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Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

spotthedrowningchild.com

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Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#341

Post by bsurmanski »

kubanczyk wrote: post #327
smileysteve wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> teaching 5 year olds the butterfly and other high energy/low safety strokes without teaching elementary backstroke, breaststroke, sidestroke. I am amazed at how few of my early millennial peers have never heard of the elementary backstroke.

I just googled "elementary backstroke" and yeah... I'm in my forties, pretty proficient swimmer, and nobody ever showed it to me. I watch my kid's lessons and I'm sure I didn't see it being shown to them. They got into what I google as "backstroke" straight away, without the "elementary" phase.

I just looked it up and turns out that's my favourite stroke! I didn't know it had a name, I just called it the "Jellyfish" :)

I don't think I was ever taught it. I think I just discovered it playing around in the water one day.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#342

Post by remcob »

young_unixer wrote: post #127
cVwEq wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Secondary drowning" is another term people use to describe another drowning complication. It happens if water gets into the lungs. There, it can irritate the lungs’ lining and fluid can build up, causing a condition called pulmonary edema. You’d likely notice your child having trouble breathing right away, and it might get worse over the next 24 hours. Both events are very rare. They make up only 1%-2% of all drowni…

1%-2% doesn't seem "very rare" to me.

Indeed, especially considering that this is "1%-2% of all drownings". It says nothing about how many people are suffering from this after a near-drowning and subsequently recover from a near-second-drowning. For all we know more than half of the near-drownings may end up with secondary symptoms.

Also we don't know how many near-drownings vs drownings there are. Lot of good statistical quiz questions in here.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#343

Post by aetherspawn »

lm28469 wrote: post #288
balls187 wrote: post #249

When I was 12, I went on a week long hike as a scout. We decided to swim across a lake, and 1/2 way through, I got tired, and tried swimming back, but couldn't. I remember having the presence of mind to yell out help before blanking out. My closest friend in the troop luckily turned around, swam back to and drug me back to shore. I was scared of the water after that, but some how ended up fighting my fear and earning…

Something similar happened to me as a kid, I decided to swim from our boat to the shore of the lake, got exhausted 100 meters from the shore. Before going in full panic mode I remembered you can basically float indefinitely on your back with very minimal effort and did just that until I was calm and rested. Turns out our mandatory swimming lessons from the age of 8 weren't as useless as I thought.

Everyone should be taught this technique.

Nethertheless: I did this in the ocean once about 200m off the shore (at that point I wasn’t really in trouble and just wanted a rest) and the waves were too high and I ended up eating a lot of salt water and nearly choking and sinking. It put me in a far worse situation than had I stayed off my back.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#344

Post by scaryclam »

irrational wrote: post #318
lm28469 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something similar happened to me as a kid, I decided to swim from our boat to the shore of the lake, got exhausted 100 meters from the shore. Before going in full panic mode I remembered you can basically float indefinitely on your back with very minimal effort and did just that until I was calm and rested. Turns out our mandatory swimming lessons from the age of 8 weren't as useless as I thought.

I think the skill of being able to flip onto your back and scuttle to wherever you need to go is more important than knowing how to swim (and I love to swim - I swam 2 kilometers just this morning). Unless you are in super cold or choppy water you should be just fine.

I have some very young nephews. As well as teaching them how to swim, we're teaching them how to flip over and float, just for this reason. If they can do that, and recognise when they're in trouble, then it might just save their lives one day.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#345

Post by strbean »

aetherspawn wrote: post #343
lm28469 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something similar happened to me as a kid, I decided to swim from our boat to the shore of the lake, got exhausted 100 meters from the shore. Before going in full panic mode I remembered you can basically float indefinitely on your back with very minimal effort and did just that until I was calm and rested. Turns out our mandatory swimming lessons from the age of 8 weren't as useless as I thought.

Everyone should be taught this technique. Nethertheless: I did this in the ocean once about 200m off the shore (at that point I wasn’t really in trouble and just wanted a rest) and the waves were too high and I ended up eating a lot of salt water and nearly choking and sinking. It put me in a far worse situation than had I stayed off my back.

This technique got me through Jr. Lifeguards. I would pretty much immediately get hypothermic in the ocean, turn blue and feel as if I couldn't breathe. I would float on my back and "jellyfish" - essentially flapping your arms in sync, sometimes doing a breast-stroke kick with the legs.

If the ocean isn't too rough, and you conserve your energy for dealing with waves, this works pretty well.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#346

Post by strbean »

fho wrote: post #137
BiteCode_dev wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most depictions of things in movies are like that. Films must show you something interesting, and watching somebody do trial and error painfully on a bash script for 6 hours is not as fun as a fast pace keyboard murder while screaming "i just passed 3 firewalls" with beautiful animations rendering on the screen. If there is a camera, what you see is a lie. The difference between a national geographic documentary and…

Even national geographic documentaries are probably "lies" ... I just had the chance to get some basic insights in to evolutionary biology ... and boy is bloody mauling and devouring of prey just the tip of the iceberg. Intraspecies rape and infanticide is pretty common out there. (Look up the penis of drakes (male ducks) and why it looks the way it does at some point) Siblings competing for food with only a small pe…

Another one - pretty much all nature footage doesn't come with quality (or any) sound. Nature documentaries are full of foley sound.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#347

Post by dpbriggs »

sequoia wrote: post #285

In Toronto, children are tested for swimming ability at each visit to a public pool. Children are given wrist-bands corresponding to their age upon arrival. If a child wishes to swim in the deep end, he or she may ask a guard to give them a swim test (swimming a fixed distance without touching floor or wall). Upon passing the test, the child is given another wrist-band indicating that they may use the deep end. Paren…

Can also confirm this occurs in the Greater Toronto Area. I remember feeling very proud when I passed that test.

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#348

Post by strbean »

lacker wrote: post #275
killjoywashere wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wouldn't let a small child I am responsible for go into a pool alone You would. Let me give you the scenario: you're home alone with the three kids, you've been chasing them around, doing laundry, cleaning up spilled grape juice, telling Jenny to stop cutting Tommy's hair, etc. Finally, you think everyone is down for a nap. You turn on the game. 5 minutes later, 5 minutes, you think "It's too quiet...". You get u…

I don't have a pool, thus solving this problem.

Until someone breaks into your backyard and sets up a kiddy pool, and your toddler goes and falls into it!

Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)

#350

Post by foota »

notRobot wrote: post #338
invisiblerobot wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Is it really "exploitation" in the human sense of taking advantage of someone else? Yes. Obviously. And whether or not the exploitation is "programmed" is irrelevant. After all everything is programmed.

But. If we're observing as humans and it appears to us that the one creature is taking advantage of another, surely that's just our interpretation from a very limited understanding of their world? I have no idea where I'm going with this, but that phrasing still seems off to me.

OT, but your usernames have a neat synchronicity.
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