sports and activities

This is a fun book with an interesting format. The pages are thick and spiral bound. The pages are laminated so the book can be used poolside for reference by parent when teaching the child these activities. The left side of the page is a beautiful scene: photographs of children enhanced by an artist with what looks like paint. There is rhyming prose under it. The intention is to read this aloud to your child to get them interested. The writings and pictures are themed, gliding, floating, etc. and go along with activities that are on the right side of the page.

The problems I have with the book are that I didn't realize this book doesn't start at the beginning. That is to say, I thought it would start with ideas for getting the child used to getting their face wet at first, then going under water. Tips for getting the child used to relaxing in the water so the parent can guide them to follow the directions. This book starts right off with the first activity of the child swimming underwater, unaided, through a hoop. I think that starting off with underwater activities assumes a lot of preparation work has already been done with either parents or by taking lessons. There is also no logical order to these activities. For example the 5th activity is to hum in the water and blow water at the surface. It would seem to me that this activity should have been first. I'd prefer the activities to go logically from easy and then progressing to more difficult (or scary) activities. I also feel the safety precautions should go right up front as the first set of activities rather than being at the end as if an afterthought.

Now for what I like about the book. This is a short book; there is no fluff or filler here. I like that there are read aloud sections for the children. The way the reading is linked to fun activities is creative and unique. There is one photograph per activity. The directions are written clearly and concisely. The method is gentle and caring, which I appreciate. However, since there are no tips for getting off to this starting point such as how to first get the child to go all the way under with trust and confidence. There are some great tips I never though of such as after having the child jump in, don't hug them but turn them back to the wall and teach to climb out. The only problem for me is that with both my kids, to get them into the pool in the first place I had to hold them in my arms (especially since the depth in shallow end is still way over a baby or toddler's head). Therefore, children used to being carried and hugged in the water have a hard time resisting that, to follow the author's directions.

What is covered in this book is: swimming underwater, doing things underwater (fetching toys, etc.), relaxing on back to float on surface, encouraging to go deeper underwater, jumping off side, climbing out, pushing off from bottom and going up'bobbing, proper kicking method, gliding, and safety precautions.

Overall this book has a lot of info in a concise format with beautiful visuals and with a caring and fun attitude toward these activities. Since there are limited books for parents on teaching our children how to swim, I recommend this book. I plan to use it but will have to come up with some kind of logical progression of easy to difficult.

Both my kids were swimming by age three thanks to this great book. Great, easy to understand tips. Learning to swim was a fun experience, not a frightening experience.