Tips on the IDC Classroom Presentation
During the you Instructor development course and at the Instructor Examination you will be required to do a Classroom Presentation. You will need to pass this presentation in order to become an PADI Instructor. This blog covers some tips on the IDC Classroom Presentation & how to prepare for this.
You will be giving the question at the start of your PADI Instructor Examination. Your presentation topic will be an incorrect knowledge review question that the student has gotten wrong. Most of these are from the PADI Open Water, Rescue and Divemaster courses. However you can get questions from the Advanced Open Water Course, Project Aware courses and the Peak Performance Buoyancy course.
By and large, the presentation is not overly difficult. Once you get your head around it, it is relatively easy. What makes it challenging for candidate is the format that it is presented in. To be fair, it is uniquely PADI. It will be most likely different to what you have previously learnt presentations at universities or the like.
The first thing you need to understand is that you are NOT TEACHING the full topic. Theoretically you have already done during your main classroom time. What you are doing is CORRECTING AN INCORRECT ANSWER. This means the presentation should be brief and not a full blown overall classroom presentation on all aspects of the general topic.
One basic tips on the IDC classroom presentation is to just answer that specific question. For example, in the knowledge reviews of the first chapter of the PADI Open Water Course there are five questions relating to equalizing. Your student may have 4/5 of them correct. They may have a good understanding of equalizing and just got one question wrong. You do not need to do a full presentation on equalizing, just the question that the incorrectly answered.
PADI break the presentation down into three sections, What You are Going to Teach Them, Teaching Them and Reminding Them What You Taught Them.
For the record, I am not a fan of an introduction ie. “Hi, my name is Derek and I am your PADI Instructor and I am going to answer this question blah blah blah”. If you are answering Question 15 from Open Water Knowledge Review 3 then I am pretty sure the students know who you are by then. More realistically would be “Lets go through question 15 again”.
Here we will try analyze each section and give you some tips on the IDC classroom presentation.
IDC Study Aussie Divers Phuket PADI Instructor
INRTRODUCTION
Contact
This is your first contact in relation to the question. Understand that the student got the question incorrect. We are going to try and give an analogy and present the question and a different way so it makes it easier for them to understand
If it is a question from the PADI Open Water Course you will do a contact story will need to be non-diving related. The reason is that the student may never have been scuba diving so they can’t relate to any diving examples. Examples of some non-diving contacts would be, flying and equalizing, snow skiing and shivering underwater, bubbles from Coke Cola and decompression bubbles.
If you are doing a question from any other course, you can use a diving related contact story. i.e If you have a question from the PADI Rescue Course about Hypothermia, your contact could start with, “have you ever been ice diving” and talk about that.
Tip: Don’t get too hooked up on the contact story. I have seen students procrastinate over this for a long time. It is one mark from 25 and if you nail it good, if you don’t and the rest of your presentation is fine then will have no problems passing.
Value
This is a short safety value or reason why the student should learn the answer. i.e If you have good buoyancy your won’t don’t break corals. If you can equalize well, you won’t damage your ears.
Tip: Keep this short and brief and stick to one reason. Do not list off four or five values. You can relate it to components of the course “while you are in the pool today/tomorrow” or “when you are doing your open water dives”.
Overview
A short overview of the question. This is a lot simpler than candidates think. It is just a few of the main words out of the question. – i.e How do I equalize when descending? The overview would be, “We are going to talk about equalizing techniques”.
Tip: Again, keep it short and brief. We are just telling the students what we are going to talk about.
Conduct
The method they learnt and you will refer to. i.e Turn to the reference page … of your manual or eLearning question.
Also mention to take notes or ask any questions.
Tip: Have a PADI manual ready, along with the correct page.
Interaction Ideas
You must interact with the students. Use open questions that solicit a response. Not a closed question that gets a yes/no answer. Involve the students, especially in the beginning.
Example: Closed question: “Did you fly to Phuket?” which solicits a yes or no answer only.. Open Question: How did you come from your home to Phuket? Follow open question with more open questions. “Where did you fly from? How long did it take? How many stops?”.
Aussie Divers Phuket PADI IDC Instructor Divemaster
BODY
Objectives
Very simply your objective is to answer the question.
Tip: “Our objective is the answer this question…….”. No more, no less.
Relation to other components of the course
The next two work together. This is where the question effects the practical components of the course (pool or open water) and local environment (the dive site you will be going to).
For example: if the question is about equalization, you could say “tomorrow we are going to Racha Yai Island for dives 1 and 2. We will be descending to 12 metres using a descent line. There will be significant pressure changes and you will need to know how to equalize. This will be important to you so you do not damage you ears.
This section gives the student an immediate reason to know the answer as they will be placing it into practice very soon.
