Buoyancy skills

[Patoux01]

However, the instructor really does need to "do something" to get students diving. It's not something in my experience that happens automatically by just not telling them that it's difficult. They need to be shown how and in any process of learning, the student will usually need to work toward a goal. Assuming that by just telling them that it's easy will make it easy isn't entirely accurate.

I'm not saying one should tell people it's easy, that's a wrong pedagogical approach in my opinion (because if the person fails, he'll have failed on "something easy").

The approach of @RainPilot is correct imnho. Show them the proper position out of the water. (Give some explanations as to why). Explain how to stay neutral: breathe in when you drop, breathe out when you rise. Let them fiddle for a bit with it, and then they're good to go. The part with no gear is good, but I believe that if they don't know they got an air bubble they can manage there, it's not necessarily a big deal (depending on the target audience. eg for people used to carrying huge bags like kitesurfers or paragliders, carrying a tank is not a big deal). The "extra gear" shouldn't be a big deal, since it gets tucked away properly normally. I kind of run my "DSDs" like that (I'm not a DM of any sort, but gave a few try dives to people), they're on my long hose and just swim along. Didn't see anyone struggle (but that's a fairly small sample).


Same thing goes for teaching how to kick, why on earth don't people take 5 minutes to lie on a table and explain it... guess it's easier to explain to someone that he should clap his fins while you're underwater.


The spgs had to be mentioned, because else you'd have thought you were perfect

 

[Diver0001]

I've been seriously thinking of making videos of the steps we take in OW and then presenting them for the skeptical among us in the I2I forum.

The thing to do, I think, is to first present a video of a student making their last OW checkout dive so they can see the end result and then work backwards in time to see how you get to that point.

Starting at the beginning and working forward in time will give too many openings for discussions about details by people who don't fully understand that a learning process is about the END result, not the STARTING point.

R..

 

[Diver0001]

I'm not saying one should tell people it's easy, that's a wrong pedagogical approach in my opinion (because if the person fails, he'll have failed on "something easy").

Yes, that's what I was trying to say. The student has to understand from the beginning that a learning process involves working toward a goal and that there may be moments when they don't get it right away or even moments of frustration.

Expectations -- particularly painting a very good picture of the required end result -- should be set from the very beginning and they should be reassured frequently that they are on track and that they will reach their goal by the end of the course (provided, of course, that it is true).

In the process I find that I have to frequently remind students that it's not necessary for them to get it right on the first try. Oddly, the more perfectionist students are the ones who get the best end results and are also the ones who require the most coaching not to be so hard on themselves as they learn. I've seen the odd student totally block their own learning by setting unrealistic expectations of themselves and then not listening to what I was saying to them about relaxing into the process.

R..

 

[RainPilot]

Absolutely no danger of me thinking I'm perfect, believe me...

One of the things I picked up on my UTD IDC was the value of dry runs. I had never been shown that or even thought about it before.

The irony is that as a flight instructor, I was already VERY familiar with the teaching paradigm at work here, but had never thought to apply it to diving. UTD teaching methodology comes directly from the FAA Flight Instructors Handbook, so the "aha!" moment was simultaneously inspiring and embarrassing.

In flight training, ALL teaching happens in the classroom / briefing. There is way too much going on in a cockpit for effective knowledge transfer. The only reason we fly at all is so they can try what they just learned and see that it really does work.

 

[RainPilot]

The main reason for the "no gear" portion is that it allows them to focus on basics without distraction. I try to never add more than one thing at a time, if they gear up before they understand breathing control then a large part of their brain is distracted by the gear, "should I be using the BCD" etc etc

I follow a very modular approach of building blocks. Laying a proper foundation is to me the overarching responsibility and duty of the instructor, especially on initial courses. I've had to undo bad habits so often, I can't be the guy who makes that problem for others.

What I usually do regarding how easy it is, is nothing. I don't comment either way unless a student has issues. Once they have the hovering down, I then show them some videos of bad divers. "This is why we did this and why you will never be THAT guy." It is usually quite a morale / confidence booster when they realize they have done something "unusual".

Oh and another reason for the no gear part is to establish weighting. From the beginning I get them to note their weight required for just their body, then their suit, then with gear, then with varying tank pressure / sizes. They keep this noted down (I write the suit weight on the label with a sharpie) and so they have a tool for changing the variables.

 

[The Chairman]

I'm not saying one should tell people it's easy, that's a wrong pedagogical approach in my opinion (because if the person fails, he'll have failed on "something easy").

Why should they fail??? I teach them the physics behind it all at breakfast using my fingers and a bottle of hot sauce. We go through the motions of kicking on the back of my van and then I set the example. Monkey see: monkey do. I spend 6-8 hours in the pool in two sessions. The first few hours are just getting them comfortable in their gear.

 

[Patoux01]

Yes, "why should they fail?" is a good question. To which I don't have an answer, "it just happens".

