While constructivist theories of learning have been widely drawn on to understand and explain learning in games when using game-based approaches their use to inform pedagogy beyond games is limited. In particular, there has been little interest in applying constructivist perspectives on learning to sports in which technique is of prime importance. This article contributes to redressing this oversight in the sport pedagogy literature by drawing on complex learning theory to propose a learner-centred, inquiry-based approach to coaching swimming grounded in two specific examples of "theory in action."