Tip: Try and be specific on the skill. Not just, during dive one of the course, but, during the five point descent of dive one of the open water course or other specific skills.
Course Activities in Local Environment
As above with some comments in relation to the dive site. Bay 1, Racha Yai Island. It can include a very quick, “It is a nice place to dive , lots of corals and we may see some turtles etc”.
Continuing Education examples/benefits
Here we will upgrade to another course. This needs to directly link into the question. i.e You could learn more about equalizing during the Deep Adventure dive of the PADI Advanced Open Water Course. If you were talking about hypothermia during the PADI Rescue Course you could upsell to the PADI Ice Diving or PADI Dry Suit Specialty Courses.
Try to pick 5 – 6 reasons why you should upgrade with additional benefits i.e PADI Advanced Open Water Course, five extra dives, certified to 30 metres, explore different dive sites, get credits for specialty courses etc.
Let the student know how many dives the course is and how many days it will take. Also mention that you will be the instructor and you can start immediately following this course.
Use the PADI App, training section to show more information about the course.
Tip: Make it realistic, simple and achievable.
Benefits of dive equipment ownership
Now you will sell a piece of relevant equipment. Again it must relate to the question i.e question is about buoyancy sell a BCD, question is about being cold underwater – sell a wetsuit or if it is about equalizing then sell a mask with a nice soft nose pocket.
Again pick 5 – 6 reasons why buy this equipment and the best reason is that you own the same equipment i.e this is my BCD and I like it because, it has integrated weight pockets, some nice big zippered pockets, plenty of D-Rings, nice padded back plate, easy to use clips etc.
Tip: The dive computer you are wearing will be good for about 80% of the questions. Learn to sell your dive computer. Dive computers have at least 20 features you can describe and are a very easy sell. Every diver should have one.
Environmental activities
If either of the two topics above have benefits to the environment use them – i.e Both the Peak Performance Buoyancy Adventure dive and a good BCD will assist in not breaking coral.
Dive travel to gain experience
If you struggle with selling equipment you can sell dive travel – i.e a liveaboard trip, an overseas diving trip. It needs to be provided by your dive shop.
Please try and remember making it relative to the question. If you are talking about cold water diving you could sell an Ice Diving trip to Sweden in June conducted by your store.
Training aids
There are a multitude of things that you can use to answer the question. I often use a glass of Coke to explain nitrogen bubbles.
Whiteboards can be used however it needs show the how the answer achieved. If you just write the question you will not get the mark.
Showing the PADI App on your phone (in detail) will assist with this mark as well.
Interaction Ideas
Continue to interact with the students. Ask do they own any of their own equipment, ask if they are considering further courses or dive trips. Again, open questions, tot do you own equipment, what equipment do you own. Solicit a response.
Teach
Play the video and highlight the information. Remember the students have already seen this video. You could start be saying, “do you remember watching this previously?”.
If there is no supporting video, have the students read information from the prescriptive lesson guide or directly from the PADI manual.
Aussie Divers Idc Candidates Hard At Work In Phuket Thailand
SUMMARY
Reinforce value with application
Reinforce the original value and tie that into the course dives that you will be doing. i.e so now you should know how to answer this question about equalizing and that will make the 5 Point descent on dive number 1 tomorrow safer and easier.
Overview
State “Now you should have a good idea about….” Repeat the original overview.
Reinstate objectives
“So now you should all be able to answer this question…… “. You could point at the question and have students read the question. Have students discuss and answer the question.
Tip: You can also quickly talk about wrong answers i.e why they are wrong, especially if you know which question the student answered incorrectly (rarely you would know this at an Instructor Examination).
Reminder of PADI continuing education, dive equipment ownership, dive trips or environment activities
Very quickly remind the students of the upcoming course that you recommended follow by let’s go into the store and look at the BCD, mask or computer I was talking about.
Tip: Do not resell anything her, you have already sold it. This is not catch up time to sell again, it is purely a reminder.
Interaction Ideas
Have the students talk about and answer the questions on their own. Positive reinforcement from you.
Conclusion
When it is all finished. Do not forget to ask students if they have any further questions and if not have them sign and date their knowledge reviews.
Please note: As my father used to say, “There are plenty of different ways to skin a cat”.
These tips on the IDC classroom presentation is not the ultimate guide to doing a presentation. Many PADI Course Directors, PADI Examiners and PADI staff have different ways to do the presentation.
If your PADI Course Director has told you a specific way they would like you to do the presentation then that should be the way you do.
Good luck and all the best with you PADI Instructor Examinations.
Download PADI IDC Classroom Presentation Tips
Posted in Instructor Pro IDC Tips on .
