scuba questions for school project

[Walter]

Sydney_Diver,

"I am quoting PADI Standards, dont forget the 8 hours of reading before the day of Theory."

I know. It's very scary to know most divers have only had that level of training.

"what do you do for 16 hours in a pool with a student ?"

I get them ready to dive. I wish I could spend longer.

Start with a swim test - 300 yd swim, 50 ft underwater swim and 15 minute float.

Everything is repeated until students can do the skill easily before moving on to the next skill.

Controlled seated entry & exit.

Learn snorkel use. Students have only a snorkel at this point. They learn breathing out of the water, breathing with face in the water, breathing through a flooded snorkel, blasting it clear and recovering a snorkel from the bottom.

Learn mask use. Put down the snorkel and pick up the mask. Learn to clear a partially flooded mask. Increase the amount of flooding until the student clears the mast easily. Recover and clear a mask from the pool bottom. Next I demo clearing my mask 6 times on one breath. Students then clear theirs 3 times on one breath. Put snorkel on the mask and recover from the pool bottom, clearing mask and blasting clear snorkel, leaving face in the water and breathing off the snorkel.

Now it's time to learn fin use. Cramp removal. Flutter kick. Scissor kick. Frog kick. Dolphin kick. Sculling. Sometimes we get this far during the first 2 hour session, usually we just get started with fins and pick up with fins at the beginning of the second pool session.

Next we learn skin diving. One up, one down. Ear equalization. Head first surface dives. Feet first surface dives. Displacement clearing of the snorkel. Ascents. Use of BC's (snorkel vest).

Weights and weighting. (will repeat when we get to SCUBA)

Entries (giant stride, back roll and front roll) and exits.

Bob to fill BC inflation.

Practice learned skills.

On the third session, I introduce SCUBA.

BC, tank, regulator assembly.

BC inflation with LPI (they already mastered oral inflation, but they get morte practice).

Regulator recovery - 2 methods.

Regulator clearing - 3 methods

No mask breathing (a snap, they've already mastered it).

Buoyancy control - shallow - shallow and deep.

Snorkel/regulator exchanges.

Descents and ascents.

Simulated ESA (horizontal)

ESA

Entries and exits.

6 hours complete - the other 10 will be in others posts, I'm out of time.

 

[Ber Rabbit]

Walter only gets 16 hours in the pool, I get 20! YEAH! Plus 20 hours in the classroom I too wish I could have more time because I'm picking up so many tips from people on the board that I want to show my students.
Ber

 

[Pez de Diablo]

herman once bubbled...
Here is a web site you may fine useful. It has apretty good description of scuba and the equipment involved.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/scuba.htm

I love that website. Thanks!

 

[DiveTub]

16-20 hours in a pool
Man that has got to be the most boring thing I have ever heard of for both the student and Instructor.
The pool is used to introduce and refine skills, I can't believe it can take you 16 to 20 hours to get 20 odd skills down to perfection.
After 20 hours in a pool I sure hope you certify them with some Kind of Pool Diver/Cleaner specialty.

I would usually do two pool seasins in a single day, at about 4 hours per session

 

[Walter]

Sydney_Diver,

It's not boring at all. My students seem to enjoy learning. Some classes are designed to actually teach SCUBA. If you'd read my last post I'm sure you'd have already noticed skills you may not use. My students are better divers as a result. You are certainly welcome to continue with less time, fewer skills and produce students who ready to dive in supervised conditions. I strive to prepare my divers to be self sufficient, I realize this is not a popular approach.

I'm familiar with your methods, I see them frequently. Two 4 hour pool sessions in one day can be quite effective (for the few skills you have time to teach) in placing skills learned in a student's short term memory. You do nothing to move those skills from short term to long term memory. This is accomplished with repetition of the skills over a period of weeks. If long term retention is not important, continue as before. Of course this also does nothing to build confidence and lessen the chances of panic when the student is certified and out on his own. I feel there is a better method. I know my class is not perfect and I change it from time to time to improve it as I learn new techniques.

Now to continue with answering your question of what I do for 16 hours in the pool.

Fourth pool session I introduce buddy breathing. First it is practiced on the surface, next underwater in the shallow end of the pool. When that is mastered, students practice buddy breathing while swimming and remaining neutrally buoyant remaining in the shallow end, then swimming shallow and deep while buddy breathing.

Next we learn octopus breathing.

Remove and replace BC/tank at the surface.

Remove and replace weight belt at the surface.

Remove and replace weight belt at the pool bottom

Doff and don - While on the pool bottom at the deep end, the diver removes mask, snorkel, fins, and SCUBA unit, makes a controlled swimming ascent, takes two breaths, returns to his equipment and puts it all back on. A weight belt, to achieve neutral buoyancy, may be worn during the exercise.

Fifth pool session students learn bailout. The act of entering the water with all equipment in the diver’s hands (mask, snorkel, fins and SCUBA unit). A weight belt, to achieve neutral buoyancy, may be worn during the exercise. The diver then dons all equipment.

Equipment exchance with buddy while buddy breathing.

Small boat exit.

Sixth pool session is a rescue session.

