Feel the fear and do it anyway

Two weeks ago, Jade couldn't put any part of her face underwater when swimming. She hated to be splashed. And related to this, hairwashing has always been a nightmare trying not to get any water into her eyes or ears. But two weeks ago we went swimming and took Jade's friend along, who is very confident about swimming underwater. We have been swimming with this girl before, and it didn't prompt Jade to have a go herself then, but obviously the time was just right for her on this occasion, and she decided she wanted to try and put her face underwater. She was nervous but determined, and took herself off to a corner of the pool to just get on with it herself. In her own time, and without any prompting, pushing or encouragement from anyone else, she decided on the small steps she was going to take towards this big goal, and took them herself. Firstly she dipped her mouth into the water for the briefest moment, and was happy to find that it was OK and did it again a couple more times. Then she decided that she would put her nose in, and dipped it in as quickly as possible. Again she repeated it, asking me to watch, full of excitement and pride in herself. She borrowed her friend's goggles and decided to put her whole face in the water, which she achieved despite her anxiety. Time after time, she pushed herself on tiny step by tiny step. She was excited but very wound up, and at one point had to take a bit of a break and sit on the side when she knew she needed to. She took her own time, set her own goals and achieved them in her own way. And by the end of the swim, she was going right under the water to catch a sinking hoop. She asked me to throw it again and again and was so thrilled at herself. It was lovely to see! And yet, had a swimming teacher decided that it was time for her to learn this and push her towards doing it, I am quite sure it would have failed completely. She would have been too scared to do it with any pressure from anybody else. It was entirely internally motivated, and successful because of it. I have never seen a clearer example in my own child as to why child-led education achieves far more than a cookie-cutter curriculum ever will.

At the end of the swim, we bought her some goggles of her own, and the following week she went swimming again, this time with DH but not me. She came home reporting that she could swim 3 metres under water, and sure enough I have seen that for myself today. She's now spending more time under water than on top of it. She is just revelling in her new water confidence, and it is a joy!