AIBU to withdraw DD from swimming?

[NotGoingSoSwimmingly]

DD5 has been going to swimming lessons for almost a year.

At first she made great progress and has gone from not getting in the water unless attached to an adult to jumping in, swimming about without a float and diving to the bottom to pick things up.

However, every time she goes on her back, her head sinks and she stands up. Because of this, she's been at 98% of stage one for 3 months. All her friends she started with have moved onto stage 2.

I'm thinking as she's made no official progress in 3 months I should take her out and just go swimming with her as often as possible? She enjoys the lessons but it's just as happy to go with us, and paying for lessons is so expensive.

I don't believe it is a life skill. We're land mammals. Why are people going around falling into water? It's quite easy to just not bounce around like a clown next to bodies of water. The only people I've known that have fallen into water have been so drunk that they haven't been competent swimmers anyway. I've never even been close to falling into water- the only time I've ever been in water is because I've chosen to get in.

If I fell off a boat, despite going through all the swimming stages, I would definitely drown. There's no way I could swim several miles to shore in the sea. Not even close.

I do think it's a fun and useful thing to be able to do.

However, she's 5 and I don't think taking a break from lessons and just going and having fun in the pool instead means that she's doomed to a lifetime as a non-swimmer.

But what if she were to get blind drunk in the future and fall in a body of water? She may just have the muscle memory to save her life. Or what if she decides to go into the sea one day for a paddle and gets taken far out by a rip tide? Again those skills could just save her life.

You have come on to ask for opinions as to whether you should pull your child from swimming lessons but get refuse to accept the overwhelming response that it is important that she continues to swim and learns a valuable skill

I’d take her out for a bit or find a new teacher. One of my DC didn’t start lessons until 7 due to not listening when younger, then COVID. They now regularly swim at regional level.
Swimming is a great skill to have so I wouldn’t rule it out.

DS was in Stage 1 for a year! It drove me mad, he was then in Stage 2 for only 2wks! Then after a few months in Stage 3 I moved him Swimming Schools into 1-1 lessons and he was through to Stage 5 in no time. Stopping lessons was never an option, just about the worst thing you could do and a huge waste of all the time and money already put in.
Due to this experience I put DD straight into 1-1 lessons and now at age 4 she's already half way through Stage 3.

Change instructor!

Hopefully you will get something useful from the session on Friday.

Dd took ages at the end of either ducklings or level 1. On a similar percentage for a similar length of time. I could see others that started later moving up first I asked if I could speak to the instructor. She explained the issue. She had aldo spoken to other instructors too - dd was doing everything correctly but it wasn't working.

I made a suggestion to the way in which the float was being held. I am a very weak swimmer but we were told to hold it differently when I had lessons as a child.

That helped but the problem was still there. All of a sudden one week it worked and she passed the level. She didn't fly through levels, but made sure and steady progress.

Carried on swimming much longer than others did, even joining a club and competing for a while. Stopped when it became too many sessions per week.

Sounds as if your daughter has made great progress from when she started. If after your meeting you feel it is best to give lessons a break, and go at weekends then do that. She is still little, and can go back to lessons when she is ready. If she is still in the water, it may happen more naturally.

Worth checking when you meet them what would happen if she took a break and went back. Would they keep the record of what she has achieved so far, so she only needed to pass that skill, or would she have to start ftom scratch.

From 13 years of DC weekly swimming lessons, both who struggled at different times, I learned you have to address issues directly with the school. Keep on them & don't let them brush you off. It's their job to get your child up to standard.

Swimming is definitely a life skill where I am. Drownings have increased due to COL making lessons too expensive & a lot of immigrants who can't swim. It's sad.

Drowning is the leading cause of death for children age 1-4 worldwide. It is a leading cause of death for children full stop. Parents are usually very focused on propulsion when actually floating is absolutely more important. Treading water isn’t taught until stage 5 or 6 because treading water is the “drowning position” People do fall into water or indeed go swimming and find themselves in trouble for a whole host of reasons.

