Swimming lessons - gazing into the abyss

[Carrotsurprise]

My god, how many years does this go on for? My DD started swimming lessons at the start of year 1 now she'll probably be moving up to stage 3 at the end of term. It runs for 50!!!!! weeks of the year. Every bloody Monday evening all year bloody round. And I'm on maternity leave! When I go back to work we'll have the juggling a toddler making sure one person gets home for him and the other goes to swimming. Then one day it'll be time for him to start lessons. Every Monday evening except Christmas, for like ten years? Right? Are swimming lessons really non-negotiable??

For me it is non-negotiable and totally worth it. But I have been through all the moaning, including by myself, and sympathise!

I would say non-negotiable on safety grounds, but totally get that having such regular lessons must be a total PITA logistically.

I did laugh reading this! We paid a fortune for two blocks of lessons and then they’ve been swimming with school for the last 10 weeks and one of mine is still wearing arm bands! The other is doing okay but definitely not competent. When I was younger we just learnt by going with our parents but now it seems like it takes an age!

I've found the trick is to find one that has a cafe that does decent coffee. Now my DC are both old enough to be in the lessons, it is something I take a book and look forward to.

I have today given notice on swimming. We were doing 1:1 lessons with the loveliest teacher, but the getting DD (7) there and back, and DH getting home to deal with the other two, and the logistics... she has been in lessons for around 4 years really. Since birth other than gaps for covid and illness. I need at least a break before I lose it / have to start lessons with her siblings. I feel like, and the teacher believes, that she can swim-to-not-drown at this point.

Mine never had swimming lessons.. l took them myself.. both confident swimmers age 5.. swimming under water.. same with Grandkids.. just like my mum took me and my siblings.. family swimming is amazing and we all still go at least once a week.. Best thing you can do for your kids.
Mine started at 6 weeks old.

Yes it seems endless! At our pool children can swim without an adult from age 10, and sorry to say but in my experience of two DC so far they were ready and strong enough to pass their competency to swim test not long before that at age 9. Mine are very small for their age though, maybe some are ready to stop lessons at 7 or 8.

I taught my kids to swim, using the approach my own mum followed with her four.

Stand a little way away from the side. Get her to launch herself at you and catch her. Move a little further away once she's confident doing that. Then a little further. Eventually, she will be swimming a few strokes (in a doggy paddle way) as well as simply pushing off. Keep going until she's doing more than four or five strokes reliably week on week. Then offer her her heart's desire if she can swim a width, with you walking backwards in front of her. She will.

Ha. My 9 year old swims 5 times a week sometimes for 90 mins and I have to juggle a younger siblings lesson on a different day because of course it’s one or the other that has the whole pool so you have it easy!

Ah another Mumsnet "essential life skill" or "mandatory", so that middle class parents can feel justified with all their efforts that they spend hours telling everyone about.

Look, I didn't learn how to swim properly until I was in my 20s when I paid for th lessons. I survived until then, they taught me what they could.

I don't think I 'failed to launch' though. I'm married, I make well above average, I own my own house, I've lived in three different countries thanks to my career.

Were my parents completely negligent because they didn't extensively rear face, they didn't give me 50 weeks of swimming lessons, they didn't even give me driving lessons when I was 17 because they were too poor?

This country is batshit about stuff like this.

Always done lessons with DS, water babies at first which we did on a weekday. I was working but would have one day at home with him. This was a nice bonding time I felt.

DS is now 5 in stage 3 and has lessons on a Sunday. It’s an absolute non negotiable for me. But he does enjoy it also. I wouldn’t even contemplate an evening lesson though! I think DS would be too grumpy and tired after school.

Well yes they are non negotiable because otherwise it’s a safety issue and also just all round shit if they can’t swim when older. There was a post on here recently where the OP couldn’t let her teen go on the school residential because it had loads of water activities and she’d never sorted lessons for him. You don’t want that to be you in 10 years.

We moved DD to a Saturday morning slot when DS was very little so one could take her and the other stay home with the baby. Far easier than juggling 2 on your own or rushing from work. The only work around I think is to go for a school that does weekly lessons from reception but IME very few non privates do.

We changed to 1:1 for dc 3 and 4. More expensive but progressed much quicker and more flexible

Non negotiable here too but I completely feel your pain…

I once chatted to a mum of four who was sat on the floor opposite the lockers, waiting for her children to get changed - she said she had been coming every week for ten years!

