Blue Minded Martin • Koh Tao, Thailand
Become the instructor your future students deserve.
Martin's Perspective
Most people think becoming an instructor is about passing an evaluation. I think it's about learning to stay calm when someone looks to you for confidence.
Start your Blue Minded Path towards becoming an SSI Open Water Instructor. The days we spend together on Koh Tao are built around real-world coaching, while Blue Minded Academy helps you prepare for presentations, briefings, theory, and assessments before each step of the journey.
Blue Minded Moment #004
Before the first day, don't worry about becoming an instructor. Focus on becoming someone who can give confidence to another person underwater. The rest is built one dive, one briefing, and one conversation at a time.
Why train with Martin
Becoming an instructor isn’t just about learning standards. It’s about learning how to stay calm, communicate clearly, and give confidence to another person underwater.
That’s the approach behind every ITC I teach at Big Blue Diving on Koh Tao.
Real-world teaching
We practice the situations you’ll actually face as an instructor — from classroom presentations and confined-water coaching to briefings on a busy dive boat. Every exercise connects back to real diving.
Confidence through coaching
Confidence isn’t expected on day one. This is where the course lives: repetition, honest feedback, and practical coaching that build the habits making teaching feel natural. Everything else supports this.
Blue Minded Academy preparation
You arrive prepared. Blue Minded Academy lets you learn the theory, standards, and briefings before each workshop, so the time we spend together in person goes into coaching rather than catching up.
The best instructors I’ve trained aren’t the ones who started with the most confidence. They’re the ones who stayed curious long enough to build it.
Who this is for
Built for divers ready to lead.
Certified Divemasters
You hold an SSI (or equivalent) Divemaster rating and you’re ready to take the next step toward becoming an instructor.
Future Dive Professionals
You’re looking for a mentor-led path into teaching — not simply another certification.
Career Changers
You’re reshaping your life around the ocean and want a professional qualification that prepares you for real-world diving.
Divers Ready to Teach
You already love diving. Now you’re ready to guide someone else’s first underwater breath with confidence, patience, and care.
What you'll practice
Habits you rehearse until they're calm.
This isn't a syllabus to memorise — it's a set of habits you rehearse until they're calm and repeatable. Practice briefing real divers. Practice demonstration-quality skills. Practice giving constructive feedback. Practice making calm decisions under pressure.
Dive theory
Physics, physiology, equipment and decompression — taught for understanding, not recall.
Teaching presentations
Classroom, confined- and open-water presentation skills, evaluated and refined daily.
Confined-water demonstrations
Calm, repeatable skill demonstrations that set the standard for your future students.
Open-water teaching
Leading real training dives in the conditions you will teach in.
Student management
Risk management, standards and the human side of looking after new divers.
IE preparation
Targeted readiness for the SSI Instructor Examination, with no surprises on the day.
A typical day
Picture the rhythm of training.
Morning
Most days run from about 08:00 to 17:00. We’re on the boats and in the water early — confined-water workshops, open-water sessions and rescue scenarios. You learn by coaching in the water, not from a chair.
- Confined-water workshops
- Open-water sessions
- Rescue scenarios
- Demonstration-quality skills
Afternoon
Afternoons move onto land: teaching workshops, candidate presentations, dive theory and SSI standards, with coaching debriefs that turn the morning’s water work into understanding.
- Teaching workshops
- Candidate presentations
- Dive theory
- SSI standards
- Debriefs & coaching
Evening
Evenings stay open. Time to prepare tomorrow’s presentations, review the day’s feedback, or just decompress after a full day on the water.
- Prepare tomorrow
- Review feedback
- Decompress
A Blue Minded Principle
Smaller daily learning blocks create better long-term confidence than trying to absorb everything at once.
What’s included
Everything in the course, nothing hidden.
Included
- ITC tuition
- IE preparation & fees
- Digital materials
- Physical materials
- Blue Minded Academy access
- Personal mentorship
Not included
- Accommodation
- Flights & travel to Koh Tao
- Visa fees
- Personal dive equipment
- Meals & daily expenses
- Dive insurance
Professional registration
The price shown applies to active SSI Divemasters. Candidates crossing over from other agencies add 4,200 THB for professional SSI registration.