Im surprised the number of people whose children have stayed in stage 1 for so long. I’m a swimming teacher and swim England recommended 3 badges per year ( although this includes distance badges as well). I absolutely hate the badge system. I appreciate it gives parents something to see where their children are making progress but I think it can mean parents focus on the wrong things particularly at the early stages. Learning to float and also orientation in the water is much more important than propulsion.

If you don’t want to continue with the lessons I actually don’t think it’s a huge deal to stop as long as you 100% take her swimming every week. You could also try a different instructor or swim school. Learning isn’t always linear and although they may seem to be doing the same things every week, she will be making progress in other ways that may be less obvious to you. If she’s stuck on one thing, I would recommend 1-2-1s focusing on that one thing in the short term in addition to the lessons.

MN is sometimes too pro swimming lessons even when they're clearly not working. Stage 1 is really not hard - anything over 6 months and I think you need a new teacher. We've had some brilliant teachers and some incredibly poor ones - as a primary teacher, if children made as little progress in lessons I taught as I've seen in some swim lessons I'd be judged as inadequate. Being stuck in Stage 1 is not going to help build many of the skills for Stage 2 if half the lesson is spent on the absolute basics of moving (walking) across the pool, having water on the face etc. and child confidently mastered those weeks or months ago. Swimming lessons aren't cheap and it's a waste of time and money to continue going if no progress is being made. I don't think the answer is to stop lessons altogether but I do think it's time to find somewhere new.

Thank you, this is exactly how I feel and I did do swimming teaching training as part of my NQT year many years ago so I have some understanding.

We're taking her to be assessed by the Aquatics Manager on Friday and then will see where we go from there.

She can float on her back. It's when she's moving that she has the problem. She can do the first few metres ok but she has to do 5m to pass.

I actually agree with @Jappled about MN being super pro swimming lessons. Some children respond better to them than others and some swimming teachers are better than others others and even swim schools.

I have two children. One who is 8.5. I started swimming lessons with him when he was 3. He’s been in and out of them since then. He probably would have been further through the stages had I consistently kept him in, but he made the most progress when we consistently took him swimming for fun for a year between ages 7-8. He’s back in lessons now to learn/improve his strokes now. I didn’t qualify as a swimming teacher until he was 6, but he won’t take any instructions from me anyway.

I suspect the swim manager will pass them on to stage 2. You don’t say whether they are using flotation or not but for stage 1 it’s moving forwards/backwards/sideways with flotation to pass. As a teacher you may want to keep them a bit longer in stage 1 if they can do this straight away as you need to be able to swim unaided by the end of stage 2. By the start of stage 3, I would expect a child a child to swim 10 meters unaided even if that’s not the criteria as they need to be relatively safe in water at this point as there will be a group of children all swimming without flotation.

Dd had a similar issue at about level 2. Friends came amd got promoted out and ahead. Then she finally nailed it and whizzed through the levels, rapidly overtaking the friends again. She now doesnt do lessons anymore and is a very competent swimmer.
We did spend a lot of time in the pool though- usually at least an extra 30 minutes before/after the lesson and then another session on the weekend.

Update- The manager watched her swim for a bit, asked her to do a few things and then said she could move to Stage 2. @calishire she hasn't used flotation for a while now, they have certain exercises they use them for but she can swim without. She is small for her age and has a big head which I think puts her at a disadvantage, her friend passed Stage 1 very quickly but she's almost twice the height of DD so it's a lot fewer strokes for her to get to 5m.

Hopefully now she can start learning new things along with improving her backstroke. As I said further up, she can float on her back and she can swim a short distance, it's just after a few strokes she struggles to keep her head up.

@NewCushions it would be nice to do that but unfortunately it's back-to-back lessons all day and even in the holidays that pool is often fully booked and we have to drive to the next town. We'd have to take her on a Sunday which takes out both weekend days.