How to Be Successful in Your Open Water Course
A scuba diver enjoying his time beneath the surface.
So, we've talked about getting started in scuba diving and the process of the open water course. One thing we haven't discussed is ways to be more successful and better prepared. So, what can you do to get the most out of the course you've paid so much money for? Let's dive in.
If you're like most of the open water students today, then you'll more than likely do all of your academic work online and then go through a presentation with your instructor. Some people are blessed with the ability to memorize information after reading it. However, I've never met anyone who can recite back the information in a dive course and apply it instantly. While going through your training, make notes of topics that you don't understand or need a more detailed explanation of and show them to your instructor. Don't be afraid to ask us to explain it in a way that makes sense to you. We are here to help you become great divers. We want you to fall in love with this sport the same way that we did.
If we need to find a way to relate the information to you, then we gladly will. I remember struggling to understand geometry and physics when I was in school. Luckily, I had a teacher who would offer free tutoring for one hour every morning before school started. When I was having difficulty, he found a way to help me retain the topics and apply them. I played sports, just about everyone I could (except tennis, but that's a topic for another time, lol). He would teach me to use the velocity and angles of a baseball cracking off of a bat, a football spiraling downfield at an angle, or the force behind a jump shot.
That's what we can do for you. Find a way for you to relate to the material that we're teaching you so that you can understand and apply it. Every dive instructor you learn from should apply that same method to you.
In today's society, we are blessed with a wealth of resources. Gone are the days when, if we wanted to learn something, we had to go to the dusty encyclopedia collection taking up space on our bookshelves. We can get information by typing a topic in a search bar and hitting enter.
Now let me be clear: YOU CANNOT LEARN HOW TO SCUBA DIVE THROUGH THE INTERNET!!! I don't think I can put enough emphasis on that. You can get supplemental information on topics that you may need additional help with. There are great resources on YouTube. Our channel, Tampa Bay Diving, aims to provide tips & tricks no matter what your level is. We take individual topics and offer expert explanations to help their viewers understand. You don't know what you don't know, and we offer tips to help you be better.
Making sure that you have the same instructor throughout your course could be one of the most important factors in your success. If you take the pool session from one instructor and then the open water dives from a different one, then I believe that more than likely will hurt you in the long run. Now, that's not the case every time, but I've seen it happen enough times to where I felt I had to include it here. As a divemaster, I've seen students paired up with great instructors in the pool, but when they get to the open water, they have another one who just doesn't teach as effectively or contradicts everything the first one taught them. Again, this could be good or bad depending on the circumstances.
For example, I assisted in a class where the pool instructor had the students do everything perfectly in the pool. Their buoyancy and breathing were fine-tuned by the end of the day, but the following weekend the next instructor wasn't concerned with anything but over-weighting them so that they can't get off of the bottom and end up teaching the students bad habits. I've also seen the other side of this, where the pool instructor was rushing through everything and not concerned as long as the students did everything correctly once. Because they only did the skills once, they hadn't had time to build up that muscle memory to apply what they learned. When we got to the open water, they struggled to even complete a few of them. This led some to not pass the first day. They had to either pay more money to come back and try again, or they just gave up.
As a divemaster, we couldn't say anything; we just had to be good little helpers. This angered me more than anything. I couldn't help but get so mad because this was turning people off of the sport and giving dive professionals a bad reputation. So if you take away anything, make sure to get a great instructor for the WHOLE course. Now sometimes life happens, a baby is born, a tire blows out on the highway, or something unavoidable. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the ones who say "I want to work this weekend but not that weekend" or the dive shops that are just so disorganized.
Scuba Diving Instructor working with students in the pool.
Whenever you're getting ready for a dive (training or the real world), you should always be checking your gear the week, night, and moments before a dive. Look for any leaks, defects, or missing pieces. Do this often to avoid an unfortunate circumstance arising that prevents you from diving. I can't tell you how many times I've seen divers show up missing gear, have an o-ring that they haven't changed out in years, or have a piece of gear with some kind of defect that had them ending up wasting their time because it prevented them from getting in the water. The process should go like this:
• After your dive, clean your gear.
• After your gear is dry, check it to make sure everything is still functioning properly.
• During the middle of the week, check it again.
• A couple of days before the dive, check it again and get anything wrong resolved.
• Check your gear before heading to the dive site. Replace anything that is missing or defective.
