AIBU but what exactly is the point of waterbabies?

[cheekypickle]

Surely you could just do the same when you take them to a pool yourself?

I do go to waterbabies

I do take her swimming by myself

I can't see how waterbabies is helping really, can anyone enlighten me?

Because lots of people aren't confident in the water?

And - you could make the same point about singing groups, soft play etc etc...

It helps the people who run the classes to pay their mortgages? Otherwise you are of course completely right unless you want ot meet other mothers. Same goes for monkey music, tumbletots, gymbabes etc etc.

Now my children are older I look at the money I threw away on this stuff and just can't believe I fell for it all!

You're right, it is only what you could do yourself.

I did it with my eldest and have just started with my youngest. I like the fact it's just the class in the pool in case something went wrong, plus I'd have no idea what to do if anything did. I'd like to think the teachers are better trained for emergencies with babies rather than the average lifeguard. Maybe they're not, I don't know.

I'm also lazy so if I'd not forked out a fortune in advance I'd probably never end up going.

We did aquanauts, and although I can (and do) take DS swimming myself, it gave me a lot of confidence in how to hold him in the water, and gave me idea of what to do when we were at the pool. Also taught me how to safely dunk him and get us both in and out of the pool.

Plus I payed a fortune for the classes so it made me get out of the house and go to them once a week. That was good for us both in the early days!

It gave me confidence to handle DD in the water, however at £13 a lesson and tying yourself in to a 10 week term it is expensive.

I did 2 terms and have learnt the skills which mean I now can teach DD on my own. We go swimming once every couple of weeks for half of the price and on our own time/terms etc (i.e longer than 30 minutes).

Having read that thread, dare I mention I do like that Waterbabies (not waterbabes ) focus on safety in the pool, teaching 'commands' to babies (I hate that word) like "hold on".