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A  cross-­cultural  study  on  meaning  and  the  nature  of  

children’s  experiences  in  Australian  and  French  swimming  

clubs  

 

Richard  L.  Light  School  of  Health  Sciences,  University  of  Ballarat,  Australia  

 

This article reports on a study conducted in Australia and France that inquired into meaning and

the nature of children’s experiences of being in swimming clubs with a focus on the positive

aspects of membership that keep them in their clubs. Three-month long case studies were

conducted in a club in Australia and in a club in France, employing Lave and Wenger’s (1991)

analytic concepts of communities of practice and situated learning. Conducting case studies within

two different socio-cultural settings allowed for the identification of common themes that

transcend very different institutional and cultural settings while highlighting contextual factors

and the situated nature of learning.

Key Words: Youth sport: sports clubs: swimming: experience: meaning; communities of

practice: competition

 

 Introduction Despite regular calls for more research on the specific nature of children’s and young people’s

experiences of sport over more than two decades it remains an under-researched area in the

physical education, youth sport and sport coaching literature (Watson, Blanksby & Bloomfield,

1986; MacPhail, Gorley, & Kirk, 2003; Light, 2008a). Research conducted on patterns of

participation and developmental stages in youth sport (see for example, Coté, Baker, &

Abernathy, 2003; Wall & Coté, 2007) makes a valuable contribution toward knowledge on youth

sport but needs to be complemented by studies on the specific nature of children’s and young

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people’s experiences of sport. At the same time, in countries where sports clubs play a, “crucial

role in fostering participation and developing young people’s competence to play sport” (Kirk,

2009), we still know too little about the ways in which the nature of experience shapes their

attitudes toward sport and other physical activity (MacPhail, et al.).

Within a conception of swimming clubs as communities of practice this study inquires into the

aspects of membership that are rewarding and meaningful enough to keep children aged nine to

twelve years of age in their swimming club in Australia and in France. Following on from

previous studies conducted on the social dimensions of youth sports clubs in Australia it uses a

theoretical framework provided by Lave and Wenger’s (1991) concepts of communities of

practice (COP) and situated learning (Light, 2006; Light & Curry, 2009). Three-month case

studies were conducted in an Australian, and a French, swimming club focused on 20 young

swimmers at either site aged between nine and twelve. This age range is a critical period for

competitive swimmers during which they are first introduced to serious competition and training

with nine being the age from which serious competition is first available for children in Australia

and France. It is also the age range identified by Kirk (2009) as being critical for developing

positive perceptions of ability and attitudes toward sport as children typically enter organized

sport. This age group also precedes significant drop out in sport from the age 13 years (Coté &

Hay, 2002; Olds, Dollman & Maher, 2009). Conducting the study at two culturally and socially

distinct sites allows for both the identification of common themes that are compelling due the way

in which they transcend such significant cultural and institutional differences and for highlighting

the importance of local context and the situated nature of learning.

 The nature of experience and meaning

Interest in processes of embodiment and the social construction of the body over the past few

decades has encouraged a focus on the body and experiences of sport and physical education with

some specific attention paid to children and youth (see for example, Kehlen & Atkinson, 2010).

Moreover, Sparkes (2000:19) and others argue for more attention to be paid to Husserl’s concept

of the ‘lived body’, the phenomenological and subjective experiences of athletes in sport and

students in physical education to develop an “understanding of lives within PE and sport along

with the complex dynamics of body-self relationships”. Such attention has been particularly

noticeable in research on sport and gender from Young’s (1990) seminal publication, Throwing

like a girl to more recent writing (see for example, Flintoff & Scratton, 2001; Garret, 2004; Light,

2008b). This work highlights the body’s role in the reproduction of gender inequality in sport, and

the importance of experience and the affective dimensions of participation, in sport. Until recently

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research on disabled people’s participation in sport has also neglected the nature of experience

with a focus on the functional dimensions of physical activity and has failed to consider the

experiential dimensions of PE and sport relating to young disabled people” (Fitzgerald, Jobling &

Kirk, 2003, 178). With only a few exceptions the research conducted on swimming is

overwhelmingly dominated by research on its biophysical dimensions with a dearth work on

learning, pedagogy or any of its other socio-cultural dimensions (for example see, Watson,

Blanksby and Bloomfield, 1985/86; Kandy, 2000; Light & Wallian, 2008).