Surface rescue of calm conscious victim.

Surface rescue of panicked victim.

Surface rescue of unconscious, non-breathing victim.

Underwater rescue of unconscious, non-breathing victim. Includes rescue breathing while towing and gear removal.

Tows learned include:

Spread eagle - not recommended for actual rescues.

Foot push

Cross chest

Do-si-do

Buddy line

Seventh pool session is a review session.

Eighth pool session is a testing session.

400 yd skin dive using flutter, frog, dolphin and scissor kicks for 100 yds each. The skin dive includes head first and foot first dives and a 50 ft underwater swim.

Bailout with 50 yd swim.

Octopus breathing 200 yds.

Rescues

 

[Ber Rabbit]

My class is similar to Walter's and many of the students want more time in the pool so we'll let them play for 15 minutes or so after class.

I use toypedos and underwater frisbees to enhance buddy and ascent rate awareness under "stress." The toys are also used early on to increase comfort levels; apprehensive students forget their fear of underwater breathing pretty quickly when the toys come out.

Stress is slowly introduced to "mastered" skills so the students know they can function safely no matter what's going on around them. They learn to accomplish tasks without their mask and even though they are trained to leave low visibility situations they spend 45 minutes of one class blindfolded. They learn to do their skills and communicate with their buddy without being able to see him/her first on the surface then in shallow water then the deep end where they conduct a "search" for CO2 cartridges. Ohio diving often exposes divers to low and zero visibility and our divers are prepared for that. What a proud moment the day we hit a "rototiller cloud" and the 2 divers I was watching (I was the DM) saw it coming. I looked over and saw the center diver grab his buddy then grab ME right before vis went to zero. The divers initiated the communications for an ascent and up we went. It's nice when you see students not only watching out for their buddy but for the "leadership" as well since all too often people complain that when they dive with students they are essentially diving solo.

We too require our students to do "air on" bailouts, what a confidence booster that is once it's been completed. We have them do a giant stride while carrying their mask first, descend and don/clear. Next they do it carrying mask and fins then carrying all their gear in one hand. They have doffed/donned all of their equipment above and under water previously so it's nothing they haven't done before.

They get basic rescue training similar to what Walter mentioned in his post.

Sydney, you're more than welcome to come participate in my class, it's not boring, really
Ber

 

[jdb]

Several years ago I and my wife decided to take up diving. Unknowing to me a friend of mine and his wife also started classes at a different location. Our classes consisted of 16 required hours of pool time and approx. 6 hours of voluntary pool time along with 6 hours of classroom time. We were never bored with this, in fact we loved it because we had never expereniced anything else, we did not know yet that a pool was boring. Today we are still enjoying the sport and are much better divers then most IMHO. My friend and his wife went through a weekend cert. with 8 hours pool time. On their first dive after getting their cards he kicked off her mask and she went into panic. She no longer dives.

My point is this. Having a mask kicked off should be like haveing your shoe come untied. She did not have the confidence in her skills as a diver which I believe come from lots of Practice. I believe the more pool time the better. Trust me students won't get bored with it this is all new to them, The instructors on the other hand may.

 

[landlocked]

Amanda once bubbled...


Hi cfern, I'm just being curious but could you precise what you wanna do ? If it's a pedagogical project, it sounds VERY interesting, since I've never seen any school project based on Scuba Diving. It could be a GREAT thing to work on... And of course we could help you a great deal

Cheerz !

My 14 year old daughter did a science project using scuba. The class assignment dealt with real life situations involving physics. Her mother took her gear in, assembled it and demonstrated it. My daughter talked about the physics involved, Dalton, etc. (The phsics and physiology are really quite interesting.) The teacher asked some great questions and the report was very well received. Besides, I think my daughter learned some things.

 

[Curly]

Walter once bubbled...
"The classes usually run for about 4 days
Day one Theory of Diving Classroom
Day 2 In pool or confined water practising skills
Day 3 Two Open Water Dives
Day 4 Two Open Water Dives"

Sounds like a class to avoid. Other classes devote more time to classroom and to pool work. Typically, my classes meet 4 times for 4 hours each in the classroom and 8 times for 2 hours each in the pool. Usually lasts a month.

My first class was ten hour-plus (some one, some two) classroom sessions, each followed by an hour or two in the pool. I'd say 15+ classroom hours and 15+ pool hours. We did five open water checkout dives, and completed a ~100-question written exam.

I was very satisfied with the level of instruction -- and felt very confident in my initial skill set after completing that course. Our instructor was Marine Corps diver (stationed at a nearby base), and he imparted a lot of the knowledge he'd gained in his professional experience, along with a no-nonsense approach to the subject matter.

 

[wch]

My 12-year-old son just completed a science fair last week with scuba as his project. He was certified last year. He did a great job setting up a display board explaining the bulk of basics of diving including theory and gear. He brought in his equipment and had it as part of his display.

Getting ready was like a refresher course for him. The most impressive part was listening to him explain the fundamentals and answer questions posed by various parents and students for the 2 1/2 hours the fair lasted.

A bit of bragging by a proud dad,
Bill

Oh, the judges were messed up and only gave him third place.