Swimming Lessons

Dean started swimming lessons on Sunday. He's in the Red class (which is actually a 3-yr-old class, but they said because he's in preschool he should go ahead and start in the "red" group). He did really well. It's a small group - only 2 other kids were in his class - and it's NOT parent/child - it's just the kids and the teacher. Joel and I sat about 25 yards away from the pool out of Dean's line of vision and watched (and took some pics). I was AMAZED to see Dean morph into a little angel child when we're not around. It was really unbelievable!! He sat nicely and listened to the teacher and waited patiently for his turn. If he got distracted and started to wander off towards another group of kids and the teacher said something like "come back over here Dean", he didn't completely ignore her but actually immediately responded and went right back to where he was supposed to be! He did everything he was instructed to do, the FIRST time he was asked to do it - no whining, no temper tantrums, no pretending to be deaf! I kept having to sneak around to look at his face to make sure that was really my child!!

His preschool teachers are always telling me "Oh Dean is so easy. He's such a good kid and so agreeable" and I'm always like "Dean? really?" and just assume this is probably what they say to all the parents the first few months. But after seeing him in action at Swimming Lessons when he obviously didn't realize Joel and I were still around, I'm starting to wonder if maybe he isn't really actually a pretty well-behaved toddler when we're not around!!!

Anyway, here are some pics of Dean at his first session of Swimming Lessons. He'll go every Sunday afternoon until right before Thanksgiving. The Lessons are provided through Valley Isle Aquatics and are at the Kihei Aquatic Center.

Dean is definitely the youngest of the 3 kids. One kid is 4 yrs old and the other blonde boy is 3.5 yrs old:They kicked and blew bubbles to start:
Then moved on to taking turns swimming on their tummies with the assistance of a noodle and a dumbbell thing:
Dean did tend to get distracted by the noodle while waiting his turn:
Or by the dumbbell thing:
The last thing they did on the first day was practice floating on their backs with the help of a noodle. Dean wasn't too sure about this, but he NEVER would have let us do this with him!!
He was obviously tired and cold by the end (the sun had gone behind a cloud and the wind was kicking up), but he held himself together really well and didn't have a single meltdown for the entire 45-minute class. He paid attention and listened well the entire time and I was really proud of him.