Kirk (2005) underlines the pivotal importance of the nature children’s early experiences of

sport and physical education for the development of life long participation in physical activity

noting that primary school physical education typically fails to offer quality experiences and that

by the time young people enter secondary school it is too late to positively influence their

dispositions toward sport and other physical activity. Indeed, the primary school years of ages

eight to twelve form a critical period for the development of competency and a positive attitude

toward sport because this is when a belief that effort alone will enable them to achieve their aims

is replaced by a realization of the importance of ability through comparison with peers (Lee,

Carter & Xiang, 1995). As Kirk points out, this coincides with their entry into organised sport to

influence participation suggesting that serious attention needs to be paid to children’s experiences

of sport and physical education at this age.

The nature of experience is tied into the meanings that people make of socio-cultural practices

such as sport and is shaped by culture. This forms the focus of much work in the anthropology of

sport that is characterized by debate over the meaning of sport in small-scale social settings

(Blanchard, 2000). The focus of this study on small communities, its use of cross cultural

contexts and field work involving extended periods of time at both sites aligns with this

anthropological approach. Furthermore, my use the term meaning is derived from Geertz’ work

on culture and meaning to see meaning as being the desires, intentions, beliefs and values of the

participants in the social setting being studied. In Geertz’ work meaning can appear to be used in

a range of ways but Ortner (1999, 146) suggests that it is essentially a “set of broad conceptions-

about which the world is like, how it is put together, how human social beings should conduct

themselves in it and a social complex of practices”.

The organization of competitive swimming for children in Australia and France

Australia

Children in Australia can access swimming as a competitive sport through the club system and

the school system. Australia has a state based education system with differences in the

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organization of school sport between states yet there is reasonable consistency across states with

national level school sport organised by School Sport Australia. The school system aims to both

widen participation by, for example, restricting most races to 50 mere events, yet also offer

opportunities for the development of talent through structured competition at increasingly

competitive levels. Competition begins at the school carnival where children can compete from

eight years of age, through to state championships and the national championships where children

can compete from 10 years of age. Every fourth year, the Pacific Schools Games is held in

Australia offering those who qualify the opportunity of competing at international level from ten

years of age. The states of NSW, Victoria and Queensland offer competition at three to four

levels from the school ‘carnival’ through to state championships.

Very little training is offered by schools for swimming with the vast majority of children

training in commercial swim schools where they are coached by professional coaches and

compete in the club system through the various state bodies and at national level through the

national body, Swimming Australia. These commercial schools typically lease a council-owned

pool where they offer learn-to swim-programs and training squads that children typically move

into from learn-to-swim classes to compete (Light, 2008a). Children can compete in regular club

competitions but most also compete in a range of competitions offered over the year that are open

to all registered members of the state body with a far wider range of events than the school

competitions offer (Light, 2008a). In this system swimmers qualify for championship events by

achieving the minimum qualifying times, as is universal practice. In this club system the

minimum age for competing at the national championships is 12 years of age.

France

In France swimming clubs are typically based in municipal pools but operate as private providers

under the aegis of the French Federation of Swimming (FFN). They offer learn-to-swim

programs, training for competitive swimming and access to organized swimming competition but

swimming does not feature strongly in school-based competitions. There is no organized

competition within the primary school system in France with access to competition only available

through the club sport system. Even at high school access to competitive swimming is limited

compared to Australia. High school swimmers in France can compete in interschool swimming at

middle school and high school through sports clubs operating within schools but with no

opportunity for students not in the swimming club to compete. There is no school swimming

‘carnival’ such as in Australia.

