Handling failure

[TSandM]

In another thread, about panic-proofing tech divers, lobstah wrote:

Just like you can train yourself to run faster, repeated exposure to stressful situations where you actually succeed, will build up your confidence and calm.

To me, the key is "where you actually succeed". But there will be times when you are training someone and you construct a problem for them to solve, and they fail . . . and some of those failures can be spectacular. AG had me feet first to the surface any number of times during my work with him. My husband's tech instructor pulled a runaway inflator drill on him at about 70 feet, and he failed and did a ballistic ascent.

What do you do after this happens? Obviously, you were trying to build confidence and it backfired. The student, although he made a mess of this one, may not be a bad diver or a bad student . . . but he's going to be shaken, and depending on temperament, apprehensive after such an experience.

So for those of you who teach, how do you deal with this? And for those of you who have been through such an experience, how did your instructor handle it?

 

[liuk3]

My technical instructor pulled the failures in shallow water first. By the time we got to deeper water, we'd already seen the failures and were able to deal with them. My instructor wouldn't pull the stuck inflator on me for the first time in 70 ft of water. He'd first do it in much shallower water like 25-30 ft and make sure I could deal with it before doing it deeper. If there was an issue of me not being able to deal with it and shooting to the surface in 70 ft of water, he'd physically catch me before I bolted uncontrollably to the surface. IMHO, seems like a very screwed up teaching process if the instructor is shooting you or your husband up to the surface from 70 ft.

 

[Peter Guy]

liuk3 -- this is NOT a thread about what happened to me (yes, I was the one who had an uncontrolled ascent from 60ish feet and ended up on the surface, upside down and a Michellin Man -- it was funny to me at the time and still is -- BUT COULD HAVE BEEN A DISASTER) but, how do YOU, as an instructor, or how do YOU as the student, respond to a training disaster.

Me, we talked about what happened and why the drill went south (several issues including equipment) and that was the end of it.

I think the OPs personality is such that she frets about "training failures" to an unbelievable degree whereas I, for example, contemplate and then let them be. I have not yet been in the position of being an instructor who has had a truly bad training experience (although losing a student in a silt cloud DID cause me much concern for the several seconds it took to reconnect with her!).

 

[ae3753]

What do you do after this happens? Obviously, you were trying to build confidence and it backfired. The student, although he made a mess of this one, may not be a bad diver or a bad student . . . but he's going to be shaken, and depending on temperament, apprehensive after such an experience.

I don't see why this a backfire. Tech classes are combination of success and failures. It's a delicate balance that good instructors must manage.

If you've only experience success in a tech class, then I think that there was disservice to you. At times, the lesson isn't always in the task, but how one handles themselves after task ends up in a hot mess. How quickly does one recover?

 

[JS1scuba]

It's a good idea when you enter training to get a good list of what skills are required for that particular training segment. If the skill requirement is not in the SOP (or standards) then doing an ad hoc drill is out of line.

Professional instructors conduct all skill sets at first in a no-stop environment. In an area where the diver would be at the lowest level of risk when first introduced to the skill.

Be careful that the skills you think you passed on were really failures for an instructor to properly introduce. I've read more about some skills that an instructor introduced that never should have been done.

If you think you failed and you survived then revisit the skill and determine if it was really a skill that solves a problem that may happen or a skill that solves a problem that wont happen.

Next, if you worry about pass -fail of every skill and every course then you ain't gonna have any fun. It may take you a much longer time to be confident about your abilities than if you just went with the flow.

cheers
JDS

 

[Dive-aholic]

All instructors have students who initially "fail" at a skill during the course. I can't think of a single class I've taught where I didn't have a student "fail" at something initially. Notice I'm putting "fail" in quotation marks. Some skills aren't meant to be "passed". They are there for the lesson learned in the process of conducting them. There are some exercises I put into my courses that I don't expect my students to do well on. The point is not whether they can do the skills well or not, but rather why they shouldn't find themselves in that situation to begin with.

As for the skills that are important to do well on, if my students don't eventually perform the skills to my satisfaction by the end of the course, then they don't get a card with my name on it. They may "fail" one dive, but eventually "pass" another.

