While competing in exciting sports -part of the American Red Cross water-safety course-new swimmers gain self-forgetful courage.

INEXPERIENCED swimmers can free | themselves from fear of the water, get used to diving, and learn a variety of strokes by playing simple games. Because the American Red Cross has discovered these facts, it has made fun an important part of the curriculum even in water-safety classes for instructors.

Games lure timid souls away from the shelter of the pool's rim, accustom them to being toppled over, bumping into others, and turning somersaults. The Red Cross has taken a leaf from the book of the small boys who play tag down at the old swimming hole, but it has carried the idea further and devised games that develop almost every kind of aquatic skill.

"The fun method is particularly good for adults who think they are too old to learn," says Mrs. Gabrielle M. Ranallo, assistant director of first aid, water safety, and accident prevention for the Red Cross in Brooklyn, N. Y. "It helps them overcome their timidity. It keeps them active in a group and takes their minds off their fears."

There are different games for beginning, intermediate, and advanced students. Many are water variations of familiar obstacle races, or parlor games such as anagrams, using stones on which the letters have been painted.

Games Of Competition Helpful

DODGE BALL encourages confidence, for it is a deep-water game in which the players will find It impossible to avoid frequent ductings

FETCHING objects from the bottom of the pool as a pert of a competition teaches beginner not to be afraid to get their faces under water.

READING a newspaper aloud while paddling backward In a pool race causes so much hilarity that contestants forget their former fears.

RACING little sailboats across the pool it a good developer of lung power, co-ordination, and endurance. The swimmer who laughs is sure to lose.

Banish Fear Of Water. Overcoming Timidity By The Fun Method