Why is it important not to teach your children to rely on floats?
Many parents often resort to armbands, or other buoyancy aids, to make the 'swimming moment' safer and more serene. Unfortunately, armbands have a few drawbacks, and sometimes give children a false sense of security, which can lead to tragedy if parents fail to keep a close eye on them at all times
ARMBANDS, MUD, FRENCH FRIES OR OTHER INFLATABLE OBJECTS DO NOT EXEMPT YOU FROM SUPERVISING YOUR CHILDREN !!!!!THEY IN NO WAY ELIMINATE THE RISK OF DROWNING! QUITE THE CONTRARY! HERE'S WHY:
1 They are not reliable
Cuffs can deflate, burst or come off when jumping into the water.
CAUTION! It's not just armbands that can turn into traps. Boats can tip over.Baby buoys can also topple over, leaving the child trapped upside down underwater.Fries and boards can be dropped by the child at any moment. So it's important to always remain vigilant, even if your child is equipped with a buoyancy aid.
2 They give a false sense of security
Thanks to the high buoyancy of the armbands, children gain confidence in their ability to float easily. They dare to move around and jump into the water from the edge, knowing full well that they'll surface very quickly.As they get used to this, they sometimes forget that their bodies, without armbands, don't have the same buoyancy.
To avoid this, regularly remove armbands or other floats to let them feel their body in the water.Get them used to holding onto you or the edges. Teach them to float unaided. This will make it easier and safer for you, and for the lifeguard, when they're old enough to learn to swim without armbands.
3 They give bad reflexes and slow down learning to swim
Firstly, for your child to learn to swim, it's important to break the habit of the landlubber who moves vertically, because a swimmer moves horizontally.However, armbands only support the upper part of the body, the arms.Legs, on the other hand, sometimes tend to sink. So, in the end, armbands don't always promote the right horizontal position for moving around.Fries or float belts are preferable
Secondly, for your children to feel comfortable in the water, they need to be aware that their bodies float, even without help.Floating without armbands requires a minimum of effort, confidence, balance and immersion of part of the head. With armbands, it's just the opposite! You float easily, effortlessly, in any position and with your head out of the water. Armbands don't give children the right cues for learning to float. Don't use any buoyancy aids. Only you or the edge of the pool to help them position themselves and let go little by little
Finally, you'll find that a child with armbands hardly ever uses his arms. He moves with his legs and keeps his arms passive. The floats support him at the surface and help him balance without the need for effort. Armbands therefore don't encourage children to understand the usefulness of arms for balancing, moving around, or finding support to get their head out of the water and breathe (as in swimming the little dog).
4 When it's time to take them off, there's danger!
As we saw earlier, a child who doesn't know how to swim, and who always swims with armbands on, doesn't have good swimming marks.So BE VERY CAREFUL WHEN YOU REMOVE YOUR CHILDREN'S ARMBANDS!Especially when it's time to leave.They might want to jump into the water one last time.Without understanding why they don't come up immediately and float like they used to, children lose all their bearings, panic, drink the cup and drown if you're not there. In the best-case scenario, the child will become positively aware of the problem.On the contrary, he may not want to go back in the water, develop a phobia and remain obsessed by the idea of sinking if he doesn't have armbands.It will then be very difficult to get him to remove them.
