Are Baby Swim Lessons Traumatizing?

There are many videos all over social media showing babies being “thrown” into the pool and “struggling” to resurface. And every one of those videos has a bunch of comments with concern for how traumatic it is, or that they would never do such a thing to their baby. But is this really traumatic, and is the baby really struggling?

In those videos, I promise that is not the babies first time swimming – they’ve had weeks or months of practice before that video was taken. While it may seem like they are struggling to come up and roll over, but I promise you that the parent or instructor has helped them during practice, and they have gradually worked their way up to this.

I am a firm believer that it’s not what is being taught, it’s how it’s being taught. If a baby is thrown into water and expected to resurface with no prior practice, I am sure that would be scary. But that is NOT what is happening in these videos.

The parent or instructor has gradually introduced baby to submerging and floating, and this can be done in a very fun and positive way. They’ve practiced this move first with help, then gradually with less and less help until the baby can do it on their own. These videos show the final product of months of very regular, very consistent practice.

There are two aspects of teaching a child to swim. There are the skills being taught and the teaching style used to teach those skills. The teaching style, not the skills, is a much bigger influence on how “traumatizing” these baby swimming videos are. Gradual introduction to these self-rescue skills with a gentle supportive teaching style is not traumatizing if taught in a positive and fun way.