What do you do about swim class when your daughter won't dunk?

To Leah's dismay I spot her immediately, crouched in the fetal position under the bed with dolls and dust bunnies, her tangled blond hair fanned across her face. When I order her out, she edges toward the wall and screeches, "I'm not getting in the pool!"

It's the first morning of swim lessons.

Leah's reaction doesn't surprise me. Now 6, she's a child who at age 2 refused to wear clothes she didn't pick out herself, and who refused to play recreation-league soccer because she didn't like other parents watching. Sometimes I admire her wild stubbornness (no fretting about Leah going along with something because she can't say no), but it's less than pleasurable on days like today.

And on the subject of swim lessons, I'm just as stubborn, partly because of safety, partly because all her friends can swim and I worry that she's behind. But mostly because I never had lessons myself — never learned proper stroke technique, how to dive gracefully, how to cannonball without swallowing water. I want Leah to develop the skills and the confidence I didn't.