The Value of Working With Your Hands

Kathy and I often chuckle about how we have learned to handle being identified as "swim lesson teachers". When asked at a party or in a meeting by someone that we have never met before, they get a strange look on their face, that seems to say "ohhh you make a living and support your family teaching swimming?" One of my favorite questions is, "and what else do you do?" I will sometimes go off with a long winded explanation about how our small business is much more complicated than it seems. We have to train and recruit staff, work daily on our teaching techniques, interact with not only the children who swim in our programs or play in our sports camps but also their parents, schedule our pool use and yada, yada, yada. With a little internal smile I will share our story and move on through the day.

Do You Have Fun At Work ? I do!

Today as we move into a bit of the hectic days of late spring and early summer, I am looking forward with excitement to the opening of our Mesa swim school this week, the opening of our four summer sports camps in two weeks, the summer recreational swim teams and the summer energy that blows in the front doors at the indoor swim schools. As much as I am proud of our curriculum and the quality of our teaching and coaching methods, I have come to the conclusion that I have fun at work not just because of what we do but who I do it with each day.

Relax, it is not that big a deal

What's not a big deal? Well anything really. Just got out of the water teaching today. The thought running through my mind is that parents of little ones today seem to place a lot of emphasis on success in everything their child does or attempts. And if the swim lesson or tumble gym class does not go well, the parent puts too much blame on themselves. They seem to think they are failing somehow or that their child is somehow acting developmentally inappropriately.

From the Mouths of Babes

Here at the swim school we have advocated for years that swim lessons are a major layer of protection in preventing drowning. We work very hard to teach a child that there will be a consequence for stepping off the edge of the pool. They will go under water! Now I personally have two, yes two, major resources that support this theory. In a recent blog, we reported on the results of the brand new, just released, National Institute of Health study that confirmed the fact that swim lessons play a role in drowning prevention.

Swimming Lessons Do Not Increase Drowning Risk in Young Children - National Institutes of Health

FINALLY, we are beginning to have some research that supports what many of us in the Learn to Swim world have believed for years. Swim Lessons do impact a child's behavior and are a factor in the fight against children drowning. The National Institutes of Health have released a study that states:

"Providing very young children with swimming lessons appears to have a protective effect against drowning and does not increase childrens' risk of drowning"

Kids Climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro, Africa

I spent some time last week with a pretty impressive 7th grader named Max. I got to know Max when he and his sister first started at our swim school several years ago. Max is in a new middle school this year but as a sixth grader he was president of the student body for his grade school. Remember, I said president of the entire school not just his class. Max and some of his friends and parents have been training and working out here in Phoenix for the last eight months in preparation for a climb of Mt Kilimanjaro in Africa this coming June.

Mt. Kilimanjaro, located in Tanzania, Africa rises to a height of 19,330 feet! For those of us who have hiked in Arizona or even climbed some of the "Fourteeners" (mountains of 14,000 feet in height) in Colorado, 19,000++ feet is pretty high. You have to work over a period of days to get acclimated to the limited air at that elevation.

Why am I sharing Max's story here? There is a constant barrage of communication in the media about how we are raising a generation of kids who are glued to their TV, Game boy or Computer Screen. Here in Phoenix we are blessed with many local hiking trails and amazing parks. "Get off of the couch" as our sports camp director recommends. So my encouragement to parents is to find ways to get involved with your kids in activities outside of the house. Foster free play and don't worry if and when they fall or scape their knee. And if someone pushes someone else over, there is no need to rush in to protect them. Kids have a way of working it out among themselves.

OK, back to Max and his friends. I have to tell you the Rest of the Story as Paul Harvey says. Max is part of a team organized by the folks at the Foundation for Blind Children, who have put together a team of blind students and partnered them with sighted volunteers to climb Mt Kilimanjaro together. Here is their web site http://www.seekiliourway.org/. I am also including a link to the letter from Pam and Jim Stelzer outlining their family's reasons for being part of the "see kili our way" climb. Click here to read their letter. If you have trouble with the link, copy and paste the following link into a new browser window:
http://www.hubbardswim.com/ConstantContact/SeeKiliOurWay_StelzerLetter.pdf

This is not a fund raising letter (although if you elect to help these kids that would be great). It is an invitation to get up, get off the couch --- parents and kids --- and chase some kind of dream. Most people would look at Max and his friends and be thankful that you have your eyesight. I think Max is gonna look back over his life and feel sorry for people who were limited because they were sighted. I am gonna bet that Max is gonna come back from Africa will all kinds of impressions of life in Africa that we would miss. From the smells and sounds of the cities, the smell of the bush, to the feel of the winds, to the rhythm of language, and to the joy of trying to do something that is a really tough challenge.

If you want to help with their mission, check out their web site. If you want to learn from these kids, just get up and take a walk.

Maybe Pig-Pen Had It Right!

(apologies to Charles M. Schulz)

Are you a "five second rule" parent? Are you a "scan the area, wipe it off and feed it to your child" parent? Or are you a "it touched the floor and it will never touch your mouth" parent!

I grew up in a hectic, 7 kids within 10 years of each other, loving household in Brooklyn in the 50's and 60's. My mom and dad were a nurse and a surgeon, respectively. They were definitely health conscious but I never remember them being freaked out over cleanliness. Some kids today wash their hands more times a day than my father did on a surgery day! My daughter just spent a week in Mexico on a beach with her 6 month old and dedicated a day to get her little one use to the feel of sand on her hands and her feet. She was determined to make sure Elizabeth got used to the feel of "stuff" squishing between her toes! Yes, it is a lot more work to clean our kids up when they've jumped in the puddle in the parking lot or as one of my other grand kids did - using his body board to surf in the neighbor's irrigation.

Now I know there is a level of hygiene that is sometimes missing especially around washrooms or food. I certainly agree that hands and faces need to be washed but there is some research out there that some strains of disease and infection are becoming more resilient because of an over abundance of cleanliness, antibiotic prescriptions and anti-bacterial soaps.

In the New York Times on January 27 they ran an article in the Personal Health column by Jane Brody titled: Babies Know: A Little Dirt IS Good For You. She summarizes a number of studies to say: "researchers are concluding that organisms like the millions of bacteria, viruses and especially worms that enter the body spur the development of a healthy immune system".

Dr. Joel Weinstock, director of gastroenterology and hepatolgy at Tufts Medical Center in Boston is quoted as saying: "Children raised in an ultra-clean environment are not being exposed to many organisms that help them develop appropriate immune regulatory circuits".

Not trying to run a medical seminar here but Ms. Brody quotes physician after physician who encourage parents to relax and not be soooo vigilant about dirt!!!

As I watch parents progress in their parenting skills I see some funny things evolve. I watched this happen in our own family as our family grew ...and grew. The new mom or dad travels with a huge diaper bag with a full pharmacy included in it, four changes of clothes, diapers for a 7 day trip, wipes, hand sanitizers, etc. When the second child arrives, the diaper bag gets smaller, the kids share drinks, and they fight over whatever food is floating in the bag. And then we have those families with three or four children. Something about a "less is more" approach to life takes over. They have a diaper in their back pocket, a small bag of sanitizing wipes in their purse, one change of clothes in the trunk of the car (a tee shirt and elastic shorts that will fit any of the kids), and enough crumbs and unidentified objects under each car seat to supply a full meal if they ever get stuck in a snow storm.

So maybe those five second parents are really helping their kids be healthier. Ahhhh, you don't know what a five second parent is? They are the parents who when their child drops some food on the floor says "as long as it wasn't on the floor longer than five seconds, you can pick it up wipe it off and eat it". Come on, relax and join the club.