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Paddle Canada - Level 2 Instructor
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Paddle Canada - Level 2 Instructor

Paddle Canada - Level 2 Instructor

$1,195.00 CAD
For working instructors

Paddle Canada Level 2 Instructor

The certification that lets you teach and certify Level 2 Skills, and the point in the stream where instructing turns into coaching. Six days on the Saugeen Peninsula, in the conditions the certification requires.

6 DaysDuration
Class 2Conditions
CampingIncluded
Max 5Candidates

Why Take It

Six days on the Saugeen Peninsula in September, when the water here reliably gives us what the standard requires.

The Level People Actually Want
Level 2 Skills is where recreational paddlers go once they get serious, and it is the course clubs, outfitters, and schools most often need delivered. Being able to run and certify it is what turns instructing from a weekend thing into a real part of a working season.
You Stop Delivering a Syllabus
The shift from instructing to coaching is the point of the week. Diagnosing a fault you have never seen, building a paddler across seasons rather than across a weekend, and knowing when to add pressure and when to take it away. It makes you better at every level you already teach.
Assessed in the Water You Will Work In
Wind, current, real landings. What you learn to manage here is what you will actually face running your own courses on the Great Lakes, rather than a version of it in flat water.
Five Candidates, One Instructor Trainer
Small enough that nothing gets missed and you get told the truth. You will have your teaching watched properly and picked apart usefully, which is rarer than it should be.
A Credential Few Hold
Level 2 is where Paddle Canada stops running scheduled instructor courses. Everything above it is arranged through mentorship, one candidate at a time. Only a handful of Level 2 courses run anywhere in the country in a year, and relatively few instructors carry it.
The Other Four People
A week with four other instructors working at the same level, camping on the same site, arguing about teaching progressions after dinner. That group tends to outlast the certificate.
Sea kayaking in class 2 conditions on the Saugeen Peninsula

The Step Up From Level 1

Candidates who have done a Level 1 Instructor course sometimes expect more of the same. It is a genuine step.

Level 1 Instructor
  • Two teaching demonstrations
  • Presentations 15 to 30 minutes
  • Taught in calm to light chop
  • Simple frameworks such as IDEAS
  • Course plan for Level 1 Skills
  • No instructor certification needed to enrol
Instructor candidates on the water during a Kayak Ontario course

What You Will Work On

The technical paddling is assumed. What this course develops is the part that separates an instructor from a coach.

Coaching, Not Just Instructing
Where the instructor role ends and the coach role begins. Building individual development plans for paddlers you will see across seasons, and understanding how a paddler's awareness widens from themselves, to the group, to the water around them.
Stress as a Teaching Tool
Using pressure deliberately to produce learning, and recognising the point where it stops working. Holding a class together while the conditions deteriorate around the lesson.
Anatomy and Biomechanics
Breaking down what the body is actually doing in a stroke, so you can diagnose a problem you have never seen before rather than reaching for the nearest familiar fix.
Leading in Real Conditions
Maintaining an effective learning environment in rising sea state, current, and reduced landing options. Route and site selection accounting for tides, currents, weather, group speed, and hazards.
Assessment You Can Defend
Designing a rubric for on-water assessment of Level 2 strokes with multiple solutions per fault. Giving feedback that is timely, accurate, and survivable. Where video helps and where it does not.
Difficult Conversations
Working with a participant who is struggling, a co-instructor you disagree with, or a group whose personalities are pulling against each other. Rarely discussed and reliably the hardest part of the job.
Running the Business of It
Sanctioning, reporting, certification maintenance, legal and liability exposure, and the real benefits and limits of the Paddle Canada instructor insurance program.
Coaching on the water during a Kayak Ontario instructor course

Coaching Every Body

Adaptive paddling and inclusive instruction are part of the Level 2 Instructor syllabus, not a footnote. You will work through adapting a session for different learning styles, hearing and vision differences, and physical limitations, because the class you are handed will not be uniform.

The same applies to you. Paddlers of different sizes, shapes, and ages solve the same problem in different ways, and a coach who only knows one solution can only help one kind of person. Paddle Canada is explicit that re-entry aids such as paddle floats and stirrups are welcome and encouraged at any level, and using one does not prevent you passing. Competence is the standard, not a particular technique.

Equipment

Bring a full personal kit. At this level your gear is professional equipment: you will be demonstrating with it, teaching from it, and running rescues in it while five other people watch. Whatever you bring should fit you and be gear you already paddle in.

