We started our IDC (Instructor Development Course) a few months ago and its been a crazy ride. We went from being out looking after divers and guiding as PADI divemaster trainees to being in the classroom and learning how to teach. We started off with knowledge development presentations which was my first big hurdle. There are 30 marks to get and hitting as many of them as we could in the right order was a big challenge, we had to learn how to conduct gear sales and course sales with an integrated approach into our presentations. After the first 3 or 4 presentations things begun to get a little more fluid, talking infront of the class was more fluid and thinking of fun contact stories and diving circumstances became more natural. Now we are nearing the end of the IDC I find giving the presentations fun and getting good scores every time is a great feeling so I am looking forward to putting these skills into practice and helping out Open Water students in the coming months with questions they are struggling on.
The hardest and most challenging part for me during the Instructor Development Course at Auckland Scuba has been the open water teaching presentations. In New Zealand the conditions can sometimes be less favourable but doing it in the hard conditions means we will be better instructors for it and makes us control our groups a lot better. At first my I found it hard to be in the right position with my students while watching students perform skills, I was so focused on what might go wrong or what problem the student might have that other things just went out of the window. Over the last few months though with guidance from our Course Directors we have all become better with our situational awareness, knowing what is going on at all times when we have students. I think it has even become like a new sixth sense… The dive instructor sense lol
I have enjoyed all of the IDC at Auckland Scuba, its been my favourite part of this whole course. The best part was when we started teaching the other diploma course (DIPSI 2) When we were at Taupo doing the Waikato Drift dive we were the instructors and they were our drift students. We had to brief them, and lead the drift dive taking care of actual students. What a rush it was and not just the dive. So I can’t wait to start teaching, our Instructor Exams are 2 weeks away and after they we will be PADI Instructors!!!!
-Cassie Lee-Gordon
Cassie leading the descent workshop as the instructor.