Children's diving

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The children diving is the recreational diving with for children and adolescents custom rules and diving courses . From the age of about eight it is possible for children to learn to dive in a child-friendly diving course and to acquire diving certificates (brevets) with diving equipment that is suitable for their body size . After completing their training, the children dive in a buddy team with an adult. Compared to adult certifications, children's certifications are usually limited in terms of the maximum depth and number of dives per day, because there are still no conclusive results on how the changed demands on the body affect the child's organism.

Children as a buddy

Dives with children usually take place in shallow water with little or no current. It is usually recommended not to exceed a maximum diving depth of 5 or 18  meters , depending on age and training. Children react differently than adults to dangers or incidents and can therefore quickly become an increased risk for themselves and their companion despite the shallow diving depth. It is therefore imperative to take into account the special medical and psychological requirements of children for every dive .

When diving, children and young people have to take responsibility for their adult buddy in order not to endanger the safety of everyone involved. Every inexperienced diver becomes part of a diving social system (buddy system). The trust that the adult buddy places in the child gives him the necessary emotional security and stability to survive in the field of tension between fear of the unknown and curiosity . A side effect of the buddy system is a social relationship that is nurtured by shared experiences and mutual recognition. This relationship can be documented and consolidated through entries in the personal logbook and through debriefings . Therefore, preparation and subsequent interaction are just as important for children as the dive itself.

Diving fitness examination

Before any diving training and afterwards at annual intervals, ideally a pediatrician who has trained as a diving doctor or a diving doctor who specializes in children should examine the child for his or her fitness to dive. A diving fitness test is more important for children than for adults, as their own body perception and emotional world are usually not as well developed as in adults. Although the approach to the examination does not differ fundamentally from that of adults, the doctor should ask more intensively whether the child is mentally mature enough and whether diving was his own desire or whether he was pressured to do so.

education

Learning to scuba dive in a swimming pool is possible from the age of 8. Courses that enable open water dives in the open sea or lake can be attended from the age of 10. From the age of 14 to 16, young people are admitted to the diving courses for adults without restriction. Most dive guide - and instructor but -Ausbildungen be reserved for young adults from the age of 18 or 20 years because these actions are legal can open up questions. With many diving organizations , diving instructors are only allowed to teach, test and certify children in diving courses after having completed additional training that distinguishes them as children's diving instructors. In contrast to the diving courses for adults, there is no standardization for the children's courses that would make it easy to change the training organization. It is entirely at the discretion of the instructor in question whether he wants to recognize the children's certification of another organization or not.

The following training organizations offer diving courses and certifications for children: ¨

CMAS

CMAS offers a three-level training system for children that is similar to adult divers:

CMAS bronze:

This basic diving training includes learning to use diving equipment, diving signs , breathing underwater, pressure equalization and flipping . The whole course takes about a week. After completing the training, the child should be able to dive to a maximum depth of 5 meters, in open water with a solid bottom, accompanied by a diving instructor or CMAS *** diver. It is recommended not to do more than one dive per day.
Children between the ages of 8 and 14 can acquire the CMAS bronze certification. In order to be able to take part in the course, in addition to a medical certificate and a declaration of consent from the legal guardian, the snorkel badge 'Robbe' must be proven.

CMAS silver:

This diving training builds on the CMAS bronze training and includes learning to navigate in the water, additional diving signs, flora and fauna identification , as well as the independent and mutual control of the equipment. The course lasts around a week and the same restrictions apply as for a CMAS bronze diver.
Children between the ages of 8 and 14 can acquire the CMAS Silver certification. In addition to a current medical certificate, a CMAS bronze certification must be provided before the course begins.

CMAS gold:

This diving training is based on the CMAS Silver training and includes learning to care for diving equipment, safety rules and simple connections from diving physics and diving medicine . The course lasts around a week. For children under the age of 12, the same limits apply as for CMAS bronze divers. For children over 12 years of age, a maximum diving depth of 10 meters is recommended.
Children between the ages of 10 and 14 can acquire the CMAS Gold certification. In addition to a current medical certificate, a CMAS Silver certification must be presented before the course begins.

