Learning to swim... how long?

[babycrazy1706]

My son is 4 and started swimming lessons in September. Goes every Friday for half an hour.
I just wondered how long on average it takes for kids to learn how to swim as it doesn't seem like he's learnt anything yet. I sound really impatient lol
Just wondering how long it usually takes xx

 

[Quartz]

What do you mean by learning to swim, swimming with floats, swimming a width, Swimming a length or being able to swim each stroke correctly?

 

[babycrazy1706]

I mean learning to hold himself afloat by himself. They don't use any kind of floats just holding them in the pool xx

 

[ClairAye]

Following, my son has his second lesson tomorrow, they only run in 5 week blocks so I wonder how much I will need to pay out....

 

[Zephram]

Learning to float will really vary depending on the kid's level of interest, natural ability, teaching methods, etc.

My four year old has been going to swimming lessons since he was 10 months and he can swim a few metres by himself on his front and on his back. He loves floating and dolphin diving and he's also learning to do tumble turns. He doesn't need any floating devices.

With floating the best way to learn is to put them in water they can stand up in and start by jumping, etc, to get a feel for it.

 

[cupcake.]

I'm a lifeguard and used to give swimming lessons to children. I think the courses were going on for 12 weeks (maybe 10 though) and it was twice a week, for an hour each. Most kids only needed one course, some had to take it twice if maybe they took longer to get comfortable in the water, some are really scared at first.

But, the children we taught were usually around the age of 5/6. So for one I think 4 is quite young to learn to swim (actual breast and backstroke is what we taught and when we were done children were able to do both for at least 25 meters without a break). But not impossible at 4!
But the second thing is, once a week for half an hour is I think not often and not long enough. They have to practice the moves and for every practice, we had to kind of start over comparing to last lesson. Obviously not completely but they do forget a little bit from one lesson to the next and moving in water is so different from their usual movements, they kind of need a bit to get used to it again during the lesson, especially since usually they can't practice in between lessons. So i think it's not surprising that with the lessons spaced so far apart and being only 30mins long he hasn't learned too much yet. Definitely does not mean your son isn't talented or won't ever learn to swim!

Is there any other swimming lessons? Or, you could go for another time during the week and practice with hin yourself? (It's best to not use too many helpers, most effective is holding the child with one hand on their chest and practice their arm and leg strokes, while moving so the child knows what it feels like to move with the strokes and gets the feeling he's moving not because you are but because of him doing the strokes. The stronger the child becomes and the more secure it feels during practice you can start holding it less and less until you barely touch the chest anymore and eventually the child can go longer and longer without any assistance.)

I hope all of that made sense, i'm not a native speaker and that was kind of hard to explain But ultimately, once a week for half an hour is not enough, especially since 4 years is quite young, in my experience at least.

 

[babycrazy1706]

I agree that half an hour once a week seems almost pointless but that's how it works here. Guess it's going to be a while! Xx

 

[lau86]

They progress very quickly if you can take them yourself. Time in the water is key. But yeah my oldest is 5.5 and can only just swim 5m unaided, he has been having lessons on and off since 3.5.

ETA at our pool I see some little ones, 3ish, who can swim unaided but they are usually only children with parents who can really devote a lot of 1 on 1 time!

 

[Eleanor ace]

My DD1 has been having lessons since she turned 3 and it took until she was about 3.5 to swim without arm bands/woggle I think. She'll be 4 in April and she can now do backstroke, front crawl and breaststroke legs with doggy paddle arms or a float out in front (so just using her legs to swim) and is starting to get front crawl arms but its taking her a while to get the hand of legs, arms and breathing together right.

 

[Quartz]

I think as well there is a difference between being able to get across the pool and proper swimming. Swimming lessons focus a lot on proper technique and a lot of that comes hand in hand in the early stages with using floats (arm placement etc). DD is 8 and in Stage 5 and when she completes that later this year she has been signed off as being able to swim all 4 strokes technically well for 25m at a time. She has been able to swim a 5m width though since she was 4

DS has just figured out how to swim without floats but his technique is awful

 

[k4th]

Dd has gone to swimming lessons since she was 3.5. She's now 6 and in stage 5 swimming which includes jumping in the deep end, swimming a full length on front & back unaided in "proper" strokes. I still wouldn't consider her able to swim properly because she needs someone with her and in a busy pool doesn't watch around her & could easily go under. She got her 5m badge after about 6 months of swimming.

She definitely progresses faster in the summer when I take her for extra fun sessions at the pool and we go on holiday.

She progresses less quickly in the winter when it's too cold for me to want to go!!

 

[babyrough]

My son is 4 and started swimming lessons in October last year. He has half an hour once a week and has come on SO fast I'm so impressed. Before he couldn't swim unaided and needed floats and hated going underwater- albeit he had always been confident in the pool.
Since started lessons he can now jump in the deep end unaided and swim a legnth on his front or back unaided. But every kid is different and I guess it also depends how confident they are in the water to start with.
I don't take him swimming any other time, however his swimming class is 1 teacher per 2 kids so I think this really helps.

 

[sequeena]

Following. I'm going to put Thomas in swimming lessons around April time. I think it might take him a bit longer due to his issues but we went swimming yesterday and he was so confident putting his head under the water and he kept wanting to go off by himself

 

[Dory85]

My daughter started lessons a month after she turned 3. She was bottom of the class for AGES and then about 10 months later she became really confident and went from nothing to swimming really quickly. The only thing that stops her doing a length is because she hasn't figured out how to breathe in whilst still swimming.

 

[DCS]

Ds was 3 when he started. Within the first 10 week block he was floating. By about 15 weeks he was swimming 8.5 meters, he probably could have managed 10 if the pool was wider. By about 30 weeks ( minus a few lessona he was off for because he was sick) he was swimming 10m on his front and 10 on his back. The last 10 sessions we did were one to one sessions. We had to stop after that because he was sick almost every week and we kepr missing lessons.