I would agree that when it comes to organized teaching and a defined curriculum, the most effective instructors tend to utilize handouts, flip charts, and other materials to help the students maintain focus and make sure nothing is left out. As with any "canned presentation" the gear/safety/put-in talk becomes easier and smoother with repetition.
I do feel however, that depending on the amount of time you have available, curricula mandated by the ACA sometimes includes more information than you can effectively convey to a group, especially if it contains young people, so you may need to decide the points that you feel are most important and talk about them first. For many students the brain switches off after a certain amount of getting talked at and some people learn poorly from verbal instruction at all.
I think the maximum safe instructor to student ratio varies greatly with the venue. For real instruction on open water or moving water I would agree with pagayeur that a 1:4 ratio is probably around the ideal usually. A higher ratio might be safe (but not ideal) if you are doing instruction in basic stroke technique in a small pond near the shore.
In a moving water or open water environment, a ratio of 18 students to 2 instructor/trip leaders might possibly work with a very good group, but can quickly turn to disaster. A moving water environment will require one instructor to function as a lead and one as a sweep. In my experience leading or helping lead downriver trips, the sweep boater usually gets caught up trying to herd one or two or more boaters, who have no control over their craft, in a downstream direction as they repeatedly carrom from bank to bank. The lead instructor might get caught up trying to restrain one or more boaters who want to push on downstream as fast as they can go. Eddies are typically too small to contain the entire group and attempts to keep the group together often result in boat logjams in the narrow channels.
The result is that the group inevitably gets spread out often leaving the bulk of the group unsupervised and sometimes unobserved. The leaders are too far from each other to offer mutual assistance should it be necessary. If a boat dumps, it might require two experienced people to recover and empty it and get the paddler(s) back in, especially if it is a tandem canoe without flotation. If this happens the leader/instructors can only hope that the remainder of the group behave themselves, stay out of trouble, and stay put, which is not always the case IME.
This is the type of situation in which having a couple of experienced boaters tag along as safeties can make a huge difference. They need not be ACA-certified instructors, just willing to help out with rescues and head counting. One can function as a second sweep boater and the other can work their way upstream and downstream through the middle of the group.
There are some venues in which a instructor/leader to student ration of 1:4 might not even be sufficient. Some of the paddling clubs I have been in have tried to have 2 or even more experienced boaters for each "newbie" when introducing them to more difficult whitewater runs for the first time. This allows each newbie to have their own mentor and still have plenty of safety boaters on hand for rescue scenarios.
I think with an instructor/leader to student ratio of 1:8 or 1:9 the best you can realistically hope for is to get the whole group on and off the water safely. I think your ability to actually "teach" is going to be very limited, unless you have a really exceptional group. I think this is the reality and I would not take it as a personal failing.
your opinion is your opinion …and mine ain’t changing. My opinion from what I’ve read here is that you’re too rigid to be an effective mentor.
I’ve been a project manager for as long as you’ve been teaching people how to swing a paddle. Some of my responsibilities include staff training and retention. Guess what? Most of us find it easier to help an existing employee modify and improve performance than it is to dismiss the employee when they fail or suggest they find another line of work, than it is to start over with a new employee.
Now, did you have any other swordfights you wanted to get into?
I think the OP came here as a new instructor in a difficult spot, asking for help, and that you’re discouraging that instructor from continuing in the profession, on the basis of their post alone. Yes, you did. So I’m not sure why you’d object to my judgement of you as a mentor on the basis of your post alone.
I’m no project manager But I have been a paddling Instructor and Instructor Trainer (one who certifies Instructors) for the last 20 years. It is a very difficult thing to have to tell someone they will not be certified. It can be heartbreaking in fact. Many times I sought to cease this endeavor for that reason.
One of the very basic tenets of the safety portion of Instructor certification is the Student to Instructor ratio. If you hold yourself out to be a paddling instructor and do not have a firm idea of what this should be then you should not be allowed out on the water with beginners. An Instructor candidate’s ambitions are always secondary to the public’s need to be schooled in safe conditions. You can call me rigid but I’m very firm on this. If you are an Instructor Candidate in one of my certifications and have no idea of this safety priority, you will not be certified period. I’m not willing to foist an individual like that on an innocent public who is not familiar with this concept. BTW, Instructor Certifications are preceded by workshops which cover this subject, so Candidates hear these things a min. of twice but usually 3 or even 4 times.
Your ideas are are very indicative of the discussions that occur at every ACA SEIC meeting for the last 3 decades that I know of and probably a hundred years before that. It is a perpetual debate. All your points have been brought up to me many times. Trying to decide on a standard is like, as is said, herding cats. A lot of what you are saying is currently incorporated in the curriculum. For instance “competent assistant(s)” are allowed with an instructor. There are many other topics that are continuously debated and refined. One is, “should life jackets be compulsory?” I could go on but the point is all these issues are dynamic and none written in stone.
I cycled off the SEIC several years ago, but can tell you that it was a privilege to be able to discuss these matters with top professional paddle instructors, competitors, US Coast Guard reps, Red Cross instructors, Instructor Trainers, Safety & Rescue professionals, etc. These are some of the types of individuals that attend and it is quite eye-opening to get such a wide review of these topics.
aca guidelines very common sense, a good starting point and necessary to follow for insurance. We review these before launching a “club event”. It seems like one of the challenges the aca faces is the diversity of paddling environments, variety of craft, and varied paddling interests and cultures. I am amazed at what they do get done given the diversity.
Of course here on pnet we agree on just about everything and that makes everything and everyone harmonious all the time!
Understanding the strength of the group (human resources inventory) and adjusting as needed- group size, # of instructors, environment, skills taught- can and should all be adjusted to fit the need. In the ww realm we often break into “pods” to make this management easier and we still often debate how many “instructors” is enough.
One of my buds tells about getting his aca “ww instructor certification” and that it was very worthwhile and he learned about proper paddling form, something that was lacking in his own school of hard knocks learning progression. He also jokes that after learning proper for that the next day he and his buds took the teachers out for some class V boatin’ and saved the instructors’ butts a few times.
As time goes on I like handouts less and less and enjoy the informal small group trips that are a step up for me or are a step up for the other participants. Always good to have someone along who knows what he or she is doing.