How long are most OW courses?

[The_DivePirate]

When I got certified, my course was a week long, with home study to be done before hand. We spent a couple of hours the first night going over the first three chapter's and the last couple the next night followed by the swim test's. On wednesday night we did confined 1&2, Thursday night we did confined 3&4 with Friday off unless further training was needed. Sat. and Sun. we went to the lake for our checkout dive's. My course hear at the shop is setup the same way and I fell my student's come away with a quality class. My checkout dive's are excactly that, "DIVES" , so the student really gets to play with bouyancy and finning. Let's face it, sure they are not perfect by any means. But if I didn't feel they could dive safely without me, they wouldn't get a c-card. PLAIN AND SIMPLE!!! I have also dealt with Japanese college tranfer student's, where we teach them the book work in two full days (6-7 hours per day) There is usually somewhere around 50 some student's so we use a college classroom to do this. From there they choose an OW weekend for their water portion. This is a 3 day portion where the students stay at a private residence with a private beach. The first day there the students do alot of land drills (to many to list) with a swim test leading right into confined 1&2 after that it is time to relax and a Q&A for those of which feel compelled. The next morning more land drills and finish up with confined 3&4. During the surface interval we have lunch and a compass refresher seminar with a course we make them manuever with a towell over their head's. Back into the staging area to saddle up for OW 1&2 where we have a gridded area to dive within. We make it a game, as we dive we ask student's to be ready for anything, and let them know we may ask them to due a skill, answer some hand signal's, thing's like that. That way all the student's are at their best, and without pointing at someone specific and making them feel uncomfortable you can work on a weakness of theirs. Make sure you ask some of the other student's to do skills as well. I have found that by the end of the weekend, we have turned out some VERY adequate divers. Some I could even say, come away better diver's in the three day course. Yes, it is a cram course, but with all the hand's on and live in training, the ones that want the extra will search it out and the others are there also to get it. Kinda a win win situation. Sure the long course will give them a better understanding of the theory and more time in the pool will help them with bouyancy and such. But does it turn out better diver's? I think to a point, it's like going to a buddies favorite site with him while he's driving. But when you go there without him and your driving, things seem different.
DP

 

[apertyx]

I took my OW in Australia, after studying PADI E-learning in Canada. Not counting the time to do the course online (which was pretty much at your leisure) my course was two days. First day was knowledge review/testing to make sure you knew what you took online, then off to the pool for the morning. Afternoon was 1st OW dive at Bare Island.

Second day was three OW dives at Oak Park in Cronulla - instruction was 2 students/instructor, and it worked out great for me and my dive buddy!

 

[grumpie]

When I teach a OW class it is 6 class room and 6 pool. the class room is 2 hrs and 2hrs pool. The open water part is 5 dives, one is snorkle and review some rescue skills and the rest are skill review and compass and nav. work. max class sizes 6 people.
grumpie....

 

[soulrebel]

I was fully confident in my instructors abilities and happy with the amount of personal attention and instruction I received.

However this comment is spot on.

Others shorten pool time to doing the basic drills without enough time to work seriously on bouyancy and trim.

The pool I was trained in was unfortunately only 1.9M deep, and we were restricted to one lane only. This really didn't give us an opportunity to experiment with and learn proper bouyancy control, before entering the OW.

I was in a class of 4 students including myself, along with the intructor and a trainee instructor. Which felt like the perfect size really, and once again I could not fault my instructors abilities or attitude towards the course.

As they say the best teacher is experience, and in my diving experience so far I have found that education is continuous anyway.

 

[llqwyd]

As a general rule, it is hard to put a specific "time" on what it takes to get certified. I teach (PADI) in a resort area where our classes can be much shorter than the timeframes given in the previos posts. Now, before anybody decides to "chide" me, just hear me out. I am not saying that shorter is better...I am only saying that what is important is how well you understand the concepts that are being taught/discussed and also how well you do in the water.

I realize that a majority of the instructors on SB typically stand behind a schedule that would probably be more lengthy than the one you went through. And, to a degree, I might agree with them. However, most of the students we certifiy are regular repeaters that come back year after year and have done some type of DSD (Discover Scuba Diving) or other program at least once. For the ones that we take from start to finish and have no prior experience, we recommend to them that, even though they have met the requirements to earn their certifications, they must still continue to learn and grow as divers and that their education has only just begun.

Answer to the question asked - on island the timeframe is typically 3-5 days. How do you feel that your certification was handled and do you feel like you are really a good "certified" diver?

