UTD Teaching Methodology

[LCF]

Richard, you are only applauding because you don't want to read any more of my tomes

[airsix]

Kindergarden through university I don't remember any of the instructors passing out the test questions ahead of time.

I don't recall showing up to class on day 1 in any math course and getting a test that expected me to solve a problem without having been instructed in how to solve that class of problems. There were very few surprises in any of my math or physics courses on test day.

Ah, see you hit it right there. You were taught to handle a class of problem, but you weren't shown the exact problem you'd be tested with. Who says the students are being presented with anything they haven't been prepared for? The curricula for all the classes follows the format of classroom presentation of skills, followed by dry runs, followed by planning. Sounds to me like students are being prepared before being challenged. (I'll know soon enough. Signed up for one today.)

-Ben

[CaptnJack]

Kindergarden through university I don't remember any of the instructors passing out the test questions ahead of time.

I don't recall showing up to class on day 1 in any math course and getting a test that expected me to solve a problem without having been instructed in how to solve that class of problems. There were very few surprises in any of my math or physics courses on test day.

Ah, see you hit it right there. You were taught to handle a class of problem, but you weren't shown the exact problem you'd be tested with. Who says the students are being presented with anything they haven't been prepared for? The curricula for all the classes follows the format of classroom presentation of skills, followed by dry runs, followed by planning. Sounds to me like students are being prepared before being challenged. (I'll know soon enough. Signed up for one today.)

-Ben

Lamont is right to a certain extent. And I think my point out not really having a "roadmap" ahead of time is valid too.

On the one hand its pointless to memorize what to do when the donated post you are breathing fails, cause it all depends on what other resources are available if any (3rd buddy and their gas+reg situation, masks, lights to signal with and a whole ton of other equipment +human factors). There is no "dry run" for how to manage this situation. Part of the class is about coming up with at least reasonable solutions to the problem at hand. Rarely is it soooo intractable that "you're dead". Much more commonly, one or another teammate kills the other by not having the bandwidth to think through the available options.

[lamont]

Kindergarden through university I don't remember any of the instructors passing out the test questions ahead of time.

I don't recall showing up to class on day 1 in any math course and getting a test that expected me to solve a problem without having been instructed in how to solve that class of problems. There were very few surprises in any of my math or physics courses on test day.

Ah, see you hit it right there. You were taught to handle a class of problem, but you weren't shown the exact problem you'd be tested with. Who says the students are being presented with anything they haven't been prepared for? The curricula for all the classes follows the format of classroom presentation of skills, followed by dry runs, followed by planning. Sounds to me like students are being prepared before being challenged. (I'll know soon enough. Signed up for one today.)

-Ben

Lamont is right to a certain extent. And I think my point out not really having a "roadmap" ahead of time is valid too.

On the one hand its pointless to memorize what to do when the donated post you are breathing fails, cause it all depends on what other resources are available if any (3rd buddy and their gas+reg situation, masks, lights to signal with and a whole ton of other equipment +human factors). There is no "dry run" for how to manage this situation. Part of the class is about coming up with at least reasonable solutions to the problem at hand. Rarely is it soooo intractable that "you're dead". Much more commonly, one or another teammate kills the other by not having the bandwidth to think through the available options.

I don't think we actually died once in C1. In T1 we were definitely dead or bent a number of times, but also a ton of other stuff going on there as well in that class...

The thing about all my GUE instructors i've had is that they can all push you to the point that you break, no matter how much you are prepared. That 4th valve failure is an interesting one. What to do if a tie-off slips and you've got a mess of line on your hands is another good one. Plus there's the higher level resource management issues. There's probably more stuff going on in T2 and C2, that i don't even know about yet. I do the same thing when I'm giving technical phone screens, and usually push interviewees until they start to get questions wrong, then switch subjects. Given that they can do that, why not have the best prepared students going into the water? Why save stuff to surprise them with in the water?

[LCF]

Well, I started to write something detailed, and thought better of it, but I can say that Andrew presented me with several issues to solve that were complete surprises, and that the surprise component of it was, in my opinion, a critical part of the learning experience.

Lamont, like you, I like to go through things ahead of time, and have a chance to learn and practice before being evaluated. But in medicine, life serves up surprises and some of them are incredibly stressful. Residency training is in part designed to allow you to experience some of those incidents, in the company of someone who can drag your butt back out of hot water, if you don't rise to the occasion. In diving, reacting poorly to something unexpected is a bad situation, and dealing with the surprise and sudden stress is as much a part of the exercise as executing an acceptable solution. I guess I believe that, if you can keep your head when all around you are losing theirs, you're probably a good diver

[lamont]

Well, I started to write something detailed, and thought better of it, but I can say that Andrew presented me with several issues to solve that were complete surprises, and that the surprise component of it was, in my opinion, a critical part of the learning experience.

