Swimming lessons and tantrums

[thegrowlygus]

Need help to deal with this tomorrow. DS1 (age 3.5) loves swimming and indeed when we take him is very over confident and will throw himself in despite not actually being able to swim "I CAN swim Mummy" etc.

We went to swimming lessons last year where I was in with him and he loved those. The pool was shut for refurbishment for a while and now he has restarted lessons but is in the next class up and so goes in without me.

The first week was sort of OK - started off well, then goggles steamed up and he sobbed but the teachers did really well and jollied him along and he stayed in the pool (all be it clinging to teacher for much of it!) The teacher said, next time no goggles and he will be fine.

Last week - screaming about going in. Clinging to my legs/wall of changing room/post outside changing room. One of the receptionists took him to the pool side - sceaming continued (no tears mind you - just screaming 'no, don't want to' etc) She said to me not to give in as it would just mean he would do the same week after week and it had got to the stage where it was a tantrum. So, with all the other watching parents glaring at me (cruel evil mother) I walked away (outside where I burst into tears). DS1 did get in, clung to teacher throughout but at the end was full of it and what they had done and seemed to have enjoyed it.

So - next lesson tomorrow. I am certain it will be the same carry on again. Do I ride it out again - hand him over, walk away? Or is he too small and we give in and leave it a while? (which worries me a bit given his overconfidence when swimming with me). Or (my preferred option) send him with DH so it isn't me that gets glared at as I leave the wailing child?!

And if it is any of you that were there last week then please don't glare at me again!!

Speak to the staff and see if they can have someone take him off you, and then you leave.

My son was the same and I was banished (by the teachers) from the complex until he stopped yelling. It took a full week of going to lesson's everyday until he got to the point where he could happily see me watching him without going into meltdown.

I felt like such a freak having the only child there who was screaming, but I (and he) survived. So hang in there.

Its pretty normal. The receptionist had obviously seen it before, hadn't she? If your DH can take him that might be a good move - DS may not be quite so clingy.

If your DS was genuinely afraid of the water then you might want to back off, but if he's actually over-confident then stick with it.

def do the cruel mummy dump and run. and tell him no goggles until you can swim 200 metres.

or do what I did, and not go back until she was 7...

Oh no it has started already "mummy, I don't want to go to my swimming lesson"

Daddy is definitely doing the deed.

Forcing a 3.5 year old to have swimming lessons when he doesn't want to seems completely uneccessary to me and you will quite possible destroy any confidence and love of swimming by going down that route.

Swimming should be fun and enjoyable and confidence building at that age and if it's not something is wrong. If you can find lessons that he enjoys, fine, if not why not wait a year or 2 and see if things come together better then.

Get him fog free goggles, let him where them and show him how to clear them himself.

darth, I think you missed the point - the DS is over-confident near water and chucks himself in regardless - he's only throwing a strop because mummy doesn't go in with him...
I'd be quite keen for him to learn to swim!

but like I said, you either guts it out and he'll shut up by week 4 and get on with it, or don't go back for a few years and hope he survives his exuberance in the meantime.

I find a bag of chocolate buttons in the swimming bag and a healthy dose of bribery work wonders. Stopped swimming lesson tantrums instantly as DD2 knows damn well she won't get them if she doesn't behave herself. She's not scared of the water, she's perfectly capable of paying attention in the swimming pool, she just 'struggles' with an alteration to her routine... well, guess what, swimming lessons are now part of her routine and she's quite happy...
(puts down attila the hun parenting manual)

go again tomorrow (or dh) armed with choc buttons as suggested as bribery for "no nonsense" about getting in.

if he is even a bit better than last week then keep going. big praise if he doesn't cry etc..

if he is worse than last week then i would leave it for a bit.

(this is from someone who has abandoned swimming lessons for DD1 who is 4 as the tantrums/refusal to get in just got too wearing). plan to try again in Jan. sometimes it's just not worth the pain - however i don't think you're at this stage just yet.

I 'forced' dd at the same age, and we had a pool at home, she yelled and complained, but eventually gave in. We used a star chart and she got a hefty reward if she did it 5 times without complaining.

Darth, dd adores swimming and is by no way traumatised by her experience

I'm with Darth. It's supposed to be fun, isn't it? Just go swimming with your child and sod the formal lessons (formal lessons at 3? What's that all about?)

If your ds was still upset and clingy by the end of the lesson, then I would say he is too young and to give it a rest and try again in a few months. But the fact that it is yelling rather than getting upset, and he is happy once he lets his tantrum go, then it says to me this is simply a power struggle which he wants to win despite it being entirely contrary to what he actually wants !

Ds1 is 2.10, a bit younger I know, but is totally going through a negative phase atm. Everything is no, don't want to, even "do you want a chocolate mousse for pudding?" (though he quickly corrects this to an OOOOOoooh yes please LOL)

If you are sure that he is eventually enjoying his lesson then continue. Give it a couple of weeks and once he discovers that throwing a wobbly does not change the way things happen, I bet he will give in happily.

This could so easily be about going to school or eating a meal instead of swimming - and I don't think anyone would suggest that he doesn't do these things just because he starts yelling. It just happens to be that he has picked on swimming for the power struggle. IMO.

We are home and it all went - well swimmingly!

Got there early so we could watch the bigger ones swimming and talked about what they were doing, showed him the snack machine and said he could choose something out of it once he had finished without crying and Daddy took him through to get changed/to his teacher.

Not a peep from him.

Loved the lesson, giggling away with a friend he has made because they splashed the teacher and throwing himself in with abandon (but when it was his turn!)

And got his hula hoops at the end. Although only ate about 3 before he fell asleep in the car exhausted (they do make them splash about an awful lot!)

And yes - formal swimming lessons as soon as possible I feel - the sooner they can swim the better both from a safety and an exercise point of view. My brother lives in Australia and they teach all the children how to swim immediately before they start school as a sort of 'crash course'.

I do feel that this was more of a power struggle - if he actually hated the water I really wouldn't push it - but he loves swimming, just not without me! But now it seems he might like it after all!

great!

i love bribery! works every time round here... glad you've cracked it, but remember the money for the hula hoops for the next few weeks! hurrah!