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In 2005 the FFN set up a development program for young swimmers called “French School of

Swimming” (Boullé, 1999). It is aimed at achieving the three objectives of: (a) exposing

swimmers to the richness of all the disciplines aquatic sports; (b) engaging swimmers in a multi-

field culture of swimming within the framework of a policy of opening up to the greatest number

(c) promoting a homogeneity of the practices of teaching and training of swimming. The French

school of Swimming operates at three levels. At the first level “Sauv' Nage” focuses on water

safety for children from six to eight years of age. At the second level, “Pass' Sport of water”

promotes a diversified culture of swimming around the discovery of five disciplines of swimming

(water-polo, swimming, synchronized swimming, swimming with palms, diving). The third level

of “Pass' competition” aims at directing the swimmer towards competitive participation in an

aquatic discipline with swimmers undertaking tests of competency. To take part in competitive

swimming students must obtain the “pass' competition” by completing a 100m medley under the

lawful conditions formulated by the FINA. From 2012, children wishing to take part in

competitions must pass this test to be able to compete and train for competition. Currently (2010),

however, children can be registered to compete without having passed this test. The children from

9 to 12 years in this study are in a phase of discovery or improvement of swimming in

competition and are organized into squads of, Poussins (aged 9-10) and Benjamins (aged 11-12),

based upon age alone and with far less stress on competition than is typically the case for the

Australian children.

Swimming clubs as communities of practice

Kirk and Macdonald’s (1998) suggestion for the use of Lave and Wenger’s (1991) notion of

situated learning in research on Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) has seen it, and their

other key concepts of communities of practice (COP) and legitimate peripheral participation

(LPP), used in research on games teaching and, to a lesser extent, in studies on club sport (Light,

2006). Over the past five years or so the concept of COP has also attracted interest in the sport

coaching field but this research has been focused on coaches’ COP rather than the COP of sports

clubs or of players (for example see, Culver and Trudel, 2006). Within the physical education

field the concepts of Lave and Wenger have proved to be useful for highlighting the less explicit,

non-conscious or embodied learning that occurs through participation in sport and leisure (see for

example, Light, 2006). Using a very broad view of learning as including social development, the

formation of identity and enculturation provides a means of seeing and understanding the nature

of experience and its inseparability from the ongoing growth and development of children within

and beyond the COP of their swimming clubs.

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For Lave and Wenger (1991) learning occurs through the social interaction that arises from

ongoing activities and practices within COP. Through increasing participation in practice children

in sports clubs learn more than sports skills. Through participation in practice they also learn the

culture of the club and of the sport they are participating in while learning valuable social lessons

with membership contributing toward the formation of identity over time. From a situated

learning perspective learning is a whole-person, transformative process arising from participation

in practice within a particular community of practice. The participation framework that learning

and development takes place within is provided by the community of practice within which the

individual is a member.

From Lave and Wenger’s (1991) perspective learning is situated within particular COP that

profoundly shape it as specific micro socio-cultural contexts. Their focus on learning as a whole

person, situated process highlights the role of practice in learning and the range of important yet

often-implicit learning that occurs as part of social life outside schools. It offers opportunities for

identifying the learning that occurs as a result of participation in sport that goes beyond merely

learning the skills of a game or of how to swim fast that is so often neither recognized nor

considered. The micro focus on a COP allows for more detailed and nuanced analyses of the part

that sport plays in learning (in the broadest sense) to provide often-intimate insights into

experience. However, members of any COP live and practise in other COP that overlap to

influence the individual’s development and growth and this needs to be accounted for (see for

example, Light & Nash, 2006). COP can also be located within larger social arenas such as those

of social or cultural fields conceived of by Bourdieu (see for example, Bourdieu, 1986) within

which micro studies on COP can be located.

Methodology The sites and the participants

The study drawn on for this article comprised two case studies; one conducted in Australia and

one in France, with both sites purposively selected. I spent three months at both sites attending

training four to five times a week and going to all major competition meets over these periods. I

chose the Sydney site as I was living in Sydney at the time and had existing connections at the

pool and the swimming club that facilitated access to the site and the participants. This site is

referred to in this article under the pseudonym of the Sydney Swimming Club (SSC). The SSC is

in the state of NSW and is an old club with a long history of success in competition but had

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declined in performance over several decades. Based at a pool in an inner city suburb of Sydney it

was rebuilding its performance in age group swimming and had a membership of approximately

190 including 43 children aged between 9 and 12 years of age. The participants were spread

across four squads based on ability but most of them were in the highest ability squad called the

Dolphins.

Three months after completing the data generation at the Sydney site I spent three months in

France as an Invited Professor offering me the opportunity to conduct the same research at a

French club referred to as the French Swimming Club (FSC). The FSC is the main club in the city

and connections my colleagues at the university had with the club facilitated gaining access to it.

