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Saving Lives

by teaching swimming

By madsPublished 3 years ago 11 min read
1
Saving Lives
Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash

I love my job because I get to teach kids how to enjoy being in the water. I love to swim and be in the water. The weightlessness can make it feel like dreams of flying. With your head underwater sound is pleasantly muted softened 'round the edges. As a child I spent hours in the water, floating, somersaulting, doing handstands. Swimming underwater, pretending to be a dolphin or mermaid and losing all sense of time in a pleasant aqua dream.

One of my earliest memories is of my mum teaching me to float on my back in a rock pool at the beach. ‘Look up at the sky,’ I remember her saying. The summer sky was brilliant blue, with little wisps of cloud. The water was refreshingly cool but not cold, all I could hear was the water soughing softly in my ears. It was peace and contentment.

Me as a child enjoying the water

I know, pretty idyllic right? Being as it’s an early memory it’s hard to know what’s real, but what I want to share is that feeling of peace. When I’m teaching swimming, I’m happy because I’m in the water. Hopefully that comes across to my students. Mostly I think it does, and they can feed off my confidence. However, it would be a lie to say this was always the case.

Being a good swimmer doesn’t necessarily make you a great swim teacher. Make no mistake, dealing with kids is a tough gig, and the water makes for an extra challenge. Children are both refreshingly original, and frighteningly unpredictable. They have enviable energy, but it needs to be directed lest it be used against your purpose. The first few weeks of teaching were a steep learning curve. The range of behaviour in young children is vast. Some are confident, but seem to find everything in the world more interesting than your lesson. New students are sometimes (understandably) terrified of being in the pool with someone they’ve never met before. Many children are somewhere in between. Most frightening are those who are confident but have little cause to be, since they cannot actually swim yet.

It is also a physically gruelling job. I was used to being in the water a lot, but not for the hours it takes to make enough money to live on. At times it seems the chlorine is slowly dissolving you whole, like an aspirin. Soft, brittle nails, dry skin and the ends of your hair turning a sickly pale green are the reality. Even working in warm water, by the end of a long shift you are somehow feeling cold and usually starving.

You have to learn to engage the whole group even when you’re only swimming with one student. You need to give confidence and praise, but also make sure students know immediately when they’re doing the wrong thing. You have to have amazing proprioception and peripheral vision, so as to know exactly where each child is and ensure they're definitely not behind you. Even kids who can swim well get into trouble sometimes and you do not want that happening behind your back. At the same time as maintaining control and movement in your class, it’s important to practice and correct skills aiming for that edge where students are challenged but not pushed to the point of fear. Above all it’s imperative to maintain trust with your students. There is trust implicit when small children choose to get in the pool with you each week. They are out of their depth, and you will often be challenging them to try things they haven’t done before. If you are not there to catch them when things go wrong, they will not be keen to come back next week.

As I struggled through those first few weeks and months soggy and exhausted I was happy. Though the job is fearsomely taxing and somewhat thankless, those rascally kids are fun. Plus, I get to work in a pool! Time passes and you learn all your students names and who is likely to jump in exuberantly (but with no thought for safety). The lesson formats and class timing become second nature. Instructions flow with little effort and more thought can be given to creative corrections. You learn from your peers: tricks to fix common faults, how to help more effectively with breath holding, better demonstrations. Best of all, you begin to notice your little students progressing. They are trusting you more and their little faces shine with excitement when they come to class.

My favourite part is converting anxious or fearful kids into confident students. It was difficult at first to know where to begin. When you have learned to swim at a young age, as an adult much of it is instinctive. Explaining breath-holding to youngsters who don’t necessarily know what breathing is on a conscious level - that's challenging. A great teacher has the empathy to understand that floating may as well be flying to a child unfamiliar with the water. That is the beauty and terror of it: the water will support you, but you have to relax.

I have learned several ways to teach breath holding, but by far the best is through other students. It is easy to demonstrate various swimming techniques - but you will never stop being a grown up to them. Adults can do all sorts of miraculous things. One of their peers having a fun time looking under the water, that is infinitely more persuasive. If kids can make faces at each other under the water - well that’s basically the party to end all parties. Funnily enough, it can take quite a lot of convincing for many children to properly put their head underwater. Unfortunately from that point they are reluctant to then keep their head up out of the water. I love being the person who facilitated that experience for them. The crystalline blue where everything is softer somehow - I completely understand why many kids want to stay down there where possible.

A lot of people still subscribe to what I call the ‘dunking’ method. As far as I can tell, this involves shoving children underwater until they are ‘used to it’. I have not met a lot of swim teachers who teach in this manner. Very luckily I am now in a position to educate both parents and colleagues in more effective methods. At the very least you need to give the poor kid a cue when they're about to go underwater, otherwise it’s just happening to them at random. What do they learn from that? They learn that adults may behave in a very unpredictable manner in the water. Often teachers and parents say ‘swim to me, I promise I won’t move’, then promptly move back a pace as soon as the child begins. Obviously that kid becomes increasingly reluctant to swim to the aforementioned adult. Young children can usually not explain their thoughts and feelings, but their actions speak volumes.