I teach adults (20-25yo students, my age) how to solder all day long from september to november. There's really nothing complicated to it:
- put the soldering iron on the solder pad.
- add some solder
- slide the component you want to solder in the solder
- remove the soldering iron
- do the other side
Nothing complicated, really! But people struggle, and fail, once, twice, a few more times, and then they get it and go "oh, it's really easy". If you tell them it's simple and they somehow fail (come on, nobody's perfect, everyone does **** at some point in their life), now you just basically told them they're a turd.

And while I'm all against telling everyone they're amazing, anyone can fail on things that we consider basic and I begin to understand that.

 

[The Chairman]

Yes, "why should they fail?" is a good question. To which I don't have an answer, "it just happens".

I haven't experienced a failure with Scuba, but I'll keep it in mind if I ever teach soldering. I don't recall that I ever say it's "easy". I do say "It's simple if you get the physics to work for you. After all, it's not rocket science: it's submarine science. "

 

[txgoose]

My first comment would be to see if the instructors here see what I saw/did. For almost all of us newbies doing demos, we got really positive just as we did each demo because we all took a slightly bigger than normal breath before trading regs or clearing our masks or manually inflating the SMB(?), etc etc. So we all popped up a bit but then settled back down as we exhaled. Anyway, maybe a different thread.

I didn't read every post so I am not sure if anyone else has described this situation. My instructor seemed to use a modified approach to what I have read in the thread. In the shallow end of the pool where we were taught the bulk of each new skill, we were mildly negatively buoyant pivoting on our knees but not sitting on them. Then in the deep end we were shown how to get neutrally buoyant and encouraged to be, but there were plenty of bounces off the bottom. At the end of our pool time he then gave us free supervised time in the deep end to work on the skill we were most tentative about in OW. We all worked on trying to get something akin to a hover.

In OW, we really didn't have a choice because the lake we dove in is a silt pit on the bottom. Nobody wanted down in that stuff and none of us hit it during the class the boys and I were in. Well, the instructor had a choice. We descended to a suspended training platform but instead of demonstrating our skills while inside the platform, he had us hover around the outside of the railing. For us newbs it was nice having that 2" railing pipe in front of us as a visual reference. My first dive was a mess. I had a vertical change of probably five to seven feet. (boys made fun of me, turds) But by the second dive, I cut my vertical changes to probably three-ish feet. By the third dive my mind was registering how I could fine tune my breathing to affect my buoyancy. "Hey buddy, macro adjust the BC. Micro adjust yo' self." I started altering how slowly I breathed in or out to adjust my internal air bladders as needed. _that_ started to feel magical (for a newb). Like the cave diver in the sky shown down their 10k lumen beam of light upon me. (for the record, trim was still fairly abysmal)

I signed up for a buoyancy class with him. It has been very enlightening. Still struggling a bit to bend at the knees properly. I am sure that my arched back looks really tense and awkward. Feels that way. But I've lost four pounds! And I can probably hold about a sub 12" hover-ish looking position if not loaded with other tasks. (I did do one barrel roll while looking for the wife above me and when I got back belly down I was only off by about 18". Was kinda cool.) Will be buddy breathing this weekend with the wife as she takes her cert/demo dives in the lake. I am curious how different my weight check will be compared to a short month ago when I did my own cert dives.

So we did knee pivot, to mostly neutral, to OW demo dives where we had to be pretty neutral.

 

[The Chairman]

For almost all of us newbies doing demos, we got really positive just as we did each demo because we all took a slightly bigger than normal breath before trading regs or clearing our masks or manually inflating the SMB(?), etc etc.

In the shallow end of the pool where we were taught the bulk of each new skill, we were mildly negatively buoyant pivoting on our knees but not sitting on them.

So, rather than learning how to relax from the beginning, they try to do that when they get to the deep end. Did I get that right?

Rule of primacy: You will fall back to the very first way you were shown/taught a skill when you get stressed. If you first learned on your knees, you'll go back to that when stressed.

Force of habit: it takes longer to unlearn a bad habit and reintroduce a good one than to simply learn it the right way first. No matter how hard you try, a habit will linger for a long, long time even after you've corrected it. This is especially true for scullers! The "Force" runs through them for either good or evil. I'm not going to give bad habits, like kneeling, a chance to take hold.

Fear is an enemy of good buoyancy. If you're not comfortable in the water, you'll be all over the place. It's one reason why I make trim and neutral buoyancy the very first skill on scuba. Once the student is past their fear and trepidation of being suspended mid-water, true learning can be accomplished. IOW, if they're not relaxed, they're going to be constantly distracted while I'm trying to teach them. Then they learn each skill in situ, just as they would be using it in open water. We do it until they're relaxed, constantly building on be in trim and neutral. No unlearning. No relearning. I honor the rule of primacy and use the force of habit for good and avoid all its negatives. It's truly efficient and makes training easier for me and my student. The best part is that they won't need a hundred dives to perfect their buoyancy. They're way ahead of that curve and relaxed. No white knuckle divers needed on the reef.