Educating the Dragon

I have , very nearly, finished reading ‘Freakonomics’ by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner.

It’s a book crammed with interesting information, answers to questions you never realized were questions before and a whole lot of inspirational application of economic theory upon everyday practice. It is, to its credit a very interactive book. Right from the get go with its own blog and website.

The reason I chanced upon the book was that the author (Steven Levitt) presented a TED talk that I found fascinating. A with the leaving book vouchers from my previous school I decided that he was a guy worth investing some time and coin into. Especially when titles of chapters read “Why teachers are like sumo wrestlers.”

There is a portion in the book about what makes a good parent. He talks about how we a responsible parents would more likely ban our offspring from playing at Amy’s house because Amy’s dad has a lienced firearm locked away in the house but would all them to play at Emma’s with her large section and outdoor swimming pool… despite the figures of child death in the being 1:11,000 for ‘death by swimming pool’ compared to 1:1,000,000+ for ‘death by firearm’.

I found the remainder of the chapter just as insightful and I encourage you to read it. But that statement took my mind on something of a tangent.

You see I have heard a theory that teaching students to swim is in fact harmful to their health. I had a University lecturer for Phys Ed once who stated that the best way to save a kid from drowning was to NOT teach him to swim.

His argument went something like this: If, in a half dozen swimming sessions you have taught a student to swim proficiently enough to save themselves from drowning you’re a miracle worker. In those few session what you HAVE taught them is to be a little less afraid of the water. The result being that when it comes to the summer holidays they are much MORE likely to enter some waterway than a complete non swimmer, therefore more likely to get themselves into trouble and drown. Instances of ‘people entering the water too quickly’ and shock paralyzing them are all too frequent.

He makes a bold and controversial statement especially given that the government is spending thousands and possibly millions on the ‘you’re a baby in the water…’ campaign.

So that’s what I’m wanting to find out. And it’s an answer that I have wanted to know for 12 years but never really known where to start…. Until I met Steven Levitt in the pages of a book.

Question:

Are we doing our students a disservice by providing swimming lessons in primary school?

Information required:

How long has it been mandatory for schools to teach swimming?

Interestingly, what was the catalyst for that move?

Number of deaths of school aged children (5-13) since it was mandatory

Number of deaths for the same, for the same number of years prior to the curriculum change- What is the percentage difference?

But where, or where do I find the answers…. I just spent an hour looking through

http://www.stats.govt.nz/default.htm with no joy. I’m not giving up though and if you’ve any thoughts or sourcesdo comment.

I did however find out couple of facts, vaguely related:

The number of drowning fatalities decreased from 130 in 1994 to 117 in 2004, with the majority of fatalities being male.

Drowning rate 3 per 100,000 (1-14 year olds) however that includes infants drowning in baths and unattended toddlers. Neither of which implact on the orginal question.