Registration covers the remainder of the current calendar year. If your Instructor Evaluation falls in October, November, or December, the following calendar year is included as well.
The goal was never to create another instructor.
The goal is to help you become the instructor your future students will remember.
Entering the Blue Mind
Six moments that change how you think, teach, and lead underwater.
The ITC lasts 16 days.
But the real journey isn’t measured in days.
It’s measured in the moments where you stop trying to get everything right and start focusing on helping someone else learn.
Arrive
Find your starting point
You arrive with experience, expectations, and probably a few doubts. The first step isn’t proving yourself — it’s understanding where you’re starting.
Observe
Learn to see differently
You start noticing things you never looked for before — how a briefing changes a student’s confidence, how a demonstration removes hesitation, and how small corrections can completely change someone’s dive.
Practice
Confidence through repetition
Repetition changes everything. Skills become smoother, demonstrations become clearer, and confidence grows because you’ve practiced them, not because you’ve memorized them.
Coach
Help others grow
Teaching isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about learning how to guide someone through uncertainty with patience, clarity, and trust.
Lead
Think ahead
Somewhere along the way, you realise you’re already thinking ahead — checking the group, anticipating problems, and planning the dive before anyone asks.
Become
Carry it forward
By the end of the course, you’ve earned an SSI certification — but the bigger change is quieter. You leave thinking differently about teaching, leadership, and the responsibility that comes with introducing someone to the underwater world.
Koh Tao — Turtle Island
Blue Minded Moment #005
Somewhere during the course, there’s usually a moment when you stop wondering whether you’re good enough and start focusing on how to help someone else become better.That’s when something changes.
Life on Koh Tao
Where the training lives.
Koh Tao is a small island built around diving. The day starts early — dive boats leave around 07:00, and the walk to the dive centre soon becomes part of your routine: the same faces, the same banter, the same slow wake-up over coffee.
Mornings are spent in the water. By the time you’re back in the afternoon, you’ve already got fresh examples to bring into workshops and debriefs — a nervous student, a skill that finally clicked, a moment worth talking through.
After workshops there’s usually time for a coffee, a swim, or just sitting somewhere with a view. Sunsets on Koh Tao are genuinely worth stopping for, and the line between training and life tends to disappear somewhere around them.
You don’t just visit Koh Tao during an ITC — you become part of the community for a while. Instructors, divemasters and students all overlap, and that’s where a lot of the real learning happens: in the conversations between dives, not just during them.
You don't need to know every answer before getting in touch. That's my job.
Before We Build Your Path
Before We Build Your Path
Most people who get in touch with me are asking the same bigger question:
“Is this actually the right path for me?”
These are the answers I usually give before we even start planning your Blue Minded Path.
Planning Your Arrival
Planning Your Arrival
Once you’ve decided this might be the right path, these are the practical questions almost everyone asks before arriving on Koh Tao.
Accommodation
I’ll help you find a place that suits your budget and keeps you close to the dive centre, so you’re never rushing across the island before an early boat departure.
Most students end up within walking distance of Big Blue, which makes early mornings and afternoon workshops far easier.
Recommended stays
Names, phone numbers, and booking links will be added here.
Equipment
You don’t need to buy everything before arriving — but a few items are worth owning as a future professional.
Mandatory professional equipment
- Dive Computer
- Compass
- DSMB
- Finger Spool
- Cutting Device
- Whistle
Regulator, BCD, fins, wetsuit, and mask can be borrowed during training. Instructors planning to work professionally are expected to build their own kit over time.
Visa & Staying Longer
Visa options depend on your nationality and how long you’re planning to stay.
I’ll point you towards the best option for your timeline, but it’s always worth checking the latest official requirements before you travel. I can’t give formal visa advice.
If you’re already on Koh Tao, I’d encourage you to stop by the shop before making your final decision.Meet the team, see how we work, and make sure it feels like the right fit.
Guided, not automated
Let’s Build Your Blue Minded Path
Skip the contact form. Answer four short questions about where you’re starting, your timeline, and what you’re working towards \u2014 Martin will read your answers personally and reply with a recommendation built around you.