SparticleBrane:
Correct--I have never taken a PADI class. However, I have worked at a LDS and I have been in contact with many PADI divers (especially those straight out of open water classes). In my humble and quite inexperienced opinion, many are misinformed and shouldn't be in the water in their current skill set.
On a slightly different topic, I disagree with the idea that you can't teach beyond the standards.
From what I have seen thus far (I would like someone to prove me wrong, in all seriousness), PADI seems to produce non-thinking divers. Those who you ask about why something is the way it is, and their only answer is "that's what the book says" or "because my instructor said so". Only later on in a more advanced class from an agency that isn't PADI do they start to question their initial teachings.
I would much rather have a longer, more challenging, and more informative basic where people are actually in control of their dives after certification. I feel that many divers today leave the sport because their find the lack of control on their own dives to be frustrating, or they didn't have an enjoyable experience (popped their ears from bouncing up and down due to bad buoyancy control, ran out of air due to no situational awareness and no gas management planning, etc).
While meant as a slight jab to PADI, my initial post was meant to be humorous and elicit a laugh from readers. Guess it jabbed a bit too hard?
Sparticle...This is our didactic list at the shop where I teach.
Equipment: We review each piece of equipment the new diver will use. We go into the history and development of each piece of equipment. We review the basics of how the equipment functions. We demonstrate assembly donning and removal. We review the process when the students are performing these skills.
We cover direct effects of pressure, gas laws, indirect effects of pressure, which includes AGE, DCS, mediastinal and subcutaneous emphysema,silent water blackout, etc...We discuss the diving environment. We discuss conservation. We include topics on ppO2, ppN2, psi...We feel the student needs to understand these concepts in order to understand the applications to them as divers,eg, why is the suggested recreational dive limit 132 ft. Why do we always want to breathe U/W. How do the gas laws apply to us as divers, etc... We dont go into MOD or EAD...because those, among other topics, are for other courses.
When we cover dive tables we discuss their origins and introduce them to decompression theory at a level the student can understand. We don't lecture on compartment theories or anything like that. We simply want the student to know how the tables were developed, which will help them understand the concept better when they are working tables.
This is not all encompassing but I hope it can give you an idea of what we teach in our PADI OW classes. I am not saying that other facilities teach this way, but my LDS owner is a firm believer in teaching the why's and not just the how's. And I feel we do produce "thinking" and knowledgeable divers when they finish our course.
I think is tremendously disrespectful of you to allude to those divers, simply because they took a PADI O/W calss as "non-thinking" divers. That is pretty much a non-thinking comment. If you don't believe that, just "think" about it. If you don't understand the ramifications of your statement...I will give you a hint...How many divers do you feel PADI has certified? And don't try to weasle your way around what you said..."From what I have seen thus far (I would like someone to prove me wrong, in all seriousness), PADI seems to produce non-thinking divers." You were just "proved" wrong...In all seriousness
