bowler1
your last paragraph reminded me of a discusion I was in on a cooking message board mostly for professionals or working cooks. The main question was is it better to go to cooking school or learn on the job as you move through your career. I learned on the job and one of my daughters went to a big name school in the culinary world. To this day we call each other and ask each other questions. From all of this what I concluded, related to the message board discussion was that cooking school will get you a broader range of exposure to techniques, flavors and cuisines in a relatively short period of time. Doing it the way I did it left me with a more limited knowledge base which took much longer to acquire. In the end both of us are good cooks.
I see the same thing with kayaking. If I could go to a one or two week school for seakayaking I would know most all of the techniques needed already. Currently I’m doing it on my own and I still don’t have a brace of any worth, nor can I roll or do any of the recoveries yet.
Just two differnt routes to learning is the way I view this whole thing. Which is the point I believe you are making.
Exactly right.
good points
I would agree of course that the best way to learn would be to get instruction. That is obviously the preferred way to do it.
But my reason for bringing that up is because a prevous poster made the case for why some people can’t take the steps to mater skills because of the expense of instruction and the distance he would have to drive to get instruction.
I find that while instruction is the preferred technique it is not the only way to learn to master skills, and in some ways I see it as the “lazy man’s” way to learn. This is not always the case, but I see a lot of people that seem to think that they can just pay someone to infuse knowledge into them by the process of osmosis, or that are not willing to take the time to learn on their own, or dedicate themselves to the amount of practice required to improve.
Of course that is an extreme example, perhaps, but not all that uncommon. I have gone to a few symposia, and it seems that I often see people like that. In my opinion they are often the type that have a lot of excess income with which they feel they can “purchase” paddling skills.
I guess ultimately the difference lies in whether they actually take the time after their instruction to practice, reinforce, and master the skills they were taught.
Please excuse me if my post sounds somewhat cynical. I am not trying to be closed minded or negative.
Matt
Not cynical
or negative at all. In fact I think you’re accurate in your assessment. Skills can’t be purchased out right. Regardless of how one gains an understanding of a skill, direct instruction or through self study of books, video etc, the skill must be practiced repeatedly to acquire the muscle memory to perform the skill. Some people don’t want to do the practice. Consequently the skill is really never learned.
coaching and practice
I agree. Often when I teach a class I will tell students that my job is to attempt to give them the correct mental imagery, work on drills, and provide effective coaching so they know what THEY must work on at home to practice and ingrain the skill. It is the student’s job to be attentive, ask prudent questions and then go home and practice, practice, practice, (before the details are forgotten and until the skill is ingrained).
Some students do this and quickly gain skills, and some students don’t practice, and you see them again the following year, at the same symposium, working on the same thing. Some people treat annual symposiums as their practice sessions, and can stay at a plateau for years and years.
I learned the Greenland rolls on-my-own, from an old video by John Heath, because Greenland-style instruction in the US was not available in 1989. The process of learning was almost like detective work – piecing together clues. This was fun, but progress was extremely slow, and often frustrating.
However, an advantage was that because I learned by trial and error, making all the common mistakes, that when I finally mastered the rolls, it helped me to instruct others, because I had already made all the same mistakes they were making, and quickly understood what they were doing wrong.
That said, often we don’t have the time to make all the errors ourselves. It can take years and some errors can cause injury or even prove fatal.
Instruction is essentially standing on the shoulders of others (and taking advantage of their errors/solutions/misfortunes/discoveries and expertise) to make the learning process much faster AND safer.
It doesn’t have to be an all or nothing approach. I recommend going to a coach for a “checkup” as you would a doctor. A coach can fix a few things and keep you from developing bad habits that could take months (or longer) to fix later on, once they become ingrained into your “muscle memory”. If you don’t go to a coach, at least try to video yourself. You will often find that you aren’t doing what you think you are doing.
Greg Stamer
Electrical construction
Mayhem, sledding, snowmobiling, hashing.
Envy you that South Pole gig…
…I was a second seat standby for the 2005 Raytheon South Pole support crew (also electrical). Unfortunately for me the primary was able to make it and I stayed on the bench. Did a lot of reading up on it, including the rogue insiders blog “Big Dead Place” which is a reality check after the glowing folderole of the “official” website. Sounded kinda like a combination of a remote mining camp and a 3 month frat house party, with mass quantities of alcohol and fornication (my own interests were geography and playing in the snow and ice).
