riverserf
Guest
First, many people seem to have read too quickly.
1)As Charlie mentioned in the very 1st post...it is not a 3 month OW to OWSI course. He's going from Rescue diver to OWSI in 3 months. And he did not say you were being given an OWSI certification (or jumping to that last leg of the total internship) with less than 40 dives. That's one reason they require you to do 200 dives minimum throughout the course.
2)He didn't mention it but there's only one program (that I know of) in thailand which offers this internship with 200 guaranteed dives: mermaid's in Pattaya. If you look at their website, they take students to something like 14 dive sites as well as 'farther afield' trips. Yes, I agree 14 is still a limited number of sites but 14+ is not the same as 2 or 3. And remember he has some prior experience already. Some might say that diving the same sites over and over is boring...but that should force a student to fine tune many aspects of their diving.
For example:
someone who dives 2-3 times a year for 10 or 15 years = 20-45 dives
versus someone who has been 2-3 times a day for 3 weeks = 42-63 dives.
who has more experience? the person with '10-15 years' or the person with the most dives? Personally, I learned a lot more in 2 solid weeks of skiing in Colorado than I did going 2 times a year for 5-6 years.
Most of all, I have to agree with AZZA about the fact that because someone has a lot of dives doesn't mean they're a great instructor. It just means they are a very experienced diver. I teach English I Korea....I went to Uni to be an English teacher...so I know what it feels like to 'know' you want to teach. I also see a LOT of foreigners in Korea that teach english that aren't qualified for it...have no natural ability or talent for teaching, etc. They give us all a bad reputation. The 'attitude' and 'teaching style' is important and just because someone knows the language doesn't mean they can effectively teach that language..not in an enjoyable and painless way. Same goes for diving.
I agree with the point most of you make about experience being very, very, very important. But, since the program doesn't cost much more than doing 200 dives in thailand anyway...why shouldn't he do it and gain that extra experience? He may come out agreeing with you that he needs to spend several more years diving before going ahead and teaching.
1)As Charlie mentioned in the very 1st post...it is not a 3 month OW to OWSI course. He's going from Rescue diver to OWSI in 3 months. And he did not say you were being given an OWSI certification (or jumping to that last leg of the total internship) with less than 40 dives. That's one reason they require you to do 200 dives minimum throughout the course.
2)He didn't mention it but there's only one program (that I know of) in thailand which offers this internship with 200 guaranteed dives: mermaid's in Pattaya. If you look at their website, they take students to something like 14 dive sites as well as 'farther afield' trips. Yes, I agree 14 is still a limited number of sites but 14+ is not the same as 2 or 3. And remember he has some prior experience already. Some might say that diving the same sites over and over is boring...but that should force a student to fine tune many aspects of their diving.
For example:
someone who dives 2-3 times a year for 10 or 15 years = 20-45 dives
versus someone who has been 2-3 times a day for 3 weeks = 42-63 dives.
who has more experience? the person with '10-15 years' or the person with the most dives? Personally, I learned a lot more in 2 solid weeks of skiing in Colorado than I did going 2 times a year for 5-6 years.
Most of all, I have to agree with AZZA about the fact that because someone has a lot of dives doesn't mean they're a great instructor. It just means they are a very experienced diver. I teach English I Korea....I went to Uni to be an English teacher...so I know what it feels like to 'know' you want to teach. I also see a LOT of foreigners in Korea that teach english that aren't qualified for it...have no natural ability or talent for teaching, etc. They give us all a bad reputation. The 'attitude' and 'teaching style' is important and just because someone knows the language doesn't mean they can effectively teach that language..not in an enjoyable and painless way. Same goes for diving.
I agree with the point most of you make about experience being very, very, very important. But, since the program doesn't cost much more than doing 200 dives in thailand anyway...why shouldn't he do it and gain that extra experience? He may come out agreeing with you that he needs to spend several more years diving before going ahead and teaching.
