PADI Training vs.. others

Thus spake hammond@not@peek.ssr.hp.com (Charlie Hammond) :

>In article <060320062135551447%sytech@yahoo.com>,
><sytech@yahoo.com> writes:
>..
>>I have to say that I was really put off by the PADI Training Manual. The
>>text was adequate but the questions at the end of the chapters could
>>have been answered by children. ...
>
>It was apparent to me when I took the PADI courses that the questions
>at the end of each chapter were taken [mostly?] word-for-word from the
>text in the chapter. Students are required to complete the questions
>and instructors are required to collect them. (Or at least this was
>the situation back then.)
>
>My belief is that this is intended as a means to help ensure that the
>students actually read the book. Sad to say, my experience is that not
>all students actually do read the book. {sigh}
>
>Most of the required knowledge can be absorbed from classroom lecture
>and videos. Without the requirement to "turn in" the completed questions,
>some instructors would probably not make any attempt to ensure that
>students had read the book.
>
>This is not a indicment of either PADI or any/all of its instructors.
>Much of the USA population is just damned lazy when it comes to
>education. {sigh, again}
>
>Just in case it is NOT obvious, I do believe that SCBUA students should
>thoroughly read and study the course manual!

Charlie, the specific question had to do with AOW. I agree entirely
that OW students MUST read and understand the manual. But for AOW,
most of the written stuff is fluff. I hate teaching much of the AOW
manual. There are things like search patterns and simple dive
planning for deep dives that are important, but a certain amount of
the manual is a repeat of the OW manual. What's more valuable, and
what I stress more, is the stuff we do on shore before each dive and
what we do in the water. AOW is about learning new skills, not on how
to become a diver. Learning new skills safely.
--
dillon

Could have been is in the past
Could be is in the future
There is only the now

Thus spake hammond@not@peek.ssr.hp.com (Charlie Hammond) :

>In article <060320062135551447%sytech@yahoo.com>,
><sytech@yahoo.com> writes:
>..
>>I have to say that I was really put off by the PADI Training Manual. The
>>text was adequate but the questions at the end of the chapters could
>>have been answered by children. ...
>
>It was apparent to me when I took the PADI courses that the questions
>at the end of each chapter were taken [mostly?] word-for-word from the
>text in the chapter. Students are required to complete the questions
>and instructors are required to collect them. (Or at least this was
>the situation back then.)
>
>My belief is that this is intended as a means to help ensure that the
>students actually read the book. Sad to say, my experience is that not
>all students actually do read the book. {sigh}
>
>Most of the required knowledge can be absorbed from classroom lecture
>and videos. Without the requirement to "turn in" the completed questions,
>some instructors would probably not make any attempt to ensure that
>students had read the book.
>
>This is not a indicment of either PADI or any/all of its instructors.
>Much of the USA population is just damned lazy when it comes to
>education. {sigh, again}
>
>Just in case it is NOT obvious, I do believe that SCBUA students should
>thoroughly read and study the course manual!

Charlie, the specific question had to do with AOW. I agree entirely
that OW students MUST read and understand the manual. But for AOW,
most of the written stuff is fluff. I hate teaching much of the AOW
manual. There are things like search patterns and simple dive
planning for deep dives that are important, but a certain amount of
the manual is a repeat of the OW manual. What's more valuable, and
what I stress more, is the stuff we do on shore before each dive and
what we do in the water. AOW is about learning new skills, not on how
to become a diver. Learning new skills safely.
--
dillon

Could have been is in the past
Could be is in the future
There is only the now

Dillon Pyron wrote:
> Thus spake mike gray <omgray@worldnet.att.net> :
>
> >sytech@yahoo.com wrote:
> >> I received my YMCA Open Water Cert. about 6 years ago and recently
> >> received my Advanced Open Water Cert. through PADI.
> >>
> >> The latter dive instructor was very knowledgeable and skilled but I
> >> have to say that I was really put off by the PADI Training Manual. The
> >> text was adequate but the questions at the end of the chapters could
> >> have been answered by children. The questions were very simple
> >> multiple choice or "yes" or "no" answers.
> >>
> >> Something like this:
> >>
> >> "Lung expansion injuries are good for you" (yes) (no)
> >>
> >> I'm really not exaggerating much at all.
> >>
> >>
> >> I can really see now that PADI wants to virtually assure that you pass
> >> the course. As a result as I continue my training I will do all that I
> >> can to avoid PADI. I realize that the expertise of the diving
> >> instructor is what's most important but I have no faith in an
> >> organization which allows such dumb and self evident questions in their
> >> training manual. My initial YMCA Certification (written part) was a
> >> hundred times more demanding than the PADI Advanced Cert..
> >>
> >> Any comments will be appreciated.
> >>
> >> Sy
This part is Mike Gray's words of wisdom =================
> >
> >There is some very basic "book" knowledge important to entry
> >level courses, but not much. Mostly, it's skill development.
> >
> >As you get further into diving, you may find an interest in
> >algorithm development, history, archeology, diving physics and
> >physiology, gas blending, equipment design, cave mapping or any
> >of the other hundreds of subjects we love to argue about here
> >(or used to, anyway) and which require the kind of knowledge
> >that can be assessed with a written exam.
> >
> >Meanwhile, work on developing yer in-water skills - that's how
> >other, experienced divers will rank you as a good or bad diver.
===== end excerpt of Mike Gray's words of wisdom