Lamont, like you, I like to go through things ahead of time, and have a chance to learn and practice before being evaluated. But in medicine, life serves up surprises and some of them are incredibly stressful. Residency training is in part designed to allow you to experience some of those incidents, in the company of someone who can drag your butt back out of hot water, if you don't rise to the occasion. In diving, reacting poorly to something unexpected is a bad situation, and dealing with the surprise and sudden stress is as much a part of the exercise as executing an acceptable solution. I guess I believe that, if you can keep your head when all around you are losing theirs, you're probably a good diver

It feels like I'm trying to describe something that people are not getting. I'm not saying that a technical diving course should never stress divers. I think my point is that what we wound up getting stressed about in that course was very basic stuff, and if we had been better prepared for the basic stuff we could have gotten past that and gotten stressed about much more interesting stuff.

As another example, I came in feeling pretty good about my ability to juggle a single Al40 deco bottle around. So bob handed me a second one, and then communicated that he wanted me to stop using my right hand and manipulate them single-handed with my left hand. Well, there' you go, bob found what I needed to work on. He can always jack up the task loading until students start to fumble around. Similarly, once the basics are solidly covered, he can always find ways to surprise and stress students in bottom work.

[LCF]

Well, Peter and I just had a spirited discussion of exactly that. His point was that he didn't feel adequately prepared on the basic stuff before it began to be used in unexpected and "creative" ways. I, on the other hand, felt as though I had enough exposure to basic skills and ideas before being asked to solve problems. The problem was that I couldn't always execute them to the standard required, but that's not the fault of the class design or the instructor.

But I think there is no substitute for that "oh my God" feeling. As an example, this is one that occurred in class, but wasn't part of the AG playbook. I had been given a left post failure -- no biggie. So I lost dry suit inflation (not using Argon). Still no biggie, because I have my wing. My buddies are given an air-share and lose buoyancy control and begin to cork. I sink a little and reach form my wing to control it, and i can't find my inflator. It's not where it's supposed to be, but I know where it attached in the back, so I reach back to my wing to find it, and I can't. Basically, I can't reach back as far as the takeoff, and I can't feel anything that feels like a corrugated hose. (On the video, you see the assembly has come out of the bungie and is sitting on the outside of my left shoulder, and I pat around everywhere but where it is.) While I'm doing this searching, I'm continuing to sink, steadily a little more rapidly. I'm in the water by myself (buddies are gone) with no ability to inflate anything, and I'm sinking. So finally, I shrug and say, "Okay, today is the day I find out if I can swim up full tanks," and I pitch up completely vertical and fin like crazy. And get up to where I'm neutral, and the rest of the ascent is no issue. (BTW, Andrew had no part in this except the initial left post failure -- I came up with this one entirely on my own!)

There is no substitute for the 60 seconds or so of figuring out what had happened, prioritizing the issues, running through possible solutions, and finally implementing the least attractive but only effective one. I am QUITE sure that, if I ever have a similar situation (in terms of having a problem where the easy solution isn't available for some reason) that I will instantly remember that dive, and it will help me stay calm and focused as I sort options. This is the sort of thing that people mean, I think, when they say, "Get out diving and let the ocean hand your butt to you a time or two," but being able to do it in the presence of someone who can intervene if you don't rise to the occasion is extremely valuable.

[lamont]

But I think there is no substitute for that "oh my God" feeling. As an example, this is one that occurred in class, but wasn't part of the AG playbook. I had been given a left post failure -- no biggie. So I lost dry suit inflation (not using Argon). Still no biggie, because I have my wing. My buddies are given an air-share and lose buoyancy control and begin to cork. I sink a little and reach form my wing to control it, and i can't find my inflator. It's not where it's supposed to be, but I know where it attached in the back, so I reach back to my wing to find it, and I can't. Basically, I can't reach back as far as the takeoff, and I can't feel anything that feels like a corrugated hose. (On the video, you see the assembly has come out of the bungie and is sitting on the outside of my left shoulder, and I pat around everywhere but where it is.) While I'm doing this searching, I'm continuing to sink, steadily a little more rapidly. I'm in the water by myself (buddies are gone) with no ability to inflate anything, and I'm sinking. So finally, I shrug and say, "Okay, today is the day I find out if I can swim up full tanks," and I pitch up completely vertical and fin like crazy. And get up to where I'm neutral, and the rest of the ascent is no issue. (BTW, Andrew had no part in this except the initial left post failure -- I came up with this one entirely on my own!)

