Swimming Ideas Podast

How should you protect yourself and others when you're teaching swimming lessons to individuals or duos?

Today we're listening to a user submitted question and answering it after a brief unrecorded phone call. 

Rowenna and I spoke on the phone and we reviewed much of the same things. Her favorite games are Treasure hunt and diving games with multicolored toys labeled with numbers. I'm a huge fan of Treasure hunt too, and you can see a list of relevant swim games and challenges here: 

https://www.swimminglessonsideas.com/games/

Things to consider:

Remain distant if you can. 

Teach from the deck or the water remaining far enough away that you're not going to get any droplets on your face or nose. Have the parent interact physically with the swimmer. Use a dummy, or doll, or practice CPR device to demonstrate how to do your supported front and back floats/glides. 

Teach both the swimmer and the parent how to do your typical routines. You'll be like a music teacher talking and guiding but not moving the swimmer's fingers for them.

If you can't remain distant, wear a face shield. You can wear one like this: https://amzn.to/2VuIK9U

It'll stay fog free, will bead water off the outside and redirect your breath droplets down and shield you from participant's spray. Stay distant when possible and do your best to realign your swim lessons to encourage more independent movement. 

This works best in shallow pools with lots of space where the swimmers can move in chest or shoulder deep water. Have them do glides and repetitive skills like streamline and kicking from two points back and forth. Intersperse your 6 x [something] activities with challenges. You can find a list here: https://www.swimminglessonsideas.com/challenges/

If you're teaching at a deeper pool see if you can use platforms or benches for younger swimmers to stand on. For more info take the Teaching Swimming online course: https://www.swimminglessonsideas.com/topic/rotation-method/

This is the most essential product you can buy. I'm talking about sun tan lotion. Sun block. We use this gallon jug. You can use this too. I suggest making it mandatory for all swim instructors to wear the lotion before they start their first lesson. When they're done teaching each class, they should get out of the pool, talk to parents, dry off, and lube up with sun tan lotion again. This is the number one best thing you can do (aside from not going outside) to protect your exposed skin from the damaging effects of the sun. Put your sun tan lotion on often. Recommended reapply rate is once every hour if you're in the water. To creatively make sure your staff is wearing sunscreen, bake it into your routines and culture. Put the sunscreen on together before your first lesson after your daily meeting / debrief. Offer 45 minute swim lessons starting on the hour. After each class have a 15 minute break, and at the :55 get together for a group sun screen circle making sure to get everyone else's shoulders and back. Use the pump lotion or the spray-on. Make sure you're dry so it stays connected to the skin.

You can check these out, https://amzn.to/2udnhnp, but I recommend going to swim outlet for something more like these: https://www.swimoutlet.com/p/dolfin-lifeguard-mens-long-sleeve-rashguard-8174189/?color=50448 Wear them to cover more skin, but still provide mobility and comfort. They are effective because the fabric will block the skin. Make these optional for your staff and cover the cost if they're used. i don't have a good recommendation to get teenagers to wear these, but if you do please comment! Maybe an end of the year bonus if you buy one and use it daily?

wow. We had these type of hats available to us when I taught swim lessons, but very few people wore them. They looked weird, and only the most confident, most bold were willing to wear them. https://amzn.to/2J5dQvw At the time that was not me. You can wear these hats to protect your face and head from the damaging effects of the sun while you're teaching swimming lessons. Pair this with good sunglasses and you have total protection for your eyes and head.

The worst time to be under the sun uncovered is between 10-4pm. The absolute worst between 11-2pm. Change your swim lessons to be earlier in the morning done at 11, and later in the evening starting at 4pm. That way your staff misses out on the worst of the sun. Your swimmers, often children, will benefit too from the decreased intensity of the sun. it might be a little colder, it might be a little more cloudy or uncomfortable, but you'll be protected and you'll be doing right by your teenage staff that, like me, will resist wearing sun screen.  

Brief guide on Autism from American Red Cross Swimming Water Saftey book

No. Most parents don't care what your swim program system is. They care about three things:

1) Will their child learn how to swim?

2) Does it fit into their schedule?

3) Is it within their budget?

They're more worried about making the most out of their time and effort to bring their kid to swim lessons. They want progress, they want success, but they don't really care how you order your level structure. It isn't important to them. 

That isn't to say you shouldn't have a structure or a plan, but you don't need to drop thousands of dollars licensing a swim program to be successful. 

Dr. Alan Goldberg,  www.competitivedge.com

Getting parents to work with, not against you.

Blog post about day 1 handout.

http://swimminglessonsideas.com/2017/09/17/handout-for-first-day-of-swim-lessons-for-parents-what-to-expect/

Day 2 handouts:

https://s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/completelessondocuments/Administration/Day+2+Handouts+(1).pdf

Be proactive. How to teach your parents on your swim team. Learn how to interact with your swim lesson parents in a healthy way.

Be proactive, take the first step, and be bold with giving information.

Recap from Dr. Alan Goldberg and Josh Davis. 

Ok. The first thing is to get in the water.

The second thing to do is to touch the bottom with your hand.

Easy? Easy peezy?

Now we're going to swim front crawl or freestyle with side breathing from here to there. (one length).

Well done. Can you touch the bottom, here?

Where did you learn how to swim?

Ok. Now we're going to do back stroke all the way back. When you get to the other end I'll go like this it means stop. Ready? Okay go.

Well done. Do you know how to do breaststroke kick? (demo) ok. Do whatever you know to me (1/3 of the way) stop when you get to me.

Ok. Turn around, now we're going to do butterfly kick. Stand with your hands at your side, and put your face in the water and wiggle like a dolphin.

Well done, hop out, lets get out of the water, we're all done. You did very well. Let's go talk to your parents.

i'll be interviewing a person about how to teach swimming lessons to autistic kids. She is an expert in adaptive physical education for special needs children and will be an excellent resource. 

I'm hoping to connect with Nitro tash to get her take on her new swim lesson format with her pool in Perth, Australia.

Look for updates to swimminglessonsideas.com and a new resource to take beginners from no program to a thriving successful one including. I understand that a lot of the material assumes an intimate knowledge of swimming lessons that not everyone has. I hope to address this in the future.

Routine works. It does. i struggled with giving my swimmers too much freedom in their swim practices and it lead to chaos. now, falling back on the tested and true routine and structure we've had massive success and improvement. 

Think of your routine as your framework. It is the brick wall of your instruction. The format (each brick in its place) is the same, but the choice of bricks change. Like a wall, not all bricks are identical and you can sprinkle your flavor of skill, drill, and activity to match the pace and goal for the cycle, but throughout your following the same structure and framework so your pieces all align. 

Correct your teachers that aren't performing like they should!

Give initial feedback.

Restrain anger and disappointment.

Immediate debrief and followup.

Frame things in the future. next time do this.

Retrain.

Deal with it in private.