  • Sea kayak: two bulkheads, outfitted for class 2 water
  • Immersion clothing: drysuit appropriate to September on the Saugeen. You will be in the water repeatedly
  • PFD and spray deck that you paddle in regularly
  • Towline with a one-handed quick release. Bring your own, we do not rent these
  • Spare paddle, pump, whistle, knife, and 15 metre buoyant heaving line
  • VHF radio and navigation kit: charts, compass, and what you actually use to plan
  • Emergency overnight equipment and a tarp
  • Camping gear for six nights on site

Travelling in? Rent from us. Hauling a sea kayak across the country is expensive and often not worth it. We have Valley sea kayaks and drysuits available to rent with your course. Book early and we will have you in the boat before day one rather than at the launch on the first morning. Towlines are the one thing you need to bring yourself, because you will be running rescues on a line you already know how to release.

If cost is the obstacle rather than distance, email info@kayak-ontario.com and we will work something out offline.

What Is Included

You camp on site with the group for the duration of the course. Staying together is part of how the course works, and a good deal of the learning happens after the day on the water ends.

  • Six days of instruction and assessment with a Paddle Canada Level 2 Instructor Trainer
  • Small group, five candidates maximum per Instructor Trainer
  • Your place on the course group site, included in the fee
  • Online learning dashboard, open from the moment you register and yours to keep
  • A pre-course information package and a one-to-one readiness call
  • Assessment and certification against the Paddle Canada standard

Not included

  • Personal paddling kit. Kayaks and drysuits can be rented, towlines cannot
  • Paddle Canada instructor membership and course fee, paid directly to Paddle Canada before the course
  • Meals. We cook at camp, and there are pubs and food trucks nearby
  • Travel to and from the Saugeen Peninsula
Available to add above

VHF Radio Operator Certificate, ROC(M)

Paddle Canada requires proof of a Restricted Operator Certificate (Maritime) within one year of your Level 2 Instructor certification. You also need it to legally operate a marine VHF in Canada at all, on any vessel.

It is a federal certificate issued for life, with no renewal. Our course covers the material and includes the exam.

Most people leave intending to sort it out later and then run the year down. Add it to your booking above and it is done.

How You Are Assessed

Certification cannot be issued unless your skills were demonstrated and assessed in class 2 conditions. Not simulated, not described. Assessed, on real water.

That requirement shapes the week. You teach in wind, moving water, and landings that are not guaranteed, while your own paddling is assessed at Level 3 standard.

Three formal teaching demonstrations, at least two on the water, each at least forty five minutes. A written test of about an hour. A complete Level 2 Skills course plan with a risk and emergency response plan attached. Alongside that you are observed all week on safety, self care, care of equipment, group dynamics, and leadership.

Topics are assigned at least 24 hours ahead. Each category is graded pass, weak, or fail. One weak can be accepted at the course director's discretion and up to two may be eligible for a conditional pass. Reassessment is available. You will know where you stand well before the last day, and you will be told what to fix while there is still time to fix it. The course plan can be finished afterwards, though certification is held until it is in.

Who It Is For

Active Level 1 Instructors. You have run your own or led a company's Level 1 courses, taught in conditions that were not on the plan, and started to notice the gap between delivering a syllabus and actually coaching someone.

This is not an introduction to anything. Six days polish skills you already have, and there is no time built in to acquire them. Everything a Level 2 Skills course asks of a candidate, you should already be able to do without thinking about it. You do not need to be the strongest paddler in the group, but you need enough headroom to demonstrate cleanly with your attention on five other people rather than on yourself.

If you are not sure whether you are ready, you are not ready yet. And that is completely fine.

Almost nobody is ready the season after their Level 1 Instructor. This is a senior certification and it is supposed to take time to reach. Coming a year later and passing is a far better outcome than coming now and not.

Email us with your certifications and your teaching log and we will tell you honestly where you stand. If the answer is not yet, we will map out the year that gets you here.

Prerequisites, strictly enforced

Minimum age 18. Current Paddle Canada membership, and provincial or territorial membership where required. Paddle Canada Level 3 Skills and Paddle Canada Level 1 Instructor, both complete before the course begins. At least 15 days of logged instruction of Level 1 curriculum, courses or clinics. Within that, a minimum of two Level 1 Skills courses taught in the past three years as lead instructor on both. Those two courses count toward the 15 days. Significant paddling experience in a wide variety of conditions and locations.

These are Paddle Canada's requirements and we have no discretion over them. We will ask to see your log, and we would rather have that conversation in March than in September. Send it to us and we will tell you honestly where you stand.

