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Poll #20449 Swimming lessons
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: Just the Poll Creator, participants: 82
I know how to swim.
Yes
78 (95.1%)
No.
4 (4.9%)
I had swimming lessons
As a child.
64 (78.0%)
As an adult.
4 (4.9%)
Never.
16 (19.5%)
[Optional] I never had swimming lessons because
Humuhumu has been having swimming lessons for about 14 months now. She started in the summer before she began school. She passed Stage 1 fairly quickly, but it has taken her a long time to get through Stage 2, which she officially passed today. This means she can move from the shallow learner's pool, which is only 80 cm deep into the "big" pool, which starts at 90 cm. She had to swim for five metres unaided on both her front and her back in order to move to Stage 3. She can actually swim 10 metres on her front, possibly more.
Keiki's going to start swimming lessons Sunday next, with the same awesome teacher that Humuhumu had. She's going to have a new teacher in Stage 3.
I never had swimming lessons because I grew up in Hawai'i. We always lived in places with swimming pools (apartment complexes and the like) or close enough to the beach for me to be able to go there every day. No indoor pools or heated water needed. I don't have any memories of not being able to swim, so I must have learnt quite early. Watching Humuhumu go through swimming lessons has therefore been a novelty for me. She's already a lot more comfortable being totally immersed than I was. It makes me think that it would have been good for me to have had lessons, as I'd probably be a much better swimmer now.
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Then I did Turtles in the swim-team (the baby level) because dad was in. Then mom tried Red Cross for a year but got pissed off that they wouldn't let me pass Red (the levels at the time were all colour-coded) because I was "too small" despite being a better swimmer than any of the adults, and put me back in swim-team, which was basically what I did every summer until high-school.
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My husband is a keen canoeist, but I've told him no taking our son in the canoe until he's had some swim lessons XD
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TW: Drowning
About five years ago, my wife, son and I were at the beach with my in-laws when my wife's parents and I were swept away from the shore by a powerful riptide. Neither my parents-in-law were good swimmers, and my mother-in-law went into a panic as the waves started crashing over her head. She drowned.
I tried to help my mother-in-law, but the combination of waves, currents, and her own flailing made it impossible. In the end, I had to save myself, which I was able to do only because I am a fairly competent swimmer, thanks to childhood swimming lessons. My father-in-law was lucky: He was resuscitated by an emergency medical unit and survived with no brain damage. A good Samaritan, who passed on a boat after I took off for shore and jumped in to try to help, was not so lucky: He also drowned.
This was the most traumatic event of my life, and years later, I still deal with the guilt of choosing to save myself, even knowing logically I couldn't have saved anyone else. I still dream of that grueling swim back to shore, and how I might not have made it had people not seen me and pulled me in for the home stretch. I am fortunate to have access to good health care and was able to get treatment for PTSD, but I probably wouldn't be alive today had I not taken swimming lessons as a child.
My son takes swimming lessons. My daughter, who is still younger than Keiki, will. I'm a pretty laid back parent and will let my kids' interests guide their activities, but swimming lessons--at least up to the point they are good swimmers--will be mandatory.
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I learned in an outdoor pool in a resort city one summer and practiced in rivers and lakes, so the indoor heated pool lessons are a weird thing for me, too. We never did that with the rodents, though we talked about it, and then they learned on their own during Hawaii trips, in the hotel pool.
Like you, learning on my own, I was avoiding being totally immersed for a long time -- I actually only taught myself to put my face in the water once I started snorkeling and there was a reason for it XP Weirdly, O prefers it/can't swim any other way even though that's not how we taught him -- except he also hates having his eyes closed under water, which means he pretty much has to swim with goggles on, or better yet a snorkel and mask. Figuring that out was actually the breakthrough for him to start swimming -- until then, he'd put his face in the water, freak out and flail.
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My children had swimming lessons with a brilliant (American) teacher here and having watched her with them, I had an adult lesson on my own and she got me putting my head underwater for the first time in 30 years. I now swim lengths without neck ache but unfortunately she went back to America before I had sorted out better coordination of arms and legs.
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Firstly, my dad was a fisherman and I grew up on the beach and in boats. I could swim before I started school. I vaguely remember learning to float, and doing kicks. I mostly remember doing lots of treading water, which is important if you fall off a boat, even with a life jacket.
My school in NZ offered swimming lessons, but in the summer when I was 5 or 6 I had impetigo and was banned from using the pool.
By the time I was in Australian and able to take lessons again, I was self conscious about doing beginner lessons as a big kid. the system there was you couldn't progress to more advanced lessons until you had the cert from the early ones. I do remember doing some lessons where we had to practice freestyle and breathe every fourth stroke.
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(not drowning, waving)
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So, even though we had a pool in the back yard, and I swam there a lot (unsupervised for much of it) I also did years of swimming lessons. Higher levels are about competitive strokes though. And I stalled about three levels before the top, because my shoulders don't do the right think in overarm, and I couldn't breathe.
