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How Pavlov’s Dogs Can Help Your Kids in Any Tense Situation

When you’re teaching your kids to swim, there are going to be times when they’re anxious or nervous. Trying something new always takes and effort, and in this case, the cost of making a mistake could be an uncomfortable gulp or snort of water. That’s enough to make anybody nervous. There’s a way that you can help your kids to relax immediately when you’re teaching them to swim, or under any circumstances. Pavlov and his dogs are the key.

Pavlov rang a bell whenever he fed his dogs, creating an association between the sound of the bell and being fed. Eventually, the dogs developed a conditioned response: salivating at the sound of a bell. You can use the same technique to help your kids relax when you’re teaching them to swim.

Start on Dry Land

You can practice relaxation techniques on dry land. Learning to swim will be easier if your child is relaxed. Kids tend to tense up under the pressure of learning a new skill in the water. You can help your child relax by teaching him how outside the water.

  • Have him lie flat on his back.
  • Ask him to make his body tight all over. You can help him by touching his body if he’s having trouble. For example, you can touch his thigh and say, “squeeze this part of your body tight.” You can ask him to squeeze one body part at a time, working his way up from his toes to his face.
  • Have him hold his breath for a few seconds.
  • Tell him to let it all go at once, and teach him a word for this. It could just be, “Relax,” but a funny, made-up word that’s your secret is more fun.
  • After he relaxes his muscles, have him take a few deep belly breaths.

Move It into the Water

After you practice this relaxation technique regularly for a while on solid ground, you can transfer it to the pool. When you feel your child tensing up, say your secret, funny, made-up word for relax, and he’ll respond by releasing the tension from his muscles.

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6 Truths Your Kids Know That Aren’t True in the Water

By the time they’re up and running, your kids know a lot about the world. They may not be able to explain physics concepts, but they know them. Gravity? Check. Momentum? Check.

Not all of the things your kids have learned about the world from the time they’ve spent experimenting on land are true in the water. These six characteristics of swimming make learning to swim unlike the land-based skills your kids already know. If you can help your kids understand these differences, you’ll have an easier time teaching them to swim.

6 Characteristics of Swimming That Are Different from Land-Based Skills

Finesse

Swimming isn’t about brute strength. It’s about finesse. It’s not what you’ve got; it’s how you use it. The better your child gets at swimming with good form, the less effort he’ll need to swim farther, faster. Your child knows that he can run faster if he ups his effort. You’ll need to help teach him that swimming better, not harder, will improve his performance.

Rhythm

Coordinating the movement of all the parts of the body in relationship to each other is key to swimming comfortably. Your child already knows how to do this intuitively if he can run. If he can skip, throw a ball, or kick, he’s beginning to understand this concept in a more conscious way. In swimming, the rhythm of movement determines whether you move at all in a way that it doesn’t on land. You’ll need to teach the importance of coordinated movement in swimming.

Power

Most of the power in swimming comes from the arms, the core, and the hips. The rhythm of the movement makes it work. Kicking provides stability but not much propulsion. This is exactly the opposite of land-based activities like running and biking, where the legs and core provide the power and the arms are secondary.

Drag

There’s much less resistance when you move your body through air than there is when you move through water, so reducing drag in the water is more important in swimming than it is in land-based activities. Any part of your body that’s moving forward should be slicing through the water, disturbing it as little as possible. Any part of your body that’s moving backwards should be maximizing resistance, using the water to push or pull against. When you’re teaching your kids to swim, you’ll need to give them plenty of practice and experience with what happens when they push and pull in the water.

Relaxation

A big shift in skill and ability will happen when your child learns to relax in the water. Ironically, it’s hard to relax in the water until you have enough skill to feel comfortable. You can help him by providing all the support he needs.

Ease

Nowhere is the concept of going with the flow clearer than in the water. It’s easier to go with the flow than against the flow of the water. It’s also more efficient and effective. On land, if it feels easier, it means you’re not trying harder. In swimming, making it feel easier is good.

The big picture

Keep these concepts in mind as you plan your lessons and as you spend time in and out of the pool with your child. Using these fundamentals to inform how you teach will allow your child to have the best, smoothest, fastest learning experience.