Teach Your Toddler To Swim

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L E A R N  Y O U R  T O D D L E R  T O  S W I M

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When we were on holiday we stayed in my partners parents house which had a swimming pool outside so we took the chance and taught Elliw to swim! I am so glad we taught her to have confidence in the pool even though it did take a while so we were quite lucky that we were on holiday for 3 weeks. Sometime we would just have to grab her and let her scream and cry but in the end she would calm down and she was full of smiles and laughter which we were really pleased! Me and my partner love Swimming and were in the pool every single day for the whole 3 weeks. In the last week Elliw was confident to be by herself with no one holding her and she would kick her legs to move/swim at us.

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T I P S  &  A D V I C E

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1. CHOOSE THE RIGHT SWIMWEAR.
Elliw wouldn't wear a swimming costume for us so she ended up going in the pool with her clothes on or just her underwear but it was warm enough so we didn't mind. She wore her armbands and her floating life jacket as you can see in the photos. Sometimes she would even want a rubber ring around her too! You need to find something that they feel comfortable and confident in.

2. WATER TEMPERATURE
Make sure the water is just the right temperature for them. You don't want them to just jump into a freezing cold pool. Sometimes if they go into a freezing cold pool they will want to get out straight away and may not even come back in again.

3. MAKE IT FUN
This is a big must! When we first started taking Elliw into the pool we made sure we would do funny things such as splashing water on my partner, chasing after him and even chucking toys and trying to get them in time before they sank! The best thing she liked was splashing my partner (or me, if my partner was holding her).

4. CONFIDENCE
The main thing you want in the water is confidence. If you show that your confident in the water then the child has a better chance of being confident too. Don't try and scare them and don't try and do anything that will take their confidence away. Take each step slowly there is no rush in learning them to swim.

5. SWIMMING POOL TOYS.
Don't make the pool boring! Let them chuck toys, get some rubber rings and floating boards. Elliw loved sitting in a floating ring and chucking her toys and then trying to grab them before they sank.