THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 12, 1996 TAG: 9607120021
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A18 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: 33 lines
The title of the article ``Dreading water'' (Daily Break, July 2) is apropos.
I was the 5-year-old, unwilling recipient of this method of teaching swimming some 30 years ago in private swimming lessons in California. While I cried in terror, my usually protective mother sat poolside ignoring my wails, believing she was doing the ``right'' thing.
Today, I have four children who have spent much time in the water, all of whom learned to swim without the terror I endured.
I still become angry when I think about those swimming lessons; that the instructor was so insensitive to my distress and that my mother did not come to my aid. Born of this experience were nightmares of drowning for years, anger toward the instructor and my mother, and the first taste of how people could not be trusted.
Dr. Stephen Bolduc is absolutely correct in his statement that children under the age of 3 are not able to cognitively understand the concept of safety; however, they intuitively surmise trust vs. distrust as Jean Piaget, the famous Swiss psychologist, identified in his studies of children.
The swimming lessons described in ``Dreading Water'' are traumatizing and unnecessary. Swimming lessons do not replace good parental judgment and watchfulness with young children. Eventually, each child will present a readiness to swim and will benefit from gentle lessons like those offered at our YMCAs.
MYRNA CARLSON
Chesapeake, July 2, 1996 by CNB