>
> In point of fact, skills development is what AOW is about. You should
> already have the basic knowledge, it's about stepping up a notch.
> --
> dillon

Not always, and that's the complaint of sytech and others -- except
they put to much emphasis on BAD PADI instructors and instruction.

I am a professional statistician. For the sake of simple arithmetic,
if there are 10 times as many PADI instructors and students than
some other agency, say SSI, then even if all things are being
equal and the same, there will be 10 times as many BAD PADI
instructors than bad SSI instructors -- by the merely fact of
PROPORTIONS or per capita.

Cozumel is THE place to observe all kinds of REALISM in
recreational diving. I've met more divers from different states
of the USA, more divers from different countries in the world,
than the next 10 most popular world class dive locations I've
been (also because of the PROPORTION factor).

Here's a post I made in 2003 recalling an incidence in AOW
Training -- the instructor AND student were diving from the
same "wooden slow boat" I dived from, hence I have plenty
of time to observe and hear what was going on.

http://tinyurl.com/ettma

THe anecdotal account was:

RF> I've seen some PADI certified divers who are not "qualified" to
RF> dive at ANY depth. I eye-witnessed a PADI AOW diver
in-training
RF> on a boat dive in Cozumel, by an instructor from Texas (her dive
RF> shop instructor, I presume). The student hung on an arm of the
RF> instructor the ENTIRE time, came back to the boat with the worst
RF> case of mask squeeze I've ever seen -- black all around her eyes.
RF> She PASSED her AOW cert, of course.

That was in the early 1990s. It was on a Discover shop boat (Vikingo)
that took about 2 hours to get from downtown to Palancar. There
was plenty of space on the boat to walk around, chat with other divers
etc. (not much of that in fast 6-pak boats these days). Said
instructor
had brought OTHER groups of students to certify in Cozumel before.

But that was the first case of an AOW diver who should NOT have
been certified to dive at ANY depth at ANY place!

There are many DIVERS who dive in Cozumel who are almost as bad
as said AOW student -- and those were trained by OTHER agencies,
and trained in Germany, Japan, Italy, France, you name it ...

For example, when I was diving there for a couple days with Greg
Mossman and Sanna, at the Mardi Gras, these were the assortment
of divers on my boat:

(feb 22: one from Holland with Instuctor, one from Switzerland)
(feb 23: couple from Las Vegas with their Cancun DM)
(feb 24: two Californian and assorted other divers)
(feb 25: two Californian and assorted other divers}
(feb 26: one Italian, two Mexican, and 3 Japanese)
(feb 27: two Chicagoans, 1 Israeli, and 1 unknown)

No obvious incompetent on this trip. But I've seen Italian
divers knocking a huge piece of the ceiling of the Cathedral in
Punta Sur and other divers who panicked. I even rescued a
few strangers who had no buoyancy control and were heading
straightdown below 120 fsw and continuing when the DM was
too far to grab them by the tank and pull them up! Those
stories are in the archives too.

In short, there are MANY incompetent divers who got certified,
from ALL agencies. Some of the BEST DMs in Cozumel, who
taught me some of my diving skills (after I already had my
PADI Master Diver cert) were PADI Instructors! It's important
to keep in mind not to sterotype anyone or any agency when
it comes to scuba certification and dive skills.

-- Bob. PADI trained; But mostly self-taught, and informally
taught by experienced divers; SSI rubber-stamped
Master Diver when my PADI card was lost in my stolen
luggage.