It's vital for safety.

I started mine very young and they were decent swimmers fairly quickly but they were in the water most days.

It goes on for what feels like forever and then you get one who wants to carry on to rookie lifeguards so you get an even longer weekly lesson in the boiling hot pool viewing area. Ours doesn’t even have seats.

One of the most irritating but important parts of parenting!
I would say not strictly necessary, I didn’t have lessons as a kid with the exception of the ones with school for one term or whatever it was. If most of us (I swim well now) fall into fast flowing water or get caught in an invisible rip tide we would struggle or likely drown but I did think it was important enough to send all 3 of mine. It was hell. But it’s better for them to have general water safety skills and the ability to swim lengths in a variety of strokes.
Anyway, you have my every sympathy op!!

None of the things in your post are relevant!

Swimming is a survival skill not a life skill.

Depends on what you all want out of it I guess. I want DC to learn to swim but they'll be stopping when they finish stage 3 because I can take over from there. Our recent holiday showed they're capable of basic techniques, can swim short distances and can float, so if they were to fall into water, they should be ok. The lessons are ridiculous as they drag it on and on and on. DC has been taking lessons for almost a year and it's only after this holiday that they've got the hang of swimming (we spent a week in the pool lol). I'm happy to take them swimming a few times a month and muck around with them and they'll learn the rest eventually.

My DC loves water but hates the lessons so that's my reasoning. That and the money. I just can't get over how long this thing takes. When I was little my mum sent me to the local lake for a swimming school for a couple of hours a day for a week or two in the summer, and that was it. Loved swimming ever since and didn't need further lessons. It feels like these lessons are deliberately drawn out to get the monthly fees coming in, but I guess there are pros if you child likes it. And it does keep them active and off screens for a bit. 😄

I agree with this about them being drawn out. They have the little tick list and they cannot pass until everything is marked off. But some of the things are daft ino, one of my dc was never able to master a handstand underwater and so was never able to pass the swimming stage even though he could do every single other thing. I’m not sure why a handstand is so vital a skill, either for water safety or swimming technique!

Mine started when they were 6 mos old in baby lessons and that's been my life every Sat for a decade!

It has definitely been painful at times.

However, DD1 who is not naturally sporty, can swim a range of strokes strongly and confidently and is now saying when she is older, she might like to qualify as a lifeguard. When they do swimming at school, she's put in the advanced group.

I'll get all mine to the end of Stage 7 and do the RNLI or equivalent sea safety course with them. Then, I'm done!!

Yep, probably 10 years here, but I feel like my kids could swim away from a sinking ferry and stay afloat for hours.
it can’t hurt (them) but it’s boring and time consuming and expensive for you.

I was very affected by the zeebrugge and Seewol ferry disasters.

I too have been dragging my DC to lessons with disappointing levels of progress. Mine don’t seem particularly motivated to improve, we’re just going through the motions. I’m not sure what is a reasonable expectation of children’s swimming these days. When I was their age I was doing probably at least 800m at each school
lesson. I’m not bothered about them doing lots of lengths, but would like them to not drown obviously and participate in school things (which they’re also happy to get out of doing). Swimming was a big part of my life as a child but it now just seems like a big hassle.

We did one to one lesson and also took them swimming once a week
All became competent swimmers fairly quickly

Your response is batshit. I’m not middle class, I’m working class and grew up in an area where too many children drowned in flooded quarries and rivers.

So, yes, a safety issue where I am from. A big one as it happens. My next door neighbours two children drowned when one went to rescue another.

But carry on with your high horse judgement about stuff you clearly know nothing about. Learning to swim was a massive thing in our valley after one too many tragedies - I never said a word about how, when or where people learn to swim, only that where I am from it was considered a vital life skill. Because it is.

So take your chip on your shoulder elsewhere please, your response was a massive overreaction - you weren’t being judged but you clearly have no problem judging others - and you clearly have no clue how other people live either by the sounds of it. Plus you don’t know whether or not I have had swimming lessons do you? Or how I leaned to swim? No you just assumed.

Also who cares about all of your bragging about everything you ‘have’ - totally irrelevant to the case in point. You just seem to be ridiculously oversensitive about a perceived criticism that no one made about you. Batshit indeed.