The FSC is based at a pool in the capital city of a rural province with a broad membership of 800

including 115 children aged 9-12 years swimming in two squads base upon age where

competition is not emphasised. All participants were in these two squads.

Data generation and analysis

The data used in this article were generated through semi-structured interviews and noted

observations. Three rounds of interviews were conducted with participants chosen at random

from those who had agreed to take part. I was able to conduct twenty at the SSC but two stopped

coming to the pool at BSC during the study leaving only 18. At the French site a native French

speaker translated the questionnaires and interview questions from English to French, assisted in

conducting the interviews and translated transcripts from French to English. As a teacher of

English at a local high school she was fluent in English. I used a grounded theory approach to

analyse the data (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). This involved an ongoing process of data generation,

analysis, the formation of theories grounded in the data that then shaped the further generation of

data over the three months of either study. It was structured around the three rounds of interviews

but was also continually informed by observation and a growing feel for, and understanding of,

the site and the participants. After the last round of interviews the grounded themes were

connected to the formal theoretical concepts of COP and situated learning.

Results The following section outlines and discusses the two central aspects of being in the club that

made it meaningful for the participants. They are, 1) The social dimensions of being in the club

and, 2) enjoyment of competing due to a focus on personal achievement.

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1) Social dimensions of membership

The following section outlines the social dimensions of three main practices that the swimmers

participated in within their club. They are: 1) training, 2) competing, and, 3) social events.

Training

Despite the time spent actually swimming there were significant spaces for social interaction

before and after training and even between training sets in the pool. Swimmers at the FSC tended

to come earlier and have more time to gather and talk before each session. From time to time they

also engaged in play in the pool after training. At the FSC the Poussins (9-10) and the Benjamins

(11-12) changed for training and gathered in an area at the side of the pool waiting for training to

begin. This provided a good opportunity for interaction between each other and the coach who

would typically spend a few minutes in relaxed conversation before the beginning of training.

They also took advantage of time in the changing rooms to chat before emerging onto the pool

deck. As a 10-year old female at the FSC suggests, there was considerable verbal interaction

before and after training extending to invitations to play at swim mates’ homes:

Yes I have a lot of friends here and we do a lot of talking before training when we are waiting and in the

showers when we talk about everything. We do a lot of swimming but we still do a lot of talking and

sometimes we arrange to visit our friends at their home after training.

At the SSC only a few arrived early before training and many had to rush off immediately after

training but others, the younger girls in particular, took time to shower and get changed together

after training. On occasion they also enjoyed free play in the recreational lanes of the pool.

Despite the intensity of training swimmers at both sites were also able to create valuable social

spaces for interaction and the development of friendship in the gaps between training sets in the

pool at training as a ten-year-old female at the SSC explains:

We get to make friends and talk at training and at meets. We talk to each other at training, like

when we’re waiting for the last ones to finish the set and before (the coach) tells us what to do

next and after and before. And like at meets when we are all waiting for our race to start.

Strong friendships also developed through a sense of shared effort at training, particularly with

the same squad. Indeed, a few swimmers suggested that they had better friends at swimming than

anywhere else:

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We’re all quite close. We’re all really good friends here. It’s a very important part of my life. I

haven’t got many like, extremely good friends at school or wherever outside the swimming

club. Outside the club I haven’t really got any close friends so it’s really important for me.

(Aust. male, 12 yrs)

For approximately a third of the SSC participants their parent(s) merely dropped them off and

picked them up after training with about two thirds of their parents attending as what Kirk and

MacPhail (2003) refer to as ‘spectators’. About 1/4 of the participants could be seen as committed

members (Kirk & MacPhail) as they were also involved in running the club through formal roles

such as being members of the committee, time keepers and recording results at club races and

running the club barbeque. The FSC did not have club races and parental involvement was more

limited than at the SSC with a clear separation of parents from the swim club as a business. While

several Australian parents swam in the public lanes near their children and had the opportunity to

chat with the coaches from time to time the FSC parents were not allowed on pool deck and

restricted to watching training from a viewing platform during training. Parents at both sites sat

on the swimming club committee but the French parents had less involvement with the swimmers

and the coaches during training than the ‘committed’ Australian parents.

