Teaching your baby to swim!!

Wow..

I never heard of this....

http://www.infantswim.com

Babies have a natural reflex that keeps them from inhaling when underwater. So, they make pretty good swim students.

Pretty cool, huh?

My two boys went through the infant swim program, and my baby girl will be doing it in about a month.

The first few lessons are the hardest; your kids look at you like you've abandoned them!

Glad we did it though as both of my boys have fallen in the pool a few times each...

I think that video is of a child with their "aquatic survival instruction". If a child with no training fell into a pool face down I would have guessed it would probably stay that way and drown. To my eye the child performs some rote single leg kick to roll face up. The topic itself, early childhood swimming training, seems sound and proven as its common here in Australia with some saying the younger the better.

I taught my child by building his confidence in the water and slowly letting him take control of his own movement through the water.

I wouldn't let my child fall into a pool in order to teach them to swim. I also wouldn't take my child away from his mother and stick him in a crib in a separate room to teach him whatever that's supposed to teach children. I'd be willing to bet this infantswim program gets the same results as any other swimming program except it probably traumatizes the child in the process.

My boys weren't traumatized. They both love swimming.

They didn't love the lessons at first, but once they got the hang of it, they did fine.

I think if my parents had been given the option of "traumatized" they would have thought it was worth the risk. Children with any access to water should be taught to swim (or made to be terrified of going near water!) as soon as is possible.

I thought it was a well-known fact that what you should do with your newborn baby is take it to a pool and throw it in...

They will always instinctively swim!

I've always really wished my parents had been brave enough to do it with me...

I am not a great swimmer and if I fell into some deep water it's not inconceivable that I might drown...

What wouldn't I give to have been subjected to that moment of 'cruelty' when I was a few months old?

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, but the Infant Swim Resource doesn't throw the baby in on the first lesson.

There are several lessons where the swim coach is assisting the baby to kick their leg when they fall into the water to turn them onto their back and float to the surface. The instructor carefully guides the infant through weeks of lessons (which are 10 mins per day); it's not cruel or traumatizing at all.

The video you saw posted by Jestor is of a well-trained toddler that has gone through weeks of the program.

Hope that clears up any misconceptions or at least gives a different view from a believer in the program

This is very helpful for them. When I was a kid then we often go for swimming and I learn it there.

I wouldn't let my child fall into a pool even if it may teach him to swim. There is so big possibility of any accident. B-r-r don't want even think about it.

Lizaslife wrote: I wouldn't let my child fall into a pool even if it may teach him to swim. There is so big possibility of any accident. B-r-r don't want even think about it.

This video was disturbing to me. It just looked like parental negligence meets the cruelty of sitting there filming a child who does not want to be floating nor the star of some video on the internet which may generate views and therefore possibly money. Who is it for? The Child or the parent? For me, safety and a desire of the child to do it should come first. All my kids can swim, but it was better teaching them when they were old enough to understand and be responsible without constant supervision.

If the argument was, what if baby gets out and falls in the pool, the answer is you lock your door and cover your pool when not in use. Did the golfing father leave the gate open too? What if the baby wanders into the street? She he be taught how to dodge traffic too? Crazy. I'm sorry but this video is just bad parenting.

I don't have any handy to link right now, but I've read about studies that say that teaching babies to swim earlier is much easier than later, as the time between floating in utero and floating in pool-ero is much shorter. In essence, they have instinctual swimming abilities that vanish with age.

If the argument was, what if baby gets out and falls in the pool, the answer is you lock your door and cover your pool when not in use. Did the golfing father leave the gate open too? What if the baby wanders into the street? She he be taught how to dodge traffic too? Crazy. I'm sorry but this video is just bad parenting.

I have not watched the video, but I'll take exception to the "lock the door...." sort of approach

Okay, yeah, safety is a thing - but parenting is about training children, not training adults.

Locking the door and covering the pool is training adults...

FWIW, I grew up on the beach, on and around boats, and whilst my parents didn't simply throw me off the side to use as shark bait, the more long term and practical solution was to teach me to swim, not try to create a world where I didn't need to know that.


In case swimming doesn't work for you - would you rather try to teach your toddler of the dangers of grabbing random items from the bench, or simply hope they never learn how to open the kitchen door?


I'm extrapolating a little here, but since I have an almost religious belief in swimming - In some workplaces, they have signs that say you must use handrails when ascending stairs.

Not just that handrails are provided, or there is a physical barrier to prevent falls - but that you must, for your safety, put one of your hands on that rail to assist you in your balance and safety when using the well known death trap of stairs. (good luck if you're carrying more than a cup of coffee)

Seems to be, that's the sort of mentality that comes from "it's more important to have a mesh over your pool than teach your kids to swim."

Life is rough, humans are good at learning skills to survive it. Why not capitalise on the very thing that put us at the top of the food chain to start with?

What if the baby wanders into the street? She he be taught how to dodge traffic too?

Traffic isn't a....natural part of the environment. It's other humans being careless - and broadly, our whole concept of how we lay out our homes, transport and so on is pretty bad.
Of course, there is area of influence and area of concern, and unless you plan it well from the start (ie, own a decent property on a private road) there's not much you can do to change the world here.

Still, there's a lesson there, and it's not about cars specifically, but "every other human on the planet is either competition or a mindless hazard, and should be treated with suspicion"

Not sure when babies make the cognitive leap that cars are just big metal saucepans being operated by other babies that got bigger.