Toddlers can learn to survive in water - Atlanta News, Weather, Traffic, and Sports | FOX 5

A new CDC report shows that more young children between the ages of 1 and 4 die from drowning than any other cause except birth defects.

The report also says that young boys are four times more likely to drown than girls. But swim lessons may be able to teach toddlers how to survive in the water.

For 25 years, SwimKids of Georgia's Nadyne Siegel-Brown has taught kids as young as 6-months-old how to rescue themselves if they get in trouble in water.

"All it takes for someone to turn their back, to talk to someone else…The child slips in the water, it's a silent death," said Siegel-Brown.
 
This summer McKay, 3, will be around pools and at the beach, so her mom, Kathy Crawford, wants her to know how to swim.

"I've been wanting to do it for a while, and I was unable to teach her because she would cry every time," said Kathy.

Not anymore. In a series of intense 10-minute lessons, McKay and the other toddlers practice rolling themselves over in the water and floating on their backs, allowing them to breathe.  Siegel-Brown wants the move to become automatic.
     
"If you talk to them, if you tell them what you want, if you show them in the water, they mimic it, and they get it. And it becomes part of their schema," said Siegel-Brown. ""It also gives them a healthy respect for the water. You're not going to see a kid that's gone through lessons like this walk over and jump in."

Siegel-Brown says kids -- especially toddlers -- need swimming lessons.  
     
"You can't be everywhere all the time, as an adult or a parent," said Siegel-Brown.
    
Siegel-Brown says try to find a swim program that teaches toddlers a simple self-rescue technique.

"It gives you the time to get to a child. It gives you the time to jump in and get them if they know how to roll back and float," said Siegel-Brown.

Siegel-Brown says don't take your eyes off your kids around water -- even for a few seconds - and if you're a parent, learn CPR, just in case. She says never assume drowning can't happen to your child.  It can, and it does.
 
"The most diligent people lose their children to drowning. It's not because they're not paying attention, it's not because they're not watching.  It's because they're little Houdinis and they slip away for one second, and….that's all it takes," said Siegel-Brown.

Even kids who take swim lessons can get into trouble in the water. The CDC says young swimmers need to be supervised by an adult and backyard pools should be surrounded by a four-sided fence with a latched gate.

Nadyne says don't use flotation devices like water wings or noodles because they give young children a false sense of confidence in the water.