The level of competence I expect to see also varies with the course I'm teaching. For example, most students are learning valve drills for the first time in Cavern/Intro or AN/DP. I don't expect them to be perfect in those courses. If they just learned them the 1st day of the course, how can anyone expect them to have them even near perfect by day 3 or 4?? At the end of every class I teach, I tell my students what skills they need to improve on. Usually for those course sets, valve drills is in the set. I also let them know that they won't get a "pass" from me at the next level without being able to perform those skills smoothly. Same thing with buoyancy control and trim. They may not be great during the initial course sets, but they must be near perfect at the cave or trimix level.

So what you may need ask is what is considered a success by you vs. what is considered a success by your instructor. And also consider that your instructor may have different standards of success dependent on the course level.

 

[lobstah]

All instructors have students who initially "fail" at a skill during the course.

What he said. It's not so much about never having a student fail, but making sure that if they fail, there will be discussion about it, and ideally they will get a chance to take the new information in and demonstrate on a following dive that they actually get it. Also, most people have no problem failing if they walk away with conviction that they will make a right choice if it happens again.
Failing is also not just about skills - it shows team that they can discuss their own failures, without feeling insecure about it. It bonds them together, builds trust and I find that aspect quite crucial if they are to continue improving after being signed off.

It's a fine line to walk to keep students challenged enough to keep learning curve sharp while still keeping success within their grasp. Just like it's pointless to run them through some hoops well inside their comfort level, it's pointless to throw them under the bus with combination completely beyond their capacity.

 

[TSandM]

It's a fine line to walk to keep students challenged enough to keep learning curve sharp while still keeping success within their grasp.

This was really my point; if you set problems for students which will stretch them, as you ought, then there will be the odd time that you miscalculate and things go sideways. And in some circumstances, that could really shake a student's confidence. I was curious about how folks go about repairing that error.

When we train horses, the mantra is "Ride to the limit, but not over the limit." If you make a significant mistake in pushing, you can spend a lot of time repairing the trust you broke. I don't know; maybe diving students are just more resilient in general.

 

[DiverLaura]

every dive is a learning experience. So you mess up a portion and have to redo it. I've never been a big fan of 'break the student so you can build them up' mostly because i know no matter how good the student is (myself included) we will hose ourselves sideways when it's time to demonstrate a skill in a class setting (especially with a camera on us). Whenever i take a class, i'm much more likely to push my 'comfort' level because i know that I have the instructor there to help me understand the best possible manner to deal with stuff. I back off so far from that, am so conservative in my own diving that the likelyhood of ever seeing a triple failure is pretty far out there. But in class, when i have the instructor RIGHT THERE, to teach me, to instruct me on better ways to handle or do something, i always feel like "Bring it!" Push me, push me to my limit so i can grow, cause once you reach a certain level, it's harder and harder to push yourself without it being just silly and you need an equivalent buddy...

Y'all know how much i love recounting OR stories and relating them to diving... So here's another one for you.

A cardiac surgeon friend of mine talked about working with residents... How he would only let them do as much of the case as he felt secure about 'fixing' if they screwed up. As he became more and more experience, saw more things, etc... he became more and more comfortable in his ability to get the resident out of whatever mess they could get themselves into. After many years in practice, he could guide the resident through all but the most complicated procedures... He could see "ahead of time" if they were holding something in a manner that was gonna mess stuff up, or blundering along in a direction that in another 2 steps would cause an issue... And he could correct them... He could let them learn from their own mistakes, ESPECIALLY if they were the type of personality that didn't take 'teaching' well... (nothing bad for the patient mind you, just mostly efficiency things) after a point, you can only tell/educate someone only so much. Sometimes people need to mess up on their own to grasp the full ramifications of their actions.
Sizing up the students and being able to guide their learning is the mark of a true educator.

the best way to 'rebuild that trust' is to not let it happen in first place. Co-teach with a more experienced instructor or equivalent assistant is my favorite way to not have things go sideways in the first place (a second set of eyes/hands never hurts). IF you can't "see" things that might make a skill go sideways underwater, perhaps its not yet time to be 'teaching' that skill in a manner that could cause an uncontrolled ascent.

 

[rjack321]

And in some circumstances, that could really shake a student's confidence. I was curious about how folks go about repairing that error.

Depending on what went wrong maybe it shouldn't be "repaired". They shouldn't pass the class, maybe shouldn't even be tech/cave diving (at least the level they are aspiring to via the class), or worst case even diving at all.

As an example... I continue to wonder if the woman who recently died in Peacock was a) challenged in her Cavern/Intro classes and b) showed any tendency to "bolt" at that time.