So, what does that example have to do with "not giving away the playbook ahead of class" though (which is exactly the phrase that I initially commented on)? You got that "oh my god" feeling and a lot of task loading and to think about your resources and what to do about the situation you were in, but it had nothing to do with a playbook, and in fact it was entirely self-created. So when students give instructors 'free' scenarios like this all the time, what is the point of not sharing the "playbook" ahead of time? I'd rather they shared the playbook as much as possible up front and get the students as prepared as possible -- and even if they did that students would still shut down posts that another student was breathing off of all the time since the map isn't the terrain -- but hopefully it would flatten the learning curve in the course more and students would get to the more advanced playbook, self-produced failures and more interesting failure cases.

[Peter Guy]

LCF wrote

Well, Peter and I just had a spirited discussion of exactly that. His point was that he didn't feel adequately prepared on the basic stuff before it began to be used in unexpected and "creative" ways.

A. Wives should NOT be allowed to write what they think Husbands said -- perhaps they may write WHAT Husbands said, but not what they THINK husbands said.

B. My point was that DIR-F is a schizophrenic class in that you are being taught and graded at the same time -- at least I was not given enough to learn what I was being taught during the class -- BUT, thanks to Steve White and his incredible patience, I was able to eventually put together what he taught me and then grade me. If you want a class to teach you skills (as is the case with DIR-F) you shouldn't immediately jump to grading those newly introduced skills.

C. Personally, I'm somewhere between Lamont and Lynne on this. I learned a lot from AG in a "failures based experience" where we had very little idea of what was coming and had almost zero discussion of "the playbook." I also learned a lot from German Yanez who took me from Cavern to Full Cave in a mentoring format. Both are valuable and each has its place IMHO.

[CaptnJack]

As another example, I came in feeling pretty good about my ability to juggle a single Al40 deco bottle around. So bob handed me a second one, and then communicated that he wanted me to stop using my right hand and manipulate them single-handed with my left hand. Well, there' you go, bob found what I needed to work on. He can always jack up the task loading until students start to fumble around. Similarly, once the basics are solidly covered, he can always find ways to surprise and stress students in bottom work.

But this is purely mechanical and has little to do with remembering and utilizing what resources you still have. In many ways its like a cave1 protocol which is very easy to do in the dry. Blind line following and switching sides would be a great example of these kinds of skills.

Edge and I discussed this on our drive to the San Juans today (she's an Essentials through Rec3 instructor) and we both agree <many> students, including ourselves at one time, focus on what's failed rather than what resources remain. So discussing the "playbook" really just re-emphasizes the "what's wrong" part of the equation. It does not help students develop the bandwidth to "see" the resources remaining to get themselves home - those are team, buddy, and dive specific.

I would postulate that the only way to develop this wide angle perspective is through a certain amount of time in the water gradually increasing the problem's sophistication.

[Paulicarp]

...develop the bandwidth to "see" the resources remaining to get themselves home - those are team, buddy, and dive specific.

I'm reminded of Apollo 13 when the team realizes they don't have the oxygen to get home. Immediatly the focus is on what they do have in the vehicle to work with and find a way to make it happen. There was no procedure for that situation.

The way I understand this part of the UTD methodology is that the focus is not on teaching the procedure for this specific failure or that particular problem(loosing a mask isn't always about the mask), but to create senarios (realistic or not) that force the student to develop the ability to control panic and THINK thru the problem and find the best way to utilize the resources at hand in order to stay alive.

Is this correct?

[CaptnJack]

...develop the bandwidth to "see" the resources remaining to get themselves home - those are team, buddy, and dive specific.

I'm reminded of Apollo 13 when the team realizes they don't have the oxygen to get home. Immediatly the focus is on what they do have in the vehicle to work with and find a way to make it happen. There was no procedure for that situation.

The way I understand this part of the UTD methodology is that the focus is not on teaching the procedure for this specific failure or that particular problem(loosing a mask isn't always about the mask), but to create senarios (realistic or not) that force the student to develop the ability to control panic and THINK thru the problem and find the best way to utilize the resources at hand in order to stay alive.

Is this correct?

As I recall I thought it was CO2 scrubber they were short on, but yeah you got it. They didn't focus on what broke or why, they started scrounging for boxes, duct tape and some spare chemicals. While they had help on the ground, if they had gotten so tunnel visioned and missed the duct tape they probably would not have been able to jury-rig together their remaining resources.

