Well, yeah. But they could also skip the books; the practice will be much more useful.

You can’t watch your form in a mirror, in a pool. Well, Elon and Bezos probably can, but most normal people can’t. So you can’t tell how you’re doing, if you’re trying to actually swim well. Having an instructor, or even a friend who knows a little about swimming would even be better than any amount of book reading.

I’m all for book learning, but I doubt many people learned to ride a bicycle by reading a how-to first.

If they’re going to spend time trying to learn to swim, that time is better spent in a pool, than reading about it.