Swim Lessons - April 2012

I am still a little shocked by just how well swim lessons went for Ethan. Of course, it has been a year and a half since we first attempted them!! If you'll recall from this post and this one from October 2010, our very first attempt at swim lessons did NOT go well at all. To the point that I put off attempting it again for months and months and then every time I tried to enroll him after that it seemed like I kept missing the deadline for the next set of classes. Finally, the day we were set to leave for California and while I should have been busy packing, I got online as registered Ethan for swim lessons [and was finally able to use the $50+ credit we'd had sitting on our Vancouver Parks & Rec account] for April. We changed it up a bit and I signed him up for lessons at a different pool. I knew he was more ready, but I was still hesitant. Of course, day of the first lesson I leave early since I have to stop and get gas plus I'm not sure where the pool is, only to miss the turn because the turning lane is backed way up so I had to go a round-about way to get there. He was 10 minutes late to his 30 minute lessons. Argh!! But we made it on-time or early to EVERY lesson after that!

This class was labeled "pre-beginners" and was mainly for the kids to get comfortable being in the water, putting their faces in the water and beginning to float on their back, etc. Ethan was, by far, one of the "bravest" in the class. He's good about putting his face in the water and would do whatever the teacher asked without much or any hesitation. He was also one of the older kids in the class, but he needed to start somewhere. Here's a little look week-by-week of his lessons... {Side note about the pictures and videos: parents watch the lesson from the 2nd level, through glass windows, so that's why the pictures are not the greatest and the sound doesn't match what's going on in the pool in the videos!}

The first week really was all about just getting the kids comfortable being in the water and not clinging to mom or dad. Lesson 2 they started to work on back floats a little.

When the pool noodles came out half-way through the fourth lesson Ethan was in heaven!! By far one of his favorite parts since it let him be independent. I admit, my heart kinda stopped when I saw one teacher for 5 kids with only a pool noodle keeping them afloat where none of them could touch! But they all did just fine.

By week 3 Ethan had already shown a lot of improvement with his back float and could *almost* do it with no assistance. The teacher just barely had his hand on Ethan's back but as soon as he took it off, Ethan would panic and his bum would sink down! He was also doing better with his kicking/gliding. This video is from week 3.

Just when Ethan was starting to get a little bored with swim lessons and was ready for Preschool to start up, they did boat/water safety for one of the classes and the kids got to wear life vests and ride in the foam boat. Ethan and the other girl in the boat were the braver kids in the class so for them they actually tipped the boat after they had talked about what to do if you fall out of a boat. On the last day Ethan accomplished a back float with NO HELP!! The kids also got use the noodles again and played a little game of catch with the ball. Ethan liked that, too.

So, Ethan passed the Salamander pre-beginner class and is moving on up to Turtle pre-level 1!! We're hoping to do June lessons once preschool gets out.