Competing

Although the literature suggests that children of this age range should be in a sampling stage until

the age of 13 (see for example, Wall & Coté, 2007) participants at both swimming clubs were

committed to swimming as a sport, were engaged in deliberate practice with increased intensity

and frequency of training and were motivated by competition. The Australian swimmers tended

to be more competitive, placing more importance on success in competition. The club and the

coaches also emphasized success in major meets such as the NSW state championships. Given the

differences in the structure of swimming for 9-12 year olds between the two countries and the

different discourses in regard to competing this is not surprising. In interviews with swimmers

and coaches they placed more emphasis on competition at the SSC than at the FSC. There were

also significantly more participants at the SSC expressing long-term competitive aspirations in

detail than at the FSC.

At the SSC there was a reasonably clear division between what could be called ‘social

swimmers’, who largely limited their racing to club events, and the ‘competitive swimmers’ who

competed regularly outside the club with many of them holding high aspirations for success at

state and national level and for their swimming futures when they get older. Most of the

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participants at the SSC compete all year with those in the lower squads mainly restricting their

racing to the weekly club swims and an occasional interclub meet. Parents drove their children to

the meet and sat in the one place under the club flag. During what can be a long day for parents

they, and their children had ample opportunity for interaction with other swimmers, other parents

and the coaches.

There was less interaction between parents and between parents and children at FSC meets

because there were no club meets and only a few parents attended the interclub meets. Even at the

regional championships, which is the biggest swim meet on the club calendar very few parents

attended. However, the participants at the FSC all said that they enjoyed the social aspects of

competition. For example, in response to being asked whether he preferred training or competing

one boy at the FSC said that, “Maybe (I prefer) competition because at meets I get to meet and

talk with my friends in other clubs so that is a good part of competing” (French male, 10yrs). On

the day of a swim meet the FSC parents would typically drop their children off at the pool for

them to travel on the club minibuses to the meet and pick them up upon from the same place on

their return. While gathered in front of the pool before the departure of the bus and awaiting its

return, there was some interaction between parents but nothing like that between the SSC parents,

and other members of the club community, during meets.

Social events

In Australia designated ‘social events’ are part of every club and are seen by Swimming Australia

to be central to the development and maintenance of healthy clubs. Indeed, the frequency and

quality of social events offered for members by clubs forms a criterion for determining recipients

of the Go Club PB Awards for swimming clubs from Swimming Australia. At the SSC this

included barbeques at club races, a barbeque at a community event at the pool on Australia Day

and games of touch rugby before training. On Friday nights at club races over summer parents

who were members of the club committee operated a barbeque at the outdoor pool with the

express aim of developing the social side of the club. Over the six-week school summer holiday

during which there was training five days a week, the coach of the SSC top squad (the Dolphins)

regularly held training sessions at the beach doing surf swimming. These sessions provided more

time for interaction than during training at the pool and even though the swimmers worked hard

in the surf they had a lighter, fun feel characterized by relaxed and often jovial verbal interaction

between the coach and his swimmers. At other times of the year when the club was not preparing

for an important meet the coach often organized touch rugby games in the park opposite the pool

in the afternoon for 30 minutes before training.

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Social events at the FSC included training camps over the holidays in the mountains and cross-

country skiing on Wednesday afternoons after swimming training. This was possible because in

France there is no school on Wednesdays. Training on Wednesday’s was held in the morning and

on some Wednesdays during winter the swimmers went cross-country skiing with the coaches

and some other staff from the club. The training camps were conducted over four days at a

mountain resort with the swimmers sharing dormitory style rooms and all eating together with the

coaches but no parents attended. The swimmers were driven to the camp and back on the club’s

mini buses. This event formed a highlight of the year for many swimmers and offered increased

opportunities for social interaction and the confirmation of social relations:

I have huge fun at social activities because we have more time to play and talk than at training

and spend a lot of time with each other. Especially at the swim camps we sleep in the same room

and all eat together so it’s a lot of fun. (French female, age 11 yrs).

2) Competition and personal achievement

The SSC placed more importance on results in swim meets that the FSC where the focus of

training up to 12 years of age was more on developing skills and a feel for the water. There was

also a value articulated by coaches, parents and swimmers placed on swimming as a vehicle for

the social development of the swimmers by coaches and parents. This was reflected in the

swimmers’ views on training and competing: “Sport is very important for me for many, many

reasons. It gives me a way to use my energy in a good way, to develop skills and to develop into a

better person.” (French female, 11 yrs). As part of this, attitudes to training as a means to

developing long-term improvement rather than attaining immediate results in competition were

strongly emphasized to me by the coaches. It was also evident in both the regimes of training

used for the 9-12 year old swimmers and in the swimmers’ views on training: “(winning) is good

but it is more important to develop good skills because you need to develop skills so that you can

keep on improving as a swimmer “ (French male, 12 yrs).