BTW don't get too wrapped up in this discussion, it only tangentially applies to Rec1.

[Paulicarp]

BTW don't get too wrapped up in this discussion, it only tangentially applies to Rec1.

Understood. Rec 1, Rec 2, Essentials, Intro to Tech are all teaching the personal skills building blocks that the critical skills classes exploit later on.

[CaptnJack]

BTW don't get too wrapped up in this discussion, it only tangentially applies to Rec1.

Understood. Rec 1, Rec 2, Essentials, Intro to Tech are all teaching the personal skills building blocks that the critical skills classes exploit later on.

Yup. Although you (e.g.) still need to be able to share air way back in Rec1. That's the only team/critical skill I can think of

[airsix]

I lived in a foreign country for a while. The first little bit was a shocker for me. There were a lot of things being done differently from what I had always known. My first reaction was to pass judgment and say to myself "These people are doing it wrong." But it didn't take long to see that despite being different from what I had been taught, their methods seemed to be working just fine for them. I quickly came to understand that just because I do something a particular way does not automatically make it the best way or the only way.

-Ben

[Grateful Diver]

Can we please make this thread NHZ?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

[Joshua Smith]

Can we please make this thread NHZ?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Done.

[Sounder]

[Sounder]

I definitely found I had a mental "switch" during T1. My "switch" was from a "what failed/what went wrong" to a "ok, everything's cool and we're headed home... what are we working with?" type of approach.

[ljjames]

I would postulate that the only way to develop this wide angle perspective is through a certain amount of time in the water gradually increasing the problem's sophistication.

The "attention pizza" that is taught in basic motorcycle riding

I'm not so fond of a known "playlist" so to speak. I am more in the camp of you don't know what's gonna fail, or when, but what you want to know how to deal with a problem when it arises. Mostly cause thats like real diving. You teach people to "SEE" potential problems before they ever occur. If my students were able to 'foresee' problems coming and solve them ahead of time, I was far prouder of them than their being able to pound out rote memory 'solutions' to common (but in reality not so common) failure patterns. I understand increasing the 'stress' level, but there are other ways to increase stress I do want to see that they can perform the problem management skills (and was reminded of this when _I_ was a student again recently in my CCR class) But I don't have to playlist them. Then they are thinking about the playlist and what they think the instructor wants to see, vs. what might be the 'best' solution in the situation. Is there really a 'best' solution... when the shit REALLY hits the fan, I want them to know how to get themselves and their buddy home, and how fast or well they manage a multiple post failure, or if I can knot them up till they trip on themselves does not prove to me they can do that. It only serves to show them where they can improve (like Lamont, Bob Sherwood and the second bottle). Hopefully I as an instructor can already see where they may or may not have issues, and have been working with them to solve those deficits.

I understand what UTD is getting at... it's incredibly helpful for instructors to have 'measurable' goals. And that these goals are consistent no matter WHO you take the class from. This isn't so far from the way GUE has been _explained_ to me (not necessarily how it's instruction is or isn't practiced), or NAUI, or any other training agency. Even basic openwater classes are 'structured' to have measurable goals and build on the basic, and the instructors have a playlist for everything from the first pool session to the last openwater dive.

The comment up for discussion is the "known" playlist tho... I also agree with the problem of 'knowing' the playlist before the class can lend itself to people pre-practicing things incorrectly, which leads to having not only to teach someone something new, but get rid of the bad habits that didn't need to be developed in the first place. Inefficient use of instructors time. This is a problem I have seen in the DIR-F classes from time to time.

My absolute favorite example of unknown (but structured) playlist is DM/AI classes. "We will not do anything to you that we have NOT seen at one time or another in a real openwater one class, with real students" and nothing is scripted, but the candidates seems to come out of things with a better understanding of the chaos factor that they have to be aware of. They learn to deal with it, and it opens their awareness. They start watching for that fin strap coming off, or that student futzing with their weight belt buckle trying to tighten it but accidentally drop it, or the fixated one who swims off, the edge of panic one that then climbs on top of you when you reach them after they've bolted to surface (THAT one almost always pushes the candidate stress level)... etc... We totally take advantage of and exploit the weaknesses, like the candidate who gets fixated helping one 'student' or can't control their own buoyancy, or their own belt is slipping off, or or...

[BDub]

I'm posting a link to a discussion started over on the UTD website. It's a course report from a recent graduate from Todd Powell's Tech 1 course.