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I had swimming lessons both as part of school and in school holidays.
The school holiday "Vac Swim", is subsidised by the education Dept.
Beaches, rivers, and backyard pools are such a big part of life here that swimming is seen as a major public safety (drowning prevention) issue for kids.
I HATED swimming lessons: the instructors who were in their teens or 20s used shame and bullying to try to push me past my comfort zone/skill level, including forcing me to dive off the tallest diving board when I had a fear of heights. :(
I became competent at breast stroke, but could never master overarm, and am USELESS at butterfly.
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The niblings got put into swimming lessons as early as possible, though. Sister isn't a strong swimmer at all and she saw the need for it as a skill because of statistics about childhood drowning, which I completely agree with. It's just a nice bonus that the kiddos love it, too.
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I used to swim a mile every Sunday and I really miss swimming, but I am lazy and the pool is just that bit too far to walk to and from after having swum. I keep promising myself I'll get back to it. I could do with taking some adult lessons really because the years of shoulder problems have made me a very lopsided swimmer and who knows that could be what finally teaches me how to front crawl! I was excellent at breaststroke but never learned how to move anywhere with front crawl.
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Despite the other half having swim competitively at one point, Child has had school swimming only and as with many things in her secondary school, they only seem to put effort into kids who are already good, so I've spent chunks of each holiday coaching her up to speed. But we need to get her an actual instructor for a few lessons because the breathing through crawl comes so naturally to me that I can't find a way to explain it and then she just holds her breath and powers through until she sinks.
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Edit: my baby has been in baby swim lessons since he was 3 months old because I’m deteremined he will be able to swim. He loves it.
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I had swimming lessons up to about age twelve, in school holidays, plus through school until fourteen or fifteen. I maxed out the technical swimming lessons, but was clearly not a candidate for lifesaving certificates or squad training, so my parents for a year or two paid for me to have a private coach while my little brother finished the kiddy lesson sequence.
For all that, I still can't... actually swim 25 metres. I could /during/ the swimming lessons, but pretty much every year I regressed over winter. These days if you put me in the water and ask me to swim from A to B I... struggle. I'll be perfectly safe, but ungainly and probably going sideways.
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I do recall we did basic lifesaving as well - how to tow someone, and how to turn your clothes into basic buoyancy aids.
Nowadays I've lost most of my ability to swim - not that I was ever a strong swimmer - my shoulders can't take front or back crawl, and breast-stroke legs feels like someone is trying to tear my leg off at the knee, but I can paddle along on my back with legs alone if need be.
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I never had formal swim lessons, though, and so I won't say that my technique is worth anything. And I might not remember exactly what to do if I get caught in hostile currents, but there was a lot of early time with slides and arm-buoyancy aids (we called them water wings or floaties) and then a lot of diving board and diving platform experience. And some boating and inner tube skiing (and a little proper water skiing) on the various lakes as I got older.
If "know how to swim" means being able to do all of the competitive strokes for significant distance, then no, I don't have that at all.
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As an adult, I decided that living in a state surrounded on three sides by water, while being unable to swim, was simply too dangerous. Learning as an adult brought a new form of exercise into my life, one that I find I strongly prefer. It has become a reflex for me to stop breathing the instant my nose is submerged. I can do all strokes but butterfly--I can dolphin kick, but not well enough to provide any significant propulsion, so whenever disposable income re-enters my life, that will be the final stroke to conquer. Breaststroke is easier on my knees, but hard on my wrists, so I usually stick with front crawl and consider that my best stroke. Backstroke is fun but I find that I often misjudge distance and end up slamming the back of my head into the end of the pool lane, so I don't do it often.
If gators weren't so prevalent here, I'd try open water swimming, but I am rather fond of having all of my limbs attached to my body, so I'll stick with chlorinated pools that are reasonably some distance away from a pond/swamp. At the gym, the most I have to deal with is creepers acting like they have never seen a leggy woman in a bathing suit before. [insert eyeroll here]
Have you thought about maybe doing those parent-child swimming lessons with Humuhumu? I know your schedule stays pretty packed but maybe even one lesson together a week could improve your own skills?
And on that note, post-swim hair care is a must.
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No quality control or performance management of the instrucors at all.
I taught myself to swim as an adult. Not well, and I am neither a confident nor particularly capable swimmer. But deep water isn't immediately lethal to me now, as it would have been before, during and after my childhood lessons.
The moral: check that your childrens' swimming lessons are actually working. The objective may well be to have given children swimming lessons, with no particular interest in them actually becoming able to swim.
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Curiously, my Mum can't float. She just...sinks. Even when she's doing a perfectly servicable breaststroke, she does so sort of vertically. She says this is a consequence of learning to swim too late in life.
I can't remember not being able to swim, but I can remember swimming lessons and absolutely loving them. I'm sure there's a class or club for you if you did want to develop your skills and become more comfortable - I keep saying I'm going to join my local swim club for the elite training (fancy name, just coaching for better technique)