Significant differences between the SSC and the FSC in the importance placed upon results in

competition reflected differences in attitudes toward competition in the larger socio-cultural

environment within which the two clubs functioned. According to the coaching staff the FSC was

in one of the less competitive provinces in France for swimming. Only a few swimmers at the

FSC had strong competitive aspirations but most of the swimmers in the Dolphins squad at the

SSC were focused on competing at the highest level they could. The coach of the SSC Dolphins

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squad, David, expected commitment from his swimmers and on a few occasions reprimanded

those he felt were being lazy leading to tears welling in the eyes of a few of the younger girls.

However, when asked whether or not they had ever considered quitting because of the demands

of training the majority said that they had not, adding that they did not think training was too

hard. One 12 year old girl at the SSC was studying in an academically selective high school with

a heavy work load yet left no doubt about the enjoyment she gained from training in response to

being asked if training was too hard and whether or not she had ever considered quitting:

I wake up in the morning at 5.15 and I love it. My parents never push me at all and I love it. I

never think about giving up at all. The main reason I started was because I had asthma and

swimming is good for asthma but now I love it. Sometimes if I have a lot of stuff at school I think

maybe I need to skip a session but I don’t because I love it and if I have to I do another day. It’s

actually really good for getting my mind off problems at school and meeting my friends (at the

pool).

Motivation and achievement in competition

At both sites the notion of a PB (personal best) emerged as a central means through which the

swimmers could achieve success, measure progress, develop self-esteem and maintain enthusiasm

for training and competing. Focusing on the individual’s own personal best time as the prime

objective in swimming provides a valuable means of maintaining motivation through the ways in

which it acts as an explicit marker of progress and allows the swimmer to ‘win’ regardless of

where he/she finish in relation to other swimmers in the race. At both clubs the individual’s PB

was emphasized as the benchmark for the swimmer’s progress as opposed to where he/she

finished in comparison to other swimmers. This cultural value is reflected in the response of a 12

year old male swimmer at the SSC to being asked which was more important to him, winning or

doing a good time? “ I think doing a good time because there will always be someone better than

you. So you’ve just got to concentrate on your own swim”. Focusing on PBs proved to be very

important means through which swimmers at both sites were able to feel a sense of achievement

regardless of how they swam in relation to other people.

Although the ‘competitive swimmers’ were concerned with placing they emphasized PBs and

this was a source of motivation for all the swimmers in this study. At the FSC competition was

seen to provides opportunities for self-evaluation in terms of times, performance against other

swimmers, and a more general sense of having swum well including consideration of technique:

“Yes, it is important to win if you can but bettering your own PB is more important because

nobody can win all the time” (French male, 12yrs).

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Discussion The differences between the two sites highlights the importance of the socio-cultural context

within which research is conducted with it being apparent that there are significant differences in

attitudes toward competition between them. As Blanchard (2000,150) argues in regard to defining

sport, “The subtleties and nuances of sport behaviour in any given cultural setting are difficult to

encompass in any transcultural definition”. However, given these differences the common themes

of, a) the importance of the social dimensions of the clubs and, b) the positive experiences

provided by competition, are compelling. The structure and organization of youth swimming up

to twelve years of age in France emphasizes enjoyment, technique, developing a feel for the water

and participation in other aquatic sports beyond swimming. Tied into this there was a culture at

the FSC that not only played down the importance of results in competition but also, on occasion,

seemed opposed to it. A similar approach is evident in the French education system where the

emphasis in the primary years is on enjoyment of the school experience as reflected in the

absence of formal homework. There is also no relationship between primary schools and

swimming clubs in France. In Australia there is a competitive primary school sport structure in

each state offering competition from the age of eight within which talented swimmers can

progress to national and even international level competition. Swimming in the club system is

geared more toward competition with more importance placed on competition by clubs, coaches

and parents than was evident at the FSC.