Teaching children is certainly a learned skill - teaching their parents is yet another. Having kids myself I am aware that parents are not a separate species of human. However children are learning new things constantly, it’s a very normal experience for them. They are open to learning, even when it’s difficult for whatever reason. Adults are far more likely to have set ideas and habits which are hard to shake. Mostly parents and carers attending a water confidence class want you to show them how best to hold their baby in the water. Once shown they regularly revert to their usual out of the water holds without realising. Striking a balance between nagging and good humoured reminding takes practice. Coming to class needs to be fun for them as well.

Obviously the child will benefit from their carer being relaxed and happy but there’s more to it than that. The relentless treadmill of everyday life somehow necessitates a sort of robotic response. I find it especially prevalent in parents of young kids as they need so much care, and it’s not as though all the other tasks in life can just stop. You still need to work, pay bills, get groceries, prepare food, do laundry - as well as seeing to the every need of a tiny helpless human. Coming to a water confidence class is a chance to just be with your baby. You cannot try to check emails at the same time, it’s well worth it to be completely present to the child and to yourself. The water can help you connect with each other and can give you a little boost of grounding equanimity for the rest of the day. So as a teacher you need to read people and give instructions and advice in ways which will facilitate that experience and have people wanting to return.

What many will see as the most important aspect of teaching children to swim is drowning prevention. This is definitely the common thread for parents seeking swim lessons. It is fear of drowning that drives much of the counter productive behaviour I have seen around swim teaching. The idea of your child drowning is a terrifying prospect. Horror stories abound: parents searching the house not realising the child is in the pool; kids drowning in water troughs or large buckets. ‘It’s so silent,’ people say in hushed tones. Parents want their children to be ‘drown proof’, but honestly this is not possible. Even strong swimmers can drown, and the most common factor in children drowning is inadequate supervision. Hence my unease when a child who is a very strong swimmer has a parent who wants to know when they ‘won’t have to get in with him anymore’. Even If your two year old can fall into the pool and swim back to the wall with perfect confidence and skill, they still have all the judgement and foresight of a two year old.

On one occasion myself and another teacher were supervising a student entering the water. He followed our instructions for safe entry, but he was excited and went too quickly. As he slid into the water he bumped his lower lip. It split sending sheets of blood down his chin causing him to panic and scream, widening the injury. After we’d calmed him down and stuck his lip back together with steri-strips my colleague and I regrouped. Where had we gone wrong - two experienced teachers supervising one student and he’d been injured! Our attention wasn’t elsewhere, we both watched it happen. Now I always tell students to get in slowly. What it really demonstrated to me was that accidents happen even with supervision, so imagine how bad things can be without it.

At the core of drowning prevention is education. Not just around skills in the water, but for our children to know that they should never swim alone. Even more importantly for our parents and carers to watch closely, especially around water. It’s totally worth it for kid's fabulous one liners anyhow. Once a tiny boy who jumped out of the pool after his lesson exclaiming, ‘Dad, I’m all wet!’

Another small girl explained earnestly to me ‘the top of my dad’s hair feels like feathers but the back feels like kitten fur’

The random and usually dramatic proclamations of small children provide regular highlights.

Ultimately I feel it’s a shame for fear to be the only motivation toward learning to swim. However the satisfaction and relief gained from occasional stories of near misses cannot be discounted. Any parent or carer letting me know that one of my students fell into water, but turned and swam back to the wall like I’ve taught them is a win. Of course I’m glad the child didn’t drown and their parents have concrete proof about the efficacy of lessons. I really think it’s more than that however. We should swim because we love it, and we should never lose our healthy respect for the danger bodies of water can pose.

A common refrain from parents is: ‘I don’t want her to be an Olympian, I just want her to be safe.’ Whilst this sentiment is relatable, it’s also limiting. Maybe your child won’t have what it takes to swim at the upper echelons of competition or perhaps they will. Being confident to go to a friends pool party, the school swimming carnival or participate in water based activities on school camp are all worthwhile. Having the skill and comfort to enjoy family holidays by the water and trips to the beach is an asset. I’m glad to recognise parents for the thankless job of organising and paying for lessons, then sitting by the pool for hours as kids learn. They are facilitating a lifetime of joy and opportunity.

Teaching swimming can help to save lives through drowning prevention. For me it's even more than that. Helping kids to learn the water free from trauma will grow their minds. I want to build a resilient community with respect borne of knowledge not fear. I hope to share the joy and wonder of swimming for many years to come.

children
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About the Creator

mads

Obsessed with the possibility of a mysterious other world. As a child was always described as having a very vivid imagination.

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