From the age of 14, teenagers can take part in adult CMAS diving courses. All CMAS children's training courses are taught by specially trained children's diving instructors. The children's trainings of the individual CMAS member organizations (e.g .: VDST , TSVÖ or SUSV ) may differ from the regulations and designations of CMAS.

PADI

PADI offers an educational system for children that is in some cases very different from the PADI courses for adult divers. Every PADI Instructor is authorized to teach the following programs:

PADI Bubblemaker:

The Bubblemaker is not a diving course, but an opportunity for children to get a taste of diving. In addition to a short theoretical introduction, the Bubblemaker includes a dive in the pool at a maximum depth of 2 meters, under the supervision of a PADI instructor. Typically, the Bubblemaker experience lasts around an hour. You can take part in the Bubblemaker from the age of 8 without prior knowledge and usually without a medical certificate.

PADI Seal Team:

The PADI Seal Team course includes an introduction to swimming pool scuba diving. You will learn the use of diving equipment, the diving signs , pressure equalization , taking out the regulator , operating the buoyancy compensator , flooding the diving mask , breathing from the octopus and switching between the snorkel and the regulator. The course consists of five theory and five swimming pool lessons. A medical certificate confirming fitness to dive and a minimum age of 8 years are required. At the end of the course, the child receives a so-called PADI Seal Team Member certificate, which entitles them to dive in the swimming pool with a PADI Divemaster or Instructor pricking up .

PADI Master Seal Team:

Building on the Seal Team course, there are so-called Specialty Aqua Missions , analogous to the special training in the Adventure in Diving program (AID) for adults from PADI. A PADI Seal Team Member certification and a current medical certificate are required . The following ten Specialty Aqua Missions can be selected individually:
  • Specialist in the identification of living things
  • Environment specialist
  • Inner Space Specialist (Taring)
  • Navigation specialist
  • Night dive specialist
  • Security specialist
  • Search and recovery specialist
  • Snorkel diving specialist
  • Snapshot specialist
  • Wreck specialist
The Specialty Aqua Missions all take place in the swimming pool.

Junior Brevets:

Young people from 10 to 14 years of age can take part in diving courses for adults and acquire a so-called junior certification, which is limited in terms of the maximum diving depth. PADI allows junior divers to dive in open water accompanied by an adult diver (aged 10-11 only when accompanied by a legal guardian or PADI instructor). From the age of 15, the so-called Junior Certificates can be converted to Adult Certificates. The junior brevets include:

SSI

SSI offers the following children's diving courses:

SSI Scuba Rangers:

The SSI Scuba Rangers program is aimed at children between the ages of 8 and 12. It is not a self-contained course, but a selective training. There are no degrees or certifications, but a five-point scheme according to which the children's ability is assessed:
  1. Theoretical knowledge: knowing the safety rules and simple diving physics and medicine.
  2. Diving Skills: The basic skills a scuba diver should master.
  3. Diving equipment: Learn how to use the equipment. Every scuba ranger should have their own personal ABC equipment .
  4. Responsibility: Learning the buddy system.
  5. Training: Taring and correct breathing are repeatedly trained and optimized.
The training takes place in the swimming pool and is led by a specially trained SSI instructor .

Junior Brevets:

Young people from 10 to 14 years of age can take part in diving courses for adults and acquire a so-called junior certification, which is limited in terms of the maximum diving depth. SSI allows children with a junior certification two dives per day or three dives per day that do not last longer than 20 minutes in open water, accompanied by an adult diver. The SSI Junior Brevets include:

hazards

When diving, humans enter an environment for which they are not created due to their biological systems and in which they can only survive for a short time without technical support. Dive medicine professionals judge the risks children face while diving as manageable as long as the recommended limits are followed. This in no way means that there are no risks. It has been proven that the peculiarities of a growing body need special consideration. Children have fewer alveoli in their lungs and therefore have a higher breathing rate than adults. Due to this fact, children tire more quickly when diving than adults. Shallow diving with children is recommended, as there is a chance that growing bones could be damaged at great depths. In relation to their body weight, children have a larger body surface area than adults, which is why they become hypothermic faster. In addition, the child's body breaks down during the dive by the increased pressure in body tissues in solution gases passing more slowly than in adult humans.

