Can You Swim?

[Turtle]

___In earlier times, I taught swimming. Numbers guy that I am, I once tried to calculate the number of people I taught to swim and came up with between 5 and 10 thousand.

___ Ben Franklin wrote one of the earliest works on the topic in the United States of America & by his and other accounts he taught himself to swim by sheer reason.

___I invite you to vote the poll as well as post your own experience with learning to swim.:)

[InfiniteNow]

The lifeguard took me out to the end of the dock at the pond near my home and asked "Can you swim?" I promptly replied, "No."

 

It was then that they pushed/threw me into the water and, after swallowing a few gallons of the pond, I swam back to the dock.

 

In their defense, they had another lifeguard in a row boat right beside us, and they did help me climb up. Been swimming ever since.

[Tarantism]

hehe i dont even remember learning how...i just can. strange, yes.

[infamous]

Living near The Lake of the Ozarks as a youth and spending much of my time hunting and fishing, I suppose it came rather natural for me to learn how to swim. I don't really even remember how young I was when my father taught me the basic technique of floating on my back. It wasn't too long after that that I learned how to swim..................those were the days.

[jkellmd]

I was just discussing this with a friend while visiting a derserted beach on Vieques island. Swimming is one of the most primal experiences available to humans. My friend and I theorize that any prolonged exposure to the classical elements brings profound peace to humans. Staring into a fire, visiting the beach (water), and being on an elevated spot (air) tend to produce profound peace - in us, at least.

 

I haven't figured out a perfect analogy for the earth element, and invite your opinions.

[bpjg2fat]

I took swimming lessons as a wee one.

[insight]

Yes, i did swim in pools, channels and rivers since my childhood. but i never swam for 3 or 4 years. I think i still remember it;)

[CraigD]

I have no memory of a time that I could not swim. My parents tell me I could head-up dog-paddle around the age or 3, and that I learned it after occasionally slipping off of my mom’s back, who was in the habit of swimming recreationally and to and from boats, sandbars, and nearby islands with me clinging there. Her mom did the same with her, and many people in their community (the Branford, CT, USA, area) report similar experiences.

 

Very primate-ish.

[Buffy]

Growing up a Valley Girl, there was rarely a weekend not spent at the beach. Even took up surfing cuz it was a great way to pick up guys (less competition out on the water girls! and then there's that weird effect it seems to have on them when you're taking off your wetsuit....).

 

In LA, there's also a pool in every backyard, so you don't really have a choice but to learn how to swim...

 

Knarly wave dude!

Buffy

[GAHD]

I learned swimming when I was 5-7. There was a weird belt system that we all had to go through starting at yellow, moving through orange, red, green, maroon, blue and 'ending' in white. There were additional CPR and lifeguard classes that you could take afterwards too(I didn't).

 

It's kinda funny that I learned to swim in a concrete rectangle, the beaches are only a few hours drive away but we never really left the city once we moved here.

[Buffy]

There was a weird belt system that we all had to go through...

You wacky Canadians! :) "I'm a white belt!" "Oh, uh, my I'm impressed!"

It's kinda funny that I learned to swim in a concrete rectangle...

As we all know however, all *real* pools are kidney shaped and should have a waterfall and have an attached jacuzzi... Rectangular pools? What are those?

 

Poolside tan,

Buffy

[Queso]

one day when i was 5

i saw the ocean

perplexed and intrigued

i took flight of swim, and swam for 17 miles

until i vanished behind the horizon

with horizons in alll directions

i got so tired out there

and slept in a glass bottle

where i found a ship

and sailed to hypography

[Turtle]

___Great replies every one! I thought to interject a few observations from the teacher's perspective, so here goes.

___First, shame on that lifeguard (moreover any and all purporting to teach swimming) who threw someone in to "teach" them to swim. It is an all too common & abhorrent practice that I can not villify strongly enough. The very idea that traumatizing someone in the name of any good intent of learning is disheartening to say the least. Such traumatized swimmers presented the greatest challenges to my teaching ability through all the years I engaged in the profession, whether child or adult learner.

___My father taught me some swimming, but he & my mother also sent me for twice-weelky lessons as a young child. As I recall, my mother never learned to swim.

___So....interjected observation completed; carry on.:)

[Loricybin]

i just stuck to the shallow end and bounced up and down in the water until one day i kind of discovered "doggie paddling" by trying to get out as quickly as possible.

 

for some reason when i was learning to swim, whenever i tried swimming towards the edge to crawl out, i suddenly had a massive fear of a mysterious shark somehow getting to me.

 

i learned to swim much faster though!:)

[Tormod]

I have been able to swim since I was a little kid, about 5 or 6 I think. I was basically self-taught but I did take swimming lessons like most kids in my neighborhood back then.

[TheBigDog]

Lets see if this works this time...

 

I remember learning to swim when I was 6. I used to scoot around the edge of the pool until my big toes were bleeding from rubbing the side of the pool. My mom would try and get me to float and blow bubbles with my face in the water. Then we were visiting a friend and they had this float that I could strap to my back. I was jumping off the diving board and paddling to the edge over and over again. Then I tried it without the float and that worked too. I never looked back. I was on an AAU swim team back in the 70's. Anyone remember the Mountain View Dolphins? Swam for hours every day training. Before and after school. Then my family moved to New Jersey and there were no swim teams. People I had trained with and competed against went on to swim in the 84 and 88 Olympics. Who knows what may have happened if I had stayed in CA?

 

I am teaching my two youngest boys to swim this spring. I love swimming.

 

Bill

[Cedars]

I finally learned to swim in my early teens after a near drowning experience. I was taught to swim by one of the people who helped drag my waterlogged dumb self back to shore. I was lucky that people were around to help me out of that situation (though I about drowned them too). Every muscle in my body ached for the rest of the day. I didnt know how intensly muscles are affected by a lack of oxygen and stress. Your lungs hurt bad too as they are screaming for air.

 

So after I became a parent myself, my kid was enrolled in the after school swiming classes. A very good investment.