I'm only posting the link because I think this course report does a fairly good job of illustrating what we're trying to achieve when you hear the term "thinking diver". It's not about simply following protocols, it's about thinking and making decisions and is a major reason why we don't give the playbook ahead of the dive. We want you to assess and think (not that other agencies don't). This is simply a unique approach to developing that, which works for some people, and not for others.

Tech 1 Course Report

[Pez7378]

I'm posting a link to a discussion started over on the UTD website. It's a course report from a recent graduate from Todd Powell's Tech 1 course.

I'm only posting the link because I think this course report does a fairly good job of illustrating what we're trying to achieve when you hear the term "thinking diver". It's not about simply following protocols, it's about thinking and making decisions and is a major reason why we don't give the playbook ahead of the dive. We want you to assess and think (not that other agencies don't). This is simply a unique approach to developing that, which works for some people, and not for others.

Tech 1 Course Report

I think I like this Todd Powell guy, Brian never bought us Starbucks!

[ArcticDiver]

Can we please make this thread NHZ?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

>>>What is NHZ? (Guess - No Hassle Zone?)

Just a comment from a guy who has taught both skills and academic courses for a lot of years. If I'm teaching someone to fly an airplane the student knows on day one what the outcome standards are. They know very early in the course exactly what individual items are going to be graded and the standards for that grading. Like in the math class example in an earlier post the final exam is almost underwhelming because the student knows all along what they have to do to pass.

What they don't know are all the specific circumstances and variables that will come into play to make good decisions. And they don't know exactly when those situations are going to occur. They do know that all the situations are going to be realistic possibilities and not just off the wall gotchas. That leaves plenty of opportunity to be sure the student knows what the teaching community thinks should be learned.

Same thing in academia.

So, to me, there is little or no reason to keep specific skills and course outcomes secret from a student or prospective student. To me having a good sylabus that is available to a prospective student also helps the student select a course and instructor that is compatible with them and their goals.

As it plays to this thread I think the treaching sequence laid out in the original post makes a lot of sense. But, keeping specific skills and outcomes secret seems to go against proven teaching theory.

Good teaching is good teaching, regardless.

[dsteding]

As it plays to this thread I think the treaching sequence laid out in the original post makes a lot of sense. But, keeping specific skills and outcomes secret seems to go against proven teaching theory.

Good teaching is good teaching, regardless.

It isn't specific skills or outcomes that are being kept secret, and I suppose the "playbook" as it is could easily be gleamed from the myriad course reports on the internet.

What isn't being said ahead of time is things like "you are going to lose your mask, you your right post, you your left . . . " that type of stuff. It keeps things dynamic and fluid--a lot like real diving. The instIn my experience, I learned more from talking through things afterwards, but I also learned much by screwing up, or successfully thinking through things.

Lamont, I get your point about being prepared with the basics or even things a bit beyond the basics so you can get to the more interesting stuff. But, the journey is part of the process. My tech class worked well because we didn't stress the details ahead of time--and I think that modern GUE students seem to be hung up on the practice until perfect thing before the class. I have some GUE training at the basic level, but always thought the practice until perfect thing builds an incomplete diver (just like not practicing at all builds a different type of incomplete diver).

I think the a good approach for these types of classes (with Lamont's point in mind) is to focus on basic, personal, skills, and then go work with the instructor. The outcome--being able to successfully execute a tech dive--is no secret, nor are the expectations in terms of skills. There isn't a set path to that outcome because each student is different, and I bet the "playbook" recognizes that. What these classes are absolutely all about are teaching you to think and problem solve underwater--which is a direct result of the fact you cannot go straight to the surface with this type of diving.

[BDub]

I probably wasn't being clear enough.

Prior to doing the critical skills (or "failures") dive, the student has built a foundation with the personal skills dives in previous classes, and even the tech classes start with personal skills (or "safe") dives, to serve as a warmup for the students and an assessment dive for the instructor.

If the students knew the failures, or the sequence of failures, prior to the dive, that'd take part of the "thinking" aspect out of it, and they'd merely be following protocols...."Ok, he just took buddy A's mask, so I do this. Next up, he's going to fail my right valve, then I do this...?"

There's been countless situations where a failure didn't progress because they recognized a problem and took care of the problem. The failure/problem only progresses if they don't take care of it. If they know what's coming, they're going to solve it, because they're anticipating it.

Good teaching IS good teaching. And again, this is by no means the ONLY way. This is a training method that worked for me as a diver, and one that I've believed in as an instructor for quite some time.

Oh, and "NHZ" means "No Hijack Zone"