本文作者分享了自己通过“家长即是老师”的方式，成功教会两个孩子游泳的经验。作者对比了集体课程和私人课程的优缺点，认为“家长即是老师”模式更具成本效益和灵活性。文章详细介绍了训练过程中的一些细节，如选择合适的游泳场地、穿着保暖衣物、以及对孩子学习方式的观察。作者强调了学习游泳的关键目标是掌握水中自救能力，并认为不必过早追求专业泳姿，更重要的是让孩子在水中建立自信和乐趣。同时，作者也提醒大家关注溺水真实表现，提高安全意识。

🏊‍♂️ **“家长即是老师”模式的优势**：作者认为相比于集体课程和私人课程，家长亲自教导孩子游泳在后勤上更便利且经济实惠。尽管私人课程价格高昂，集体课程虽然单次价格低，但进度慢，整体性价比不高，因此家长教学成为了一种有效的替代方案。

💡 **训练环境与辅助装备的选择**：选择了水深适中的健身房泳池（约1.4米），既能让孩子站立，又能提供足够的活动空间。作者还提到，穿戴1.5毫米的氯丁橡胶潜水裤能有效保暖，提升游泳体验，而孩子们则无需额外保暖。

📈 **教学过程与关键目标**：作者的孩子（约6岁）大约经过12小时（24次）的训练，从零基础掌握了跳水、水中游动和自我保护的能力。核心目标是让孩子能够原地踏步、跳入水中并爬出，以及狗刨式游泳，以确保他们在水中能自救并享受乐趣，而非追求专业竞技泳姿。

🧠 **学习过程的个体差异与关键**：作者观察到孩子学习游泳的过程，就像在大脑中建立一个庞大的“查找表”，需要通过大量在水中不同方式的运动来内化。一个过于分析型、一个则不太听指令的孩子，都最终学会了游泳，显示了过程的灵活性。作者也提到，减少对漂浮物和过多支撑的依赖，逐步放手，是孩子真正学会游泳的关键。

⚠️ **关于溺水安全的警示**：文章特别强调，现实中的溺水与影视剧中的表现大相径庭，溺水者通常不会大声呼救或剧烈挣扎，而是悄无声息地发生。作者提醒家长们应了解溺水的真实迹象，提高警惕，即使在近距离也可能无法及时发现。

📉 **对学习过程的耐心与坚持**：作者在笔记中记录了不少“没有明显进步”的时刻，但强调了不应因此失去信心。学习游泳是一个循序渐进的过程，需要时间和耐心，家长在过程中扮演着至关重要的引导和支持角色。

Published on July 29, 2025 3:10 AM GMT

Both my kids can swim! Yay! 🥂🍾 Some notes about the process:

The options were group lessons, individual lessons, and parent-is-the-teacher. We have tried all three. Individual lessons were logistically inconvenient and expensive. Group lessons were equally inconvenient, and while they seem less expensive, my impression was that if your kid is in a class of four kids, all just getting started from zero, then the kid is gonna make progress 4× slower, which cancels out the 4× lower price per lesson, but meanwhile each lesson has 100% of the hassle. False economy. So we ended up at parent-is-the-teacher.We bought a membership at a nearby gym with a pool. The pool was mostly for adult lap swimming, but they set aside an hour a day for families. It was 4½ feet deep (1.4 m), which was great—deep enough for kids to not scratch their feet on the bottom, but shallow enough for me to comfortably stand.I get cold in pools, especially lap-swimming pools which are not overly heated. The process was much more pleasant after I started wearing 1.5 mm Neoprene wetsuit pants into the pool. Thanks @jefftk for the idea. (The kids never got cold.)For my second kid, it took 12 hours (24 sessions, each ≈30 minutes before the kid petered out and asked to get out) from “basically never been in the water” to “jumping in and swimming all around by himself, while I’m sitting in a chair lifeguarding.” I think my first kid was similar, although I didn’t keep as careful notes.
If there’s some magic recipe to teach a kid to swim much faster than that, well it’s too late for me, but please share in the comments.Both kids were ~6 years old at the time.
The victory condition was that the kid can tread water, jump in, and climb out. (Also, doggy paddle, but that doesn’t really count as a separate thing, it’s kinda just treading water while trying to move forward.) This list is basically capturing what it takes to fall in a pool and probably not die, and also to have fun in a pool with friends.
Most online tutorials would say that I was Doing It Wrong, and that I should have instead started right in on Proper Strokes like the crawl. But: (1) even the kids who learn Proper Strokes will still also need to learn to tread water and doggy paddle sooner or later; (2) you can swim faster and farther with Proper Strokes than doggy paddle, but I’m not trying to get them onto the varsity swim team or go boating without a life vest, I just want them to fall in a pool and probably not die, and to have fun in a pool with friends; (3) teaching Proper Strokes seemed more annoying, so I didn’t do it, sue me; (4) they can always learn Proper Strokes later.
One of my kids is very overly analytical, wanting to talk through everything before doing anything (“OK and then how am I supposed to move my left leg?”). My other kid is very under-ly analytical, and basically ignores all verbal instructions (this is related to his speech and language delay). In between would have been ideal, but the latter was a bit closer to optimal for what we were doing.
Think of learning to swim as a bit like making a giant lookup table in your brain: If my body is in configuration X, and I contract muscle Y, then I'll move according to Z. Everything is different in the water. I think it just takes a bunch of time in the water, moving different ways, to internalize this. It’s mostly subconscious.(Unfortunately, building that lookup table is slowed by a chicken-and-egg bootstrapping challenge: a kid’s body moves differently in the water when there’s an adult holding onto him, or he has a floatie thing, etc.)
We mostly didn’t use any life vests or other floatie things. Instead the basic idea was: hold the kid, with less and less support over time. Beyond that, I was just winging it.There were a bunch of sessions where I wrote “no obvious progress” in my notes. Don’t lose faith!PSA: everyone should learn what drowning looks like, and it does not look like how it’s depicted on TV. “There is very little splashing, no waving and no yelling or calls for help of any kind … In [dozens of drownings each year], the adult will watch [from within 25 meters] but have no idea it is happening.”

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