AOW card has more practical experience in the water than I did after 12 pool sessions and 3 checkout dives. I started with a much more grounded training, but not a lot of follow up. The next class I had after certification was the AI course I took in college three years later.

 

[TMHeimer]

I wish I could answer the exact question the OP asked but I was certified in 91 so e-learning wasn't available and I have never taken any significant time off since, but I do have a couple of thoughts.

First, I think it's going to be very difficult to get any objective information when you have someone who took the course years ago and then took it again as an e-learning course to freshen up on the subject matter. The problem you have is the diver isn't really learning the material again. They already know the material and what they are really doing is taking a refresher. So is the e-learning going to seem easier because they essentially already know what they are looking at? Are the e-learning materials more than enough because everything will quickly come back to mind?

Second, I think e-learning in general is a better way to learn. I work in the power industry and we have all kinds of safety classes, chemical awareness classes, etc. Early in my career all of this was taught in a classroom setting. Such classes were usually at a minimum 4 hours. Most of the time longer. These classes were scheduled such that every hour there would be a 15 minute break. During the class folks could stop the instructor and ask questions. Certainly nothing wrong with asking questions if you don't understand some concept. But what about the folks who easily understand the material. Sometimes there was always that person in the class who would just ask question after question and would stall the entire process. E-learning seems to take care of this. Almost all of these same classes are now offered in an online form and can be accomplished in less than half the time. Sometimes much less. You can still contact safety reps if you have questions with a phone call so if you truly are having difficulty with something there is a way provided to get clarification.

If I had a choice when I was certified, I'm sure I would have preferred on online course. The course material is not difficult at all and I think the concepts are very basic. Perfect for an e-learning environment.

Funny. Something I mentioned years ago on SB was that back in the '80s or so when I was still a teacher, I thought that in an ideal world each student (family) should get a VCR and tapes for the courses that required no class discussion (Math and Science come to mind, as opposed to Shops and Band). This would eliminate ALL the WASTED time we all had to endure as students when dopey Johnny didn't understand the work. Sounds like today's e learning to me.
Of course, my idea for school had too many pitfalls that a scuba e learning course doesn't have. Mom's not gunna sell that VCR for booze.

 

[boulderjohn]

Funny. Something I mentioned years ago on SB was that back in the '80s or so when I was still a teacher, I thought that in an ideal world each student (family) should get a VCR and tapes for the courses that required no class discussion (Math and Science come to mind, as opposed to Shops and Band). This would eliminate ALL the WASTED time we all had to endure as students when dopey Johnny didn't understand the work. Sounds like today's e learning to me.
Of course, my idea for school had too many pitfalls that a scuba e learning course doesn't have. Mom's not gunna sell that VCR for booze.

Except that a VCR is not interactive.

eLearning does not merely present information--it has ways to check for understanding as you go along. If you're not understanding, you can't go ahead. You can't just fall asleep with the program running and call it good.

 

[Bob DBF]

The dive planning, at least for PADI, has been greatly improved in the most recent version of the class. Gas planning is part of the academic material. Students plan and execute a "mini-dive" in the pool sessions. Dive #4 is now supposed to be planned and executed by student team, with no intervention by the instructor unless it becomes necessary. The instructor just observes.

I wouldn't know, as this was done in my class on dive #5 in '80. I got a PADI card, I was on a tight budget, but it was a NAUI/PADI class, the instructor used the PADI OW manual as he said it was better than the NAUI materials, at that time.

Times change.


Bob

 

[CT-Rich]

Any learning is student motivation dependent. I worked in a HS where certain classes were taught online. Students had a real hard time getting anywhere near the basic minimum standard. I thought they were a train wreck. It may have been the students weren’t willing to engage the material and the material failed to engage the students.

When I tried to watch my daughters online class, I had to struggle to be interested and I doubt I would have retained nearly as much as did in 1980. In 1980 I was a kid that scraped up the $120 to take the class because I was excited to hear about this amazing sport I watched on TV. Was it the instructor or was it the subject or was it me?

 

[boulderjohn]

Any learning is student motivation dependent. I worked in a HS where certain classes were taught online. Students had a real hard time getting anywhere near the basic minimum standard. I thought they were a train wreck. It may have been the students weren’t willing to engage the material and the material failed to engage the students.

As someone who was heavily involved in the development of online classes for high school students, I assure you the difference in quality from one to another is enormous. Many are made by a certain person with a bare understanding of how to do anything in his or her spare time. Our courses were built by teams of experts, with a cost per course of more than $100,000. I am sure PADI paid more than that for their course.