 

[ayeshacantrell]

I believe alot of the differences in time scales are due to when and where you choose to take your course. If you are completing the course at home whilst work,family and general daily life responsibilities are in place then it make sense to complete your training in bite size chunks. If you complete your training while on holiday then these restrictions do not apply and you will have the freedom to dedicate a number of whole days to learning to dive. Either way the course 'hours' and content and level of achievement should ultimately be the same as regardless of timetable certain standards need to be met. It is the intructors responsibility to ensure that each student meets these requirments no matter how long it takes.....

 

[Yoshua]

The course was over 3 days but I had the book 3 days before that doing book work and when I went to the class I passed the quizes.


They offered other courses that took longer but I was on vacation and I am a quick study, but from the start of the course to the end it went like this.


Have all book work done for at least the first 3 chapters before the course starts and then do the book work on your own during the 3 days completing the tests/quizes as you go and the last thing you do is the final exam with the instructor.


Day 1- Meet at the shop, get geared up and head to confined dive, which was at a beach that had zero current. Did confined dives 1 and 2 and the swimming compentency tests day one.


Day 2- Meet at the beach for Confined dive 3 and then proceed to doing an open water shore dive from that confined dive. There is a huge Reef that the depth is about 30feet max


Day 3- Boat dives. We did 2 open water boat dives. One was max depth of 40ft and the other max depth was 72ft at the bottom of the reef but average depth was between 50 and 55ft




It was also a private class. Just me and the instructor and then his instructor in training was also tagging along but didn't do much more than observe.

 

[Yoshua]

Answer to the question asked - on island the timeframe is typically 3-5 days. How do you feel that your certification was handled and do you feel like you are really a good "certified" diver?

I am a 3 day island grad. And I feel I am competent enough to get back under the water with a buddy of the same level who isn't too adventurous. There are a ton of 'beginner' dive sites in my area and my plan is to get my friend certified in a 2 week class, which consists of 5 days, 2 weekends. 1-Friday- Sunday 2-Sat and Sun.

After he is certed we are going to start the beginner dives and get a feeling for rental gear to see what gear we actually want to buy. We'll probably do the same 2 or 3 dive sites 20 or 30 times before venturing out to a few of the other sites we want to see.




How do I feel about competency? I feel it is great for being a beginner, and I feel that my instructor put the right amount of fear into me about respecting my surroundings, gear, and furthering my education without taking too many risks.


I'd definately recommend my instructor to anyone going to Maui.

 

[guppie9]

I did my cert over 3 days while on vacation. However, those days were from 9-3 each day. We did a lot of the book work at home (hotel). It was a small class, only 3 of us. 1 dropped after the first day because she couldn't handle being under the water. The other guy dropped after the second day. I'm not sure why. So I got 1-1 attention on the last day. 1st day we geared up, did a lot of basic stuff and then headed to the beach for a shallow water dive with zero current. It was like being in a pool, but with a better view! We did two dives that afternoon, doing skills. After the dives, there was review of the skills on shore. We also did a lot of book learning and review during our surface interval. Day 2 we reviewed our homework and went over the new skills. 2 dives in the afternoon with skill review and book work during SI and after the dives were over. Day 3 was a final review, did the final exam. Than off to the same beach for final skills checkout. After a SI and congratulations, we were off to a different dive site for a 6th dive just for fun.

How do I feel? Pretty confidant. I realize that there is a lot to learn still and that diving is something you practice and never really master. (IMHO) Granted, my course was recent (Nov 2008). But I feel like I could dive tomorrow without any concerns. 6 months, a year, 2 years from now....who knows.

Yoshua - Just curious, but who did you get your cert with? I did mine on Maui, also, and thought my instructor was fantastic, as well.

 

[amerz]

From what I recall, which at times, is not THAT accurate! LOL

I do remember 3/4 pool sessions,(3-4 hours each) 2 lake classes (2 dives each, 4 hours) before the actual boat dive. Also, we had 3/4 book days with 3-5 hours each time.
*Just a note, my instructor for OW was INCREDIBLE with A LOT of experience

Hope this helps!

How long are most OW courses in other countries? I live in Australia and my course was:

Friday night - theory (basically a review of homework sheets completed with the help of videos & text on a CD-ROM)
Saturday - pool & 1 dive
Sunday - 3 dives

From some of the posts I've been reading on here, it sounds like some of the OW courses go for weeks? Whats the average?

If it makes any difference it was an SDI course