Dillon Pyron wrote:
> Thus spake mike gray <omgray@worldnet.att.net> :
>
> >sytech@yahoo.com wrote:
> >> I received my YMCA Open Water Cert. about 6 years ago and recently
> >> received my Advanced Open Water Cert. through PADI.
> >>
> >> The latter dive instructor was very knowledgeable and skilled but I
> >> have to say that I was really put off by the PADI Training Manual. The
> >> text was adequate but the questions at the end of the chapters could
> >> have been answered by children. The questions were very simple
> >> multiple choice or "yes" or "no" answers.
> >>
> >> Something like this:
> >>
> >> "Lung expansion injuries are good for you" (yes) (no)
> >>
> >> I'm really not exaggerating much at all.
> >>
> >>
> >> I can really see now that PADI wants to virtually assure that you pass
> >> the course. As a result as I continue my training I will do all that I
> >> can to avoid PADI. I realize that the expertise of the diving
> >> instructor is what's most important but I have no faith in an
> >> organization which allows such dumb and self evident questions in their
> >> training manual. My initial YMCA Certification (written part) was a
> >> hundred times more demanding than the PADI Advanced Cert..
> >>
> >> Any comments will be appreciated.
> >>
> >> Sy
This part is Mike Gray's words of wisdom =================
> >
> >There is some very basic "book" knowledge important to entry
> >level courses, but not much. Mostly, it's skill development.
> >
> >As you get further into diving, you may find an interest in
> >algorithm development, history, archeology, diving physics and
> >physiology, gas blending, equipment design, cave mapping or any
> >of the other hundreds of subjects we love to argue about here
> >(or used to, anyway) and which require the kind of knowledge
> >that can be assessed with a written exam.
> >
> >Meanwhile, work on developing yer in-water skills - that's how
> >other, experienced divers will rank you as a good or bad diver.
===== end excerpt of Mike Gray's words of wisdom

>
> In point of fact, skills development is what AOW is about. You should
> already have the basic knowledge, it's about stepping up a notch.
> --
> dillon

Not always, and that's the complaint of sytech and others -- except
they put to much emphasis on BAD PADI instructors and instruction.

I am a professional statistician. For the sake of simple arithmetic,
if there are 10 times as many PADI instructors and students than
some other agency, say SSI, then even if all things are being
equal and the same, there will be 10 times as many BAD PADI
instructors than bad SSI instructors -- by the merely fact of
PROPORTIONS or per capita.

Cozumel is THE place to observe all kinds of REALISM in
recreational diving. I've met more divers from different states
of the USA, more divers from different countries in the world,
than the next 10 most popular world class dive locations I've
been (also because of the PROPORTION factor).

Here's a post I made in 2003 recalling an incidence in AOW
Training -- the instructor AND student were diving from the
same "wooden slow boat" I dived from, hence I have plenty
of time to observe and hear what was going on.

http://tinyurl.com/ettma

THe anecdotal account was:

RF> I've seen some PADI certified divers who are not "qualified" to
RF> dive at ANY depth. I eye-witnessed a PADI AOW diver
in-training
RF> on a boat dive in Cozumel, by an instructor from Texas (her dive
RF> shop instructor, I presume). The student hung on an arm of the
RF> instructor the ENTIRE time, came back to the boat with the worst
RF> case of mask squeeze I've ever seen -- black all around her eyes.
RF> She PASSED her AOW cert, of course.

That was in the early 1990s. It was on a Discover shop boat (Vikingo)
that took about 2 hours to get from downtown to Palancar. There
was plenty of space on the boat to walk around, chat with other divers
etc. (not much of that in fast 6-pak boats these days). Said
instructor
had brought OTHER groups of students to certify in Cozumel before.

But that was the first case of an AOW diver who should NOT have
been certified to dive at ANY depth at ANY place!

There are many DIVERS who dive in Cozumel who are almost as bad
as said AOW student -- and those were trained by OTHER agencies,
and trained in Germany, Japan, Italy, France, you name it ...

For example, when I was diving there for a couple days with Greg
Mossman and Sanna, at the Mardi Gras, these were the assortment
of divers on my boat:

(feb 22: one from Holland with Instuctor, one from Switzerland)
(feb 23: couple from Las Vegas with their Cancun DM)
(feb 24: two Californian and assorted other divers)
(feb 25: two Californian and assorted other divers}
(feb 26: one Italian, two Mexican, and 3 Japanese)
(feb 27: two Chicagoans, 1 Israeli, and 1 unknown)

No obvious incompetent on this trip. But I've seen Italian
divers knocking a huge piece of the ceiling of the Cathedral in
Punta Sur and other divers who panicked. I even rescued a
few strangers who had no buoyancy control and were heading
straightdown below 120 fsw and continuing when the DM was
too far to grab them by the tank and pull them up! Those
stories are in the archives too.

In short, there are MANY incompetent divers who got certified,
from ALL agencies. Some of the BEST DMs in Cozumel, who
taught me some of my diving skills (after I already had my
PADI Master Diver cert) were PADI Instructors! It's important
to keep in mind not to sterotype anyone or any agency when
it comes to scuba certification and dive skills.

-- Bob. PADI trained; But mostly self-taught, and informally
taught by experienced divers; SSI rubber-stamped
Master Diver when my PADI card was lost in my stolen
luggage.

