Dear Editor;
I was an English Teacher until a car accident curtailed this two years ago. But I still maintain contact with a number of English teachers. One of them is Australian and besides being a teacher is a qualified swimming instructor.
During a recent conversation with him he raised the subject of swimming instruction in some of the Thai schools that he had worked and said he was appalled to see that no basic swimming safety was being taught at all.
How to tread water, float and bearing in mind that many Thais bathe fully clothed, how to create a buoyancy aid from a shirt or pair of trousers.
He also remarked that very bad basic stroke skills were being shown creating bad habits that can last a lifetime.
It is far easier to teach correctly from the start than to try and correct bad techniques later.
I would be very interested to receive further comments on the subject.
Barry Hooper [Banchang]
