Now, I know I go on a lot about how we know more about learning these days, which means new approaches can often be remarkably effective - as have seen in a host of projects, and I constantly worry about how often education can under ambitious be for the children in it... and of course we are seeing now so many breaking through the artificially low ceiling of criterion referencing and thumbing their noses at the foolishness of Incrementalism (just one variable, a tiny bit better.... hah!) so that in so many ways we are really now starting to see just how good our learners might be...
...so pictures like these have become less exceptional. But it still impresses the heck out of me!. This is granddaughter Amelie, under water and completely as ease - she's been swimming underwater from 6 months and is nearly two now. Unthinkable 15 years ago, every-day-normal now. Science + learning = remarkable progress for so many.
Sorry about the photo quality - being under water blurs things a bit.
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1 comment:
Hi Stephen,
Great to see your granddaughter loving the water so much. A swimming story for you: My mum worked as a casual swimming instructor during her maternity leave years, and I think I was the greatest beneficiary of this. She'd have 6-month-old me on her hip or under her arm while she was in the water, teaching, and I've hardly left the water since! Watersports of all sorts are a huge passion of mine.
Experience teaching swimming has taught me that being comfortable in the water (usually through lots of water play) is an absolute precursor for learning to swim... which is really the same for any kind of learning context, right? Play in a print-rich environment via storytelling, browsing, discussing words & signs with parents, is an important step before reading and writing - not that the two are separate, but you can't easily jump right in on performing the mechanics without having a good sense of the context.
yours,
Annalise
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