In article <vmjr021iv7gjhuqg95ag9lg5qvjnum81i9@4ax.com>,
Dillon Pyron <dmpyronINVALID@austin.rr.com> writes:


>Charlie, the specific question had to do with AOW. I agree entirely
>that OW students MUST read and understand the manual. But for AOW,
>most of the written stuff is fluff. I hate teaching much of the AOW
>manual. There are things like search patterns and simple dive
>planning for deep dives that are important, but a certain amount of
>the manual is a repeat of the OW manual. What's more valuable, and
>what I stress more, is the stuff we do on shore before each dive and
>what we do in the water. AOW is about learning new skills, not on how
>to become a diver. Learning new skills safely.

Dillon, I agree that my prior comment applies less to AOW and more to OW.
I also agree that AOW is about developing existing skils and learning
new ones.

As I recall, the AOW manual I used had a general chapter or two, then
a group of chapters for the specific dives being done in the AOW course.
i.e. Deep dive; boat dive; night dive; etc.

We had only one "classroom" session, in which we discussed the general
material. We were told to read the chapter(s) pertient to the dives being
done. We then discussed this information at the dive site, before diving.

I think this was a good approach.

As to the end-of-chapter exercises/questions -- while the OW questions
were certainly right-from-the-book, my memory is that the AOW questions
we not always so "obvious". In fact, I recall that we never got a
"definative" for some of the questions. If I went back and looked at
them, I'd expect that to this day I don't know what point(s) they were
trying to make.

Not only PADI manuals, but manuals from at least two other agencies I've
experienced are often not well written. I think the problem is that they
are written by individuals who know a lot about diving, but not a lot about
the educational process. Good divers are not always good instructors;
good divers and good instructors do not always write good manuals.

--
Charlie Hammond -- Hewlett-Packard Company -- Ft Lauderdale FL USA
(hammond@not@peek.ssr.hp.com -- remove "@not" when replying)
All opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily my employer's.

In article <vmjr021iv7gjhuqg95ag9lg5qvjnum81i9@4ax.com>,
Dillon Pyron <dmpyronINVALID@austin.rr.com> writes:


>Charlie, the specific question had to do with AOW. I agree entirely
>that OW students MUST read and understand the manual. But for AOW,
>most of the written stuff is fluff. I hate teaching much of the AOW
>manual. There are things like search patterns and simple dive
>planning for deep dives that are important, but a certain amount of
>the manual is a repeat of the OW manual. What's more valuable, and
>what I stress more, is the stuff we do on shore before each dive and
>what we do in the water. AOW is about learning new skills, not on how
>to become a diver. Learning new skills safely.

Dillon, I agree that my prior comment applies less to AOW and more to OW.
I also agree that AOW is about developing existing skils and learning
new ones.

As I recall, the AOW manual I used had a general chapter or two, then
a group of chapters for the specific dives being done in the AOW course.
i.e. Deep dive; boat dive; night dive; etc.

We had only one "classroom" session, in which we discussed the general
material. We were told to read the chapter(s) pertient to the dives being
done. We then discussed this information at the dive site, before diving.

I think this was a good approach.

As to the end-of-chapter exercises/questions -- while the OW questions
were certainly right-from-the-book, my memory is that the AOW questions
we not always so "obvious". In fact, I recall that we never got a
"definative" for some of the questions. If I went back and looked at
them, I'd expect that to this day I don't know what point(s) they were
trying to make.

Not only PADI manuals, but manuals from at least two other agencies I've
experienced are often not well written. I think the problem is that they
are written by individuals who know a lot about diving, but not a lot about
the educational process. Good divers are not always good instructors;
good divers and good instructors do not always write good manuals.

--
Charlie Hammond -- Hewlett-Packard Company -- Ft Lauderdale FL USA
(hammond@not@peek.ssr.hp.com -- remove "@not" when replying)
All opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily my employer's.

Dillon Pyron wrote:

> In point of fact, skills development is what AOW is about.

Which skills specifically?

And, developped into what?

Matthias

Dillon Pyron wrote:

> In point of fact, skills development is what AOW is about.

Which skills specifically?

And, developped into what?

Matthias

sytech@yahoo.com wrote:

> I can really see now that PADI wants to virtually assure that you pass
> the course. As a result as I continue my training I will do all that
> I can to avoid PADI.

I was always told that NAUI is more comprehensive than PADI. My OW I is NAUI
but my advanced is PADI. It's like flying an airplane, a certification
should be viewed as a license to learn, not a "your an expert, have at it"
doc.

sytech@yahoo.com wrote:

> I can really see now that PADI wants to virtually assure that you pass
> the course. As a result as I continue my training I will do all that
> I can to avoid PADI.

I was always told that NAUI is more comprehensive than PADI. My OW I is NAUI
but my advanced is PADI. It's like flying an airplane, a certification
should be viewed as a license to learn, not a "your an expert, have at it"
doc.