Could have reapplied for the following season but got sucked into family responsibility stuff – still sorry I never made it down there.
driving schools ARE analogous
Many sports car clubs like the SCCA and the BMWOCA offer high speed driving schools. Yes, they are on closed courses BUT the skills that you learn in them, pushing a car into a skid and then recovering and having a professional sit beside you and correct bad habits in steering, line selection and braking, are invaluable. A lot like having an ACA instructor dump you out of your boat and coach you back into it.
I used to date a guy who organized such events for his car club and I took three of the weekend seminars myself. I doubt I could have survived the 8 years I lived and commuted extensively in Michigan, with it’s crazy “demo derby” style public highway conditions, if I had not had that training.
B.S., willi h20
First of all, your question was based on a flawed premise. Obviously newbies don’t shun training or we’d all be newbies.
Secondly, experienced folks are rescued as much as or more than newbies.
Thirdly, you have no patience for anyone with a differing viewpoint. your only response is more judgemental nose-gazing. I doubt the aficionados could tolerate you.
^EXACTLY!^ the irony is perfect.
Nothing personal against Dr. Disco, but he responded to the question with ignorance - the same kind of ignorace we’re accusing some newbies of having.
I share that last sentence with you
you know, the people I paddle with don’t seem to hold the same sentiment that Willi and a few others here do. I think I had a naive view of paddlers who in reality are like any other group.
I think folks like willi are too proud of their recent accomplishments and their pride sets them looking about to judge people who made different decisions than they did. And I think a minority of instructors in this thread are being a bit too sensitive. No one is slagging instructors.
I agree with you
where did you attend defensive driving
school?
Elitist hypocrite.
reality
I was there for a the last few years of it really being a free for all. As you’re familiar with BDP, I was part of the crew that came up the Safety Slogans, Our network was cut off after it was hacked from outside, created the Hash House Harriers chapter at South Pole, among other things.
The corporate site is one extreme and BDP is the other with the truth somewhere in between. There is a lot of drinking and not a whole lot of fornication (it’s a numbers game).
I will say that I do miss it and I do think about returning.
bingo
Hey bowler: I’ll cop to my chronic abrasiveness. But that doesn’t explain all the normally “polite” people who have somehow crossed a line in your eyes. Guideboatguy is right.
why can’t you understand?
We all have different enthusiams levels for different sports and activities. Should I expect you to enjoy cycling as much as I do?
It’s comments like those that are inexplicable and judgemental.
Staying alive
Living to paddle another day is what its all about
“Counting the negative remarks”
Keeping tabs on "how many" of the statements of disagreement were made by the original poster versus the number that were made by others is pointless. Here's why. The OP says something really far out, so far out that it's not even remotely true for thousands upon thousands of cases for every ONE case where it is true, and if three people voice their disapproval, the immediate result is what you are seeing as a three-to-one majority of negative comments by responders. Besides, I don't see any of the responders being untruthful just to make their case, and as far as being nasty, the worst most of them have said to the OP is that they disapprove of his manners and methods. There's no easy way to "be nice" when pointing out a load of bull.
No bull
A large percentage of new kayak owners hit the water
"cold" with very little knowledge of "the water"
or "paddling" or "the consequences" or "the weather".
The fact that I called that bluff seems to
have pissed some of you off - so be it.
I see it every season in greater Detroit, Michigan
and we have literally 100's upon 100's of little
lakes, ponds, puddles in addition to the Detroit River
and Large Great Lakes.
No pfd, paddle upside down, ice cold water,
etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.
A few posters have been real, truthful, and honest;
- they see the same stuff I do, it happens a lot.
Others seem very skilled at learning hard knocks,
and boast about it, like it's the only way to go.
I've always been amazed at folks that bathe in ignorance.
It perplexes me, mystifies me, and boggles my mind.
People do things in their "own" way in a free society.
-- Including posting on P.Net any way you wish
I've thanked you before and I'll thank you again
- forums are most definitely for discussion !