Despite these significant differences in the emphasis placed on competition at the local level

and located within the broader state and national structures of swimming, all the participants had

positive attitudes toward, and experiences of, competition. Beyond the social aspects of

competing all participants enjoyed and found significant meaning in competing as one of the

main factors making membership in the club enjoyable and rewarding. Although they might also

be expected to be ‘samplers’ at this age they had begun to specialize. Although they played other

sports they participated in deliberate practice with increased intensity and frequency and were

motivated by competition. Experiences of competing were reasonably homogenous at the FSC as

squads were organized according to age with most competing in the same competitions run over

the season and leading to the provincial championships. On the other hand there were two

identifiable groups of, 1) ‘social’ swimmers who mainly competed in the weekly club races and

one or two interclub meets and 2) ‘competitive’ swimmers who competed at high levels and held

aspirations of competing at elite levels when they were older.

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Despite these variations all swimmers at both sites enjoyed competing and were able to

experience personal achievement due to the emphasis on personal best times (PBs). While PBs

were important as markers of personal achievement for them a few swimmers at the FSC and

more than half of the swimmers at the SSC also focused on success as gauged against others with

this becoming more important to them as their performances improved and their goals became

more ambitious. Regardless of these differences all participants in the study had positive

perceptions of their own swimming ability. Children’s experiences of sport from age eight to

twelve are important for developing competency, positive perceptions of their ability and positive

dispositions toward sport for their continuing participation in it (Kirk, 2005; Lee at al., 1995) and

this study suggests that competition made a positive contribution toward the participants’

motivation to extend their involvement in swimming.

These positive experiences of competition cannot, however, be separated from the social

dimensions of membership in the clubs and particularly when viewed as being COP. Kirk (2009)

identifies three main findings in the youth sport literature that underpin research on participation

as: 1) the influence of the family and its social class, 2) the influence of the local sports club, its

coaches, volunteers and other people making up its community of practice and, 3) the relative size

of the sports community in which young people participate and the facilities on offer. While all

these three factors have relevance for this study the functioning of both swimming clubs as COP

had the most significant influence on the nature of the participants’ experience of membership in

their clubs. Swimming can appear to be a lonely individual sport but when it is practised within

meaningful communities such as the SSC and the FSC it can form a central practice within a

highly social setting full of meaning and important relationships. The social nature of

membership in the two clubs and the ways in which they form COP for the participants gives

meaning to the demanding regimes of training, expectations of success by coaches, peers and

parents, and to achievement in competition. The participants not only formed strong friendships

with club-mates their own age but also formed meaningful relationships with coaches, parents

(other then their own) and with older and younger club-mates. Through participation in the

practices of the clubs over time they not only developed as people, moving into adulthood, but

also as more mature members of the COP of the club. When the 12 year-old swimmers in the FSC

turn 13 they will move up into the competition (competition) squad and more serious competition

as a marker of increasing maturity and movement from a position of legitimate peripheral

participation. Likewise, a few 12 year-old swimmers at the SSC had been asked to move up into a

new, higher-level squad this, again, marking movement toward more mature participation.

15  

Conclusion Children’s early experiences of sport are crucial to encouraging life-long participation (Kirk,

2005) and can form important factors shaping the development and formation of identity

(Connell, 1983; Kirk, 2005; Light, 2008b). They can also contribute toward the realization and

development of talent in sport. The ways in which this study underlines the importance of the

social dimensions of sport for giving it meaning and making it enjoyable for children, and the

importance of personal achievement for their motivation, enjoyment and development of self-

esteem, reminds us that sports clubs can be more than merely places for learning sport skills and

keeping ‘fit’. The examination of experience and meaning within two swimming clubs in

significantly different settings suggests that they are more than merely places to learn to swim

faster. The can also can come to form separate ‘worlds’ of meaning and relationships for children

and young people (Light, 2008a). This complexity of children’s participation in sport and the

central place that it can assume in their lives lends supports to calls for more research to be

conducted on this aspect of youth sport and physical education. Further case studies on the nature

of children’s and youth experience in sport would add considerably to our understanding of the

meaning that it holds in their lives and how we might encourage their participation in it. It would

also add to our understanding of the contribution to learning that extended periods of participation

in sport and other organized physical activity make to learning as an ongoing social process.

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