Good to Know

  • Your online dashboard opens as soon as you register. The reading is required, not optional, and doing it is what lets day one start on the water.
  • The days are long and the evenings are working time. Lesson plans and course plan work happen after the paddling day, so plan nothing else that week.
  • We run six days rather than the five day minimum so that a flat week does not cost you your certification. When the water cooperates, the extra day becomes more teaching reps.
  • Paddle Canada requires a minimum of three registered candidates and enforces it. If we do not reach three, we will move you to another date or talk through the mentorship route.
  • The course runs rain or shine. Wind is the assessment rather than a problem. We only stand down for lightning or genuine safety risk.
  • Locations shift through the week to find the right water. That flexibility is part of the learning.
  • Wilderness first aid (16 hours) with CPR is strongly recommended, though Paddle Canada's requirement is standard first aid (14 hours) with CPR.
  • Participants are responsible for parking permits at launch sites.
Kayak Ontario

Certification. Successful candidates earn Paddle Canada Level 2 Instructor, certified to conduct and certify Waterfront Kayak, Kayak Rolling, Basic Kayak, Level 1 Skills, and Level 2 Skills courses, and to assist a Level 3 Instructor on a Level 3 Skills course.

After Level 2 → The stream moves to mentorship from here. We are glad to talk through what Level 3 Instructor looks like and how to start building toward it.

Questions

How do I know if I am ready?
If you are asking, the honest answer is usually not yet, and there is no shame in that. Readiness looks like this: your Level 3 Skills are current and comfortable rather than recent and hard-won, you have run your own or led a company's Level 1 courses in more than one kind of water, you know your kit, and you can demonstrate a stroke cleanly while watching five other people. Send us your log and we will give you a straight answer either way.
Can I rent a kayak and gear?
Valley sea kayaks and drysuits, yes, and for anyone travelling a distance that is usually cheaper and easier than hauling a boat. Book early so we can get you into the boat before the course starts rather than on the first morning. Towlines are the exception: bring your own, because you will be running rescues on a line you already know how to release under load. If you own gear you are comfortable in, bring that too.
I am short on the teaching log. What now?
You may be closer than you think. Clinics count, not just full courses, and the two lead-instructor courses count toward the fifteen days rather than sitting on top of them. Send us what you have. If you are genuinely short, we will help you plan the season that closes the gap.
Do I need my ROC(M) before the course?
No. It is not required to register or to take the course. Paddle Canada requires proof within one year after your Level 2 Instructor certification is complete. You can add our ROC(M) course to this booking above, which is easier than remembering it eleven months from now.
Why six days when the minimum is five?
Weather insurance. Certification depends on being assessed in class 2 conditions, and the water does not take instructions. When it cooperates, the extra day becomes additional teaching reps and coaching on your own paddling instead.
Can I use a paddle float on re-entries at this level?
Yes. Paddle Canada is explicit that re-entry aids such as paddle floats and stirrups are welcome and encouraged at any level, and using one does not prevent you passing. It has to be used competently, and at this level you also need to be able to teach it well. Bodies differ, and the goal is getting back in the boat.
Can I do Level 1 Instructor and Level 2 Instructor together?
No. Paddle Canada does not permit the two to be offered as one course, and there is a real gap between them anyway. Level 2 requires Level 1 Instructor plus fifteen logged days of instruction.
What is the mentorship alternative?
Instead of a course, you can be assessed while apprenticing on two Level 2 Skills courses. It needs two different Level 2 Instructor Trainers, one per course, which takes some arranging. Ask us and we will be honest about which route is realistic for you.
Does this lead to employment with Kayak Ontario?
No, and we would rather be straight about it. We are small, and when work comes up it is posted publicly. Most people who leave this course go on to teach for someone else or for themselves. We are glad to see it, including when they become our competition. Training instructors properly is the point.
Where do I stay?
On the course group site, included in your fee. Bring your own tent and sleeping gear. If you would rather have a roof, there are cabins and trailers at the same camp you can book directly, and we will point you at them.

We acknowledge that our courses on the Saugeen Peninsula take place on the traditional territories of the Anishinaabewaki, the Odawa, and the Mississauga peoples, as well as the Saugeen Ojibway Nation, the Chippewas of Saugeen First Nation and the Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation. This land is covered by Treaty 45 ½, signed in 1836.

We are grateful for the deep connections that the Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation at Neyaashiinigmiing continue to hold with these lands and waters.

This acknowledgement, accompanied by action, includes contributions to Indigenous-led organizations that make a lasting impact.

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