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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to ask if you need to be dunked to learn how to swim...

43 replies

guiltynetter · 20/10/2018 21:35

My DD has just turned 4 and loves going swimming, she went to swimming lessons for around 6 months with her nursery when she was 3. however she HATES getting water in her eyes. She doesn’t mind the occasional splash but going underwater is something she gets really upset about.

For 4 weeks now we’ve been going to a new swimming pool for lessons. the lessons are for beginners. the teacher seems fine and she really loves the rest of the lesson but they get dunked (as in, fully submerged underwater) twice per lesson. my DD cries every time, as do 2 of the other children. Now she’s started saying before every lesson that she doesn’t want to go, crying and really upset because she doesn’t want to go underwater.

Is the dunking essential to learn how to swim and would i look like a soft parent if i asked them not to do it? i know if they didn’t do it she’d be excited about the lessons.

OP posts:

Jdeah · 20/10/2018 22:23

That would have petrified me as a child. Mine are encouraged to go under water but never forced.

FreshEyre · 20/10/2018 22:31

MN’s hate it when people ask for help

Not sure I agree with this. I see lots of people being upset that GPs have declined requests for help when the poster feels, for all sorts of reasons, that they should be helping or doing more. I also see posters being upset that GPs haven't offered to help but they haven't actually been asked.

FreshEyre · 20/10/2018 22:32

Wrong thread. Sorry!

Liland · 20/10/2018 22:37

I was forcibly dunked as a young child. As a result, I never learned to swim, the fear was too much. I hate having water on my face to this day - I have a bath every day and shower only if there's no other option, just in case some water drips into my eyes.

Please speak up if dunking is not for your child!

davisday · 20/10/2018 22:42

Give her some goggles in the bath to get used to.

Spotsandstars · 20/10/2018 22:49

My ds got a water phobia from this practice when we did a well known toddler swimming school. Now two years on we started proper one on one lessons told the teacher his fear she's been very patient and he will now go under himself. I would change lessons definitely.

IdblowJonSnow · 20/10/2018 22:52

No. This is a terrible idea! How upsetting for your dd. Please either stop taking her or tell them to pack it in!

MinorRSole · 20/10/2018 22:56

Dunking sounds bizarre. Never happened with my 4. They spend some of the session jumping in from the side (built up though, if they want to sit and slide in they're allowed) and some diving for objects the teacher throws in. They end up submerging themselves of course but in a fun way because they are focused on something else.

I'm a confident swimmer, used to swim for my school too many years ago - I would absolutely panic at being dunked, it's horrible.

Lolapusht · 20/10/2018 22:56

I’d either find a new teacher or say to this one not to dunk your daughter during lessons. Are they encouraged to go under the water or is someone holding them and physically putting them under? If it’s the latter then absolutely no way in Hell would I let that happen if my child wasn’t completely happy with it. Sounds like she’s already stressed at the thought of it and she will start associating that fear with swimming which may put her off swimming altogether. I hate swimming and that’s because of how I was taught nearly 40 years ago. Still not happy if I can’t touch the bottom or the side. Christ, I can still remember spluttering along the from the deep end as the instructor held a pole just out of reach as I swam along panicking I wouldn’t be able to reach it. She doesn’t need to learn to get water in her eyes. She needs to learn that being in the water is fun and how to move safely in the water. If she’s 4 she’s realistically not going to be unsupervised near water until she’s good at swimming anyway.

AnnieAnoniMouse · 20/10/2018 23:04

You’re not ‘being soft’. No way would I allow them to do that.

canyouhearthedrums · 20/10/2018 23:41

When ds1 had a swimming lesson there was a 'baby class' where the babies had to be dunked at the end of a song. One little boy used to increasingly cry and then scream and cling on to his mum just before the dunk, he knew it was coming and was very distressed. The instructor used to insist that the mum dunked him, saying it was important for his development It was very uncomfortable watching, the mum was clearly having doubts but felt under pressure.

AndNoneForGretchenWieners · 20/10/2018 23:50

I nearly drowned when I was 8, I had not taken to swimming lessons and wouldn't lift my feet off the bottom of the pool so my mum thought she would try again in a few months time. We went on holiday and my parents both became extremely ill with salmonella, so I was pretty much left to my own devices for two weeks around the hotel complex (it was the 80s, wouldn't happen now). Mum had told me not to go near the adult pool but to stick to the shallow paddling pool, but I ignored her and sat swinging my legs in the big pool. My flip flop floated off into the water and I reached across for it - the inevitable happened and I toppled in. I sank like a stone, and if it hadn't been for a man nearby who saw what happened and jumped in to retrieve me, I would have been a goner.

Anyway, more than 30 years on, I still can't go underwater or even put my face under the shower. I can swim now, but I am not very confident. I can't see that dunking someone who isn't confident in water, or hates going underwater, is going to help at all.

FlirtyRomanticToast · 20/10/2018 23:54

I can swim and I was certainly never 'dunked'. I'm a pretty slow swimmer though, I dislike putting my face down in the water. I'd probably be faster if I did.

SockQueen · 21/10/2018 00:01

In order to learn to swim properly, it is necessary to be comfortable putting your face in the water. But enforced "dunking" doesn't sound like a suitable way to achieve this for your DD.

newrubylane · 21/10/2018 01:24

I sympathize with your poor DD. I'm a reasonable swimmer and can cope with a bit of face splaahing, but I genuinely panic if go underwater, especially if I'm not in control. It's not essential at all.

AornisHades · 21/10/2018 01:32

I haven't seen anyone forcibly dunked. Ds didn't like his face in the water so we practised with goggles in the bath. He's now the first with his hand up to be dunked to touch the floor in the deep end.

AdventuringThroughLife · 21/10/2018 01:45

They encouraged dunking of babies at one od the baby swim groups i went to. Did it once but never again. I dont see how it can be right.

Its certainly necessary as both mine got to swimclub standard without it. Second in particular was v anxious around water and we gradually taught her to be okay in a shower by showering a rubber duck! In swimming they learnt to "blow bubbles" and swim under a watering can etc to build up to it. And dive sticks and goggles are a good incentive. Starting where they can pretty much reach them!

I think half the baby swimmimg thing is a con really...

Seniorschoolmum · 21/10/2018 01:52

. Change swimming teacher.

My ds is v timid, but in 18 months he has gone from non-swimmer to swimming a width under water and being able to do four different strokes happily.

However it’s taken constant reassurance. He uses goggles all the time, and has only this term started to jump in the deep end. But he is happy and confident. If he’d been forcibly dunked he’d have refused point blank on lesson 2.

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