PADI Advanced Open Water: Did you learn anything new?

[guahoo]

They are experience based supervised dives. It's as valuable as the instructor is skilled. Often it's a read the manual, do a couple things, come diving. From what you're reading in the manual, does it seem what your being offered during the dives lines up with the scope of the course?

What aspects might be missing?

Sometimes it can be significant having mentorship for refining basic skills in more 'advanced' dive conditions or planning. If that's a paid instructor in a formal course or an old salt that takes you under their wing both can be valuable.

At worst: it's a card that's required for some dive sites and it's a fairly cheap way to get a dive package of multiple dives.

Cameron

Thanks for reply! That’s the thing... I don’t know what I’m supposed to get out of the AOW course. Whether my experience is similar to others was basically what I was trying to get at. It just seems awkward to ask instructor whether he is teaching me everything he’s supposed to. But I do understand your valid points.

 

[guahoo]

So you did learn something new. AOW introduces you to different types of dives, but there is no substitute for experience.

Yes! I actually enjoyed playing with the compass. It was like a mini adventure finding that coral on so and so compass heading. Thanks!

 

[guahoo]

It has been invented for the business... anything you "learn" as AOWD should be already know as "diver".
Unfortunately the card is required by OP's to have access to many dive sites and live aboard, so you "must" pay the bribe.

That was one way I was thinking, but I’m enjoying it, so I’ll take as supervised dives. Thanks!

 

[guahoo]

I think AOW is probably the most warranted recreational training offered aside from OW, once certified its pretty much the card you will use until you retire from diving. My AOW was money well spent, great instructor, first time at depth, navigation etc.....coupled with Nitrox...oh yea

So was your AOW course similar to mine? No classroom time, basically supervised dives in different environment? Thanks

 

[guahoo]

On my AOW I told the instructor to help me with my buoyancy.

We did a proper weight check and he helped me a lot with my trim by moving the weights around. Then he also gave me a few tips for breathing and corrected a bit my finning and trim underwater.

This made a massive difference for me as I was going through air really fast as I kept finning to compensate for bad buoyancy control.

I spent one week diving with the same shop afterwards, twice a day and made more progress everyday because of the advice the instructor gave me.

So my advice would be to tell the instructor what you would like to get of the dives aside from doing the drills.

Buoyancy control seemed to come through trial and error for me. And discovering on my own that I can breath shallow or deep to control my buoyancy was like discovering some lost secret! I don’t know how or why I might have missed that in my ow course? The more I dove, I eventually realized I didn’t have to keep playing with the bcd and instead could just basically control my breathing. That was exciting and a real eye-opener for me. I don’t think my ow instructor emphasized that enough if at all...

I did ask AOW instructor I would like to deploy smb under his watch. Thanks!

 

[guahoo]

In a word, yes.

AOW was invented by the Los Angeles County program and then picked up by NAUI in the mid 1960s. The reason for it was the perception that far too many people were getting the OW certification, doing a few dives, and then quitting. The belief was that by giving them a little more instruction and showing them different kinds of diving, they would find something that would interest them and keep then going. That is why most of the dives are simply designed to give you something new.

In OW, you only learn to go in one direction, then turn around and come back.

If you pick your dives carefully and have an instructor who is willing to work with you, you can learn quite a bit. When I work with an AOW student, I evaluate the skill level from the start, and I then decide what needs to happen going forward. For that reason, I like to have one of the chosen dives be altitude. All the learning for the altitude dive is academic--nothing happens on the dive itself. That gives me complete freedom to turn the dive into a skills dive doing whatever I think the student needs most.

Thank you! Altitude diving is not gonna be an option where I am . But, yes I see where you’re coming from! Thanks!

 

[guahoo]

Unfortunately, AOW can be run from a group of fun dives to a great learning experience, dependant on how the instructor runs the class. It sounds like your instructor is towards the fun dive end.

After AOW you may want to shop instructors to find one that will help you work on rounding out your training, or take the specialty training you feel will help your diving the most.



Bob

Appreciate your feedback! And yes, I think instructor is more on the fun experience diving you mention. Thanks!

 

[guahoo]

I didn't learn anything new but I did get a card to show the boats!

Thats what it seemed like after my first dive of the AOW was the night dive

 

[guahoo]

For me, AOW was an introduction to night diving, navigation, deep diving,and recovery. All activities were supervised by the instructor, and if I recall correctly, a divemaster. While some shops want you to take the AOW right after you complete your OW course, I waited until I was comfortable in the water (about 40 dives) before I took the AOW.

Although I don't do it too often anymore, I love night diving. Lots of critters out and about that are not out during the day.

For the most part my navigation skills are good. The odd time I am way off, usually by not taking the current caused by tides into account. For example, I know the heading back to the exit point, but don't compensate enough enough for the current caused by the tidal exchange (not an issue in lakes but most of my diving is in the ocean), leaving me a distance from the exit point.

The deep dive portion gave me the confidence to explore deeper depths without the worry about being too deep. My deepest dive has been to 155 feet to look at gorgonian coral, but the majority of my dives are less than 100 feet. Now I only go deep to check out octopus or wolf eel dens.

As the recovery part of the training, I learned how to rig lift bags properly, and raise items from the bottom. Haven't actually used this skill too much. I think the last item I recovered was from about 20 feet, and was light enough it did not require a lift bag.

As others have stated, a quality instructor will help round out your training, making you a better, more confident diver.

Dive safe,

Divegoose

Enjoyed reading your aow experience! Yes, the night dive was great! It was a first and followed a monster eel (had to be 7-8 feet) out in open water as we were headed back to shore! So it definitely topped off the end of an exciting dive!

 

[guahoo]

I will always do a thorough workup on Buoyancy, Breathing and Body position, the aim being to improve your general diving skills, finning techniques etc, for some students this is all remedial training, for other students its just "fine polishing"
Navigation involves compass and natural nav, much more detail than in OW.
Computer use, surface safety sausage, surface safety in choppy conditions, how to dive from a boat from a boat safely, lots of other safety stuff as conditions dictate.
Deep dive covers Sac rate (calculated on earlier dives), gas planning, the concept of "rock bottom" gas and the use of a 40 cu ft pony. I also insist on "in water" buddy check / bubble check at shallow depth on every dive.
We will also discuss in detail Narcosis, DCS, computer algorithms and everything pertaining to going deep.
Everything else, depends on what dives you elect to do.
If you felt the you didn't learn anything, then you are either a very experienced diver OR you had an (inexperienced) instructor who did the minimum to "tick the boxes"

Thanks for all that info... insightful for sure. That’s a lot more detailed info especially the deep dive part that I never did. But I now have more questions for my instructor. Thanks!