In spite of the shallow depth that children normally dive to, there are basically the same risks as adults diving. In addition, children are more prone to panic reactions than adults, which can put them at greater risk of various types of diving accidents. In addition to dealing with the logic of the child and safe, competent guidance from an experienced buddy, strict adherence to all diving limits is recommended - as with adults - to avoid diving accidents.

criticism

Critics accuse the diving organizations of trying to build strong customer loyalty by confronting children with diving as early as possible . Profits would be optimized at the expense of the health of children and adolescents. Among other things, this is achieved by employing diving instructors in a swimming pool as " babysitters " while parents take part in adult dives instead of teaching their children about snorkeling or swimming, which are less harmful to their health .

It is often emphasized by critics that the risks for the growing organism of a child when diving are too great. Mostly, the unsolved scientific questions about diving are pointed out. Despite all these unanswered questions, diving and hyperbaric doctors share the view that scuba diving does not pose a greater health risk for children than it does for adults.

More and more diving operators advertise, for example, diving safaris for the whole family. Diving doctors (e.g. Christian Beyer from the Society for Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine ) consider diving safaris to be generally unsuitable and dangerous for children under the age of 16, because most safari tours are overwhelming and pose a high risk for adults with little diving experience .

The diversity of the very different educational concepts for children, which is difficult to understand for inexperienced legal guardians, the lack of standardization and the fact that the individual development stage of the child is often too little taken into account are also criticized. If diving is reduced to vacation employment , it will be difficult to provide diving training suitable for children.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Harald Apelt: A question of teaching? Children's diving. In: DiveInside. Taucher.Net GmbH, August 5, 2008, accessed on July 10, 2020 .
  2. ↑ a b Evi Dombrowski, Martin Kusch, Uwe Hoffmann: Diving with children and young people . Sport and Book Strauss, Cologne 2004.
  3. ↑ Heiner Fabry: Eight brave boys go underground. Adventure and theater educational project days with tests of courage at the Friedrich-Ebert-Schule Schopfheim. In: Badische Zeitung . July 22, 2013, p. 23 , accessed March 6, 2014 ( alternative source ).
  4. ↑ a b School knowledge as a background for extracurricular sports exams. A study of the correspondence between the theoretical requirements of the bronze diving qualification and the content of the school subjects biology, physics, chemistry and mathematics . GRIN Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 978-3-640-13152-5 , pp. 1–2 (thesis; online ).
  5. ↑ a b Anke Fabian: Diving with children. What if your offspring want to dive? Messe Düsseldorf GmbH, accessed on March 6, 2014 .
  6. ^ Standards Children's Diving,. (PDF) Version 2008. CMAS , accessed on March 6, 2014 (English, Alerntive Source: Children's Diving Standards 2003, Version 2008/01 ).
  7. ↑ Training Map. CMAS International, accessed March 6, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Diver Dolphin 1 CMAS.CH. CMAS.CH, accessed on March 6, 2014 .
  9. ↑ Diver Dolphin 2 CMAS.CH. CMAS.CH, accessed on March 6, 2014 .
  10. ↑ Diver Dolphin 3 CMAS.CH. CMAS.CH, accessed on March 6, 2014 .
  11. ↑ Bubblemaker from 8 years. PADI, accessed July 10, 2020 .
  12. ↑ a b PADI Seal Team program. (PDF) AQUATICA Scuba Diving, Oerlinghause, accessed on October 29, 2013 .
  13. ↑ Kids' Courses. PADI, accessed July 7, 2020 .
  14. ↑ Instructor Manual. PADI, accessed on July 7, 2020 (German).
  15. ^ Scuba Rangers. SSI , accessed March 7, 2014 .
  16. ↑ Children & Scuba Rangers. SSI , accessed March 7, 2014 .
  17. ↑ 2014 Training & Dive Center Standards. (PDF) Scuba Schools International / v102813. (No longer available online.) Concept Systems International GmbH, October 28, 2013, p. REC-10 , formerly in the original ; Retrieved February 25, 2014 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.divessi.com  
  18. ↑ Torsten Gervers: Children's diving . Tauch-lenen.net, Duisburg, accessed on February 25, 2014 .
  19. ↑ Anne StClair: The Dangers of Scuba Diving for Children. In: Sporting Life 360. Kirsty O'Lone, April 18, 2008, archived from the original July 5, 2014 ; accessed on April 3, 2014 .