Handling failure

[Cave Diver]

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.

I have to agree with this.

While i think it's admirable that there are some very good instructors are willing to spend extra time with student til they master a skill, at some point there should also be the "I don't think you're cut out for tech diving" conversation as well. Unfortunately, there is nothing to stop that student from going elsewhere and finding an instructor who is willing to sign off on a card. If I recall, Rob had a student recently that did something similar.

I think too many things have gotten politically correct and gotten to the point where "everyone gets a trophy" when they play. I don't know this woman, so I can't speak about her specifically, but I have seen several other users that are pursuing tech diving who make posts that make me think they need to take up golf instead.

 

[Dive-aholic]

I've since had 2 students go instructor shopping. The first found a cave card with his 2nd instructor after me. The other has gone to 2 others and still only has an Apprentice card. Both the other instructors told him the same thing I did. What's funny is these students seem to think cave instructors don't talk to each other, but we do... :cool2:

 

[boulderjohn]

Since my field is educational theory, let me chime in on this.

Proper skill instruction requires a sequence of steps that lead to a final performance. In each step, the student takes learning from the previous step and transfers it to the new step. The new step, being more difficult, will produce a transfer load for the student. If the transfer load is too small, the student will not be learning anything. If it is too great, the student will fail.

A good illustration of this is the typical sequence for mask skills in an OW class:

Partial mask flood--full mask flood--no mask breathing--mask removal and replacement--no mask swim and replacement.​

A good instructor will monitor student progress carefully and not move on to the next step until the student is ready for it. If an instructor were to say in the first pool session, "OK, we are going to start working on mask skills. You will all take your masks off, swim across the pool and put them on again while maintaining horizontal trim," then that instructor would deserve to be banned from scuba instruction forever.

For some reason, though, I have seen the equivalent practice in technical instruction on more than a few occasions, and I have heard others give similar stories. For example, I saw a case where students were evaluated on their ability to pass a bottle. There was no instruction. There was no demonstration. There was no practice in a pool. There was no practice in the OW. Students were simply told to go to an ascent line at its starting point, anchored to a silty floor a few feet from a steep silty bank. They were carrying AL 80s rather than AL 40s. As they reached the ascent line, the instructor decided to make things interesting by putting one of the divers OOA.

Well, they did not put in a passing performance.

The film study was loads of fun. Lots of talk about the puffs of silt as the divers struggled for position. The camera zoomed in on the diver trying to get the second AL 80 clipped and finally clipping it to the inner tank's clip rather than the D-Ring. Lots of quips about competence that the instructor obviously found amusing.

I am sure the instructor felt very good about himself and his high standards that did not allow that performance to pass.

I am equally sure the students had different feelings.

 

[AndyNZ]

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.

You do it again. Break down the "failure" into accessible chunks, work on those chunks in isolation to build the students confidence and then repeat the scenario again in it's entirety.

 

[Kevrumbo]

You do it again. Break down the "failure" into accessible chunks, work on those chunks in isolation to build the students confidence and then repeat the scenario again in it's entirety.

"Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter.
Try again. Fail again. Fail better."
--Samuel Beckett

"The far object of a training system is to prepare the combat officer mentally so that he can cope with the unusual and unexpected as if it were the altogether normal and give him poise in a situation where all else is in disequilibrium."
--S.L.A. Marshall

"The challenge of education is not to prepare a person for success, but to prepare him for failure."
--Admiral James Stockdale

"It is as if a surgeon had to practice throughout his life on dummies for one real operation."
--Sir Michael Howard

 

[Trace Malinowski]

If my lacrosse coach trained me like a scuba instructor, I'd be dead. Therefore, I train my scuba students like a lacrosse coach.

They keep dying in class until I no longer find ways to kill them.

They seem to become pretty confident once I'm out of plays and they no longer are dying. Many students find this process to be lots of fun.

For example, after they learn to handle manifold failures and gas sharing, I hit them with an OOG while the team is working to deploy a lift bag or DSMB. The OOG will turn into a right post fixable failure. Often the student with the failure will shut down the offending post killing the buddy out of habit once air gunned. The student will often be embarrassed. I make it clear that diving is a sport like lacrosse and we are going to practice until nothing can penetrate the crease of team awareness, team procedures, training, practice, and creative thinking. The student often feels better when he or she understands that we don't want to sacrifice learning for grades and making mistakes is how we will learn to fix them. The student probably won't shut down the offending post next time. Once the student thinks he or she has solved the problem by not shutting down the post, the gas ends up being depleted. Now, the donor and receiver are OOG. They usually die. Then, they learn they can buddy breathe with the third team member's long hose. Once they develop proficiency with that. The third team member's left post fails. They'll need to decide whether to stay on the back-up and long hose, or shut down the left and do three-person buddy breathing.

A scuba instructor will ask, "When will that happen?" and dismiss the exercise.

A lacrosse coach may see this exercise much the same as trying to keep 2 or 3 balls cradled in the stick. If you can keep 3 balls in the pocket during body and stick check drills in practice, you'll have a better understanding of the mechanics that will go into keeping one ball in the pocket in a game.

Come game day, when a team is at max penetration and does suffer an OOG ... that real OOG is going to be much easier than what the coach made them do in practice.

"Oh! All we need to do is donate a reg, clean up, and swim out in touch contact? That's so much easier than having to do that while buddy breathing in a three-person team without face masks."

You create confidence by having them earn it.

 

[rongoodman]

Trace is an accomplished and very patient instructor. I'm looking forward to a couple of his mini-workshops.