Why do we ask and pay for advice and services from qualified, experienced professionals when we think we know better all along? As a sports instructor I’m annoyed when it happens to me, but I realise I can be just as guilty.

Although I have my own regular swimming classes through my local councils swim scheme, yesterday I was asked to cover for a colleague at a different pool. If you cover at your regular pool, the parents recognise you, you have probably taught them or their siblings in previous lessons and they know the structure of the lessons. Covering at a different pool is a challenging experience.

After 5 weeks, I think even a nervous 5 year old child should attempt some water confidence skills without wearing arm bands.  This could be just walking across the pool pulling the water with their arms, or sitting on the steps trying to pick up some sinkers. Obviously wearing armbands restricts these actions as they don’t allow the arms to go under the water.

As we sat on the steps picking sinkers from the floor I hear ‘Oi! Teacher’, from the balcony above. The parent proceeded to shout how her child needs armbands. I explained that we were working on water confidence and they could wear them when we start swimming. But the mother bellows she knows what her child needs and he is going to be terrified when he goes under the water. The child who was happily sitting on the steps collecting the toys from the bottom of the pool then begins to cry as his mother continues to shout at me. So I put him in arm bands and he struggles through the lesson as he can’t put his feet on the ground to walk and tries to swim vertically.



The next group were slightly more advanced beginners who I was supposed to teach breast stroke legs to. Some kids can’t grasp front crawl kicking straight away and have trouble moving but are natural breast stroke swimmers. But because some children who are obviously good frontcrawl kickers were struggling with these new strokes, the parents complained very vocally that what I was teaching was too difficult. Never mind that other children were mastering it, it was too hard because theirs couldn’t. All that ended up happening was those children listened to their parents announced they couldn’t do it, and refused to try.

Yesterday I was angry. Not only because of the public, vocal way they made their feelings known but also in the way their views affected their children who were happily doing as I asked until they listened to mum and dad shouting. Whilst I appreciate that the parents are paying money for the lessons, I wonder why some of them are. One would think it was because I have professional qualifications and 8 years experience so could teach their children to swim better than they could themselves. If their child was so terrified of water, we have classes that children and parents can go to together to overcome those fears, yet the parent chose not to en-role them in that class. The parents complaining about the breast stroke teaching would also complain when they move up to the next class and find the other children joining the class have mastered both front crawl and breast stroke leg action and their child is left behind.



Today I have calmed down and realised that I am as bad as some of those parents. When I have a sports injury I go to the physio and they recommend 6 weeks of rest or no training so I can recover. The first thing I do is complain that is so unreasonable. I whinge to my friends that sport is my life, what will I do for 6 weeks, and that the physio doesn’t understand. But I guess the physio just thinks, ‘Why did she bother coming to see me and paying the money if she is going to ignore my professional, experienced opinion.’

It’s not just me though. I overheard a girl in a running shop having her gait analysed and when she discovered she was a severe over-pronator, refused to buy a suitable shoe because they looked like a special shoe you would get from a hospital and instead went for one she liked the look of. Why bother wasting time having a professional analysis? And how often do you hear people complain that ‘their doctor has given them antibiotics and has unreasonably said they can’t drink alcohol. But it’s a big work party on Saturday so of course they are going to drink.’

If we are going to see a professional for a service, especially when we are paying, maybe we should remind ourselves why we chose them. Rather than dismissing their opinion just because it’s easier than accepting them.



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