Swim Squad Alternatives for Children?

Its always amazed me how little effort pools go to to keep their learn to swim swimmers. They dont engage well with swim clubs and dont seem to have programs targeted to continuing swimmers who just want some semi-organised fun as they improve. You’d think getting an income stream for years to come would motivate a bit of thought about their needs.

I dont know of much available other than swim squads. Even non-competitive squads tend to be mainly focused on stroke correction and fitness. Some kids really do like swimming squads and find these good to do. My daughter loved this and she is really into competitive swimming, but that’s not everyone. However, we didnt make that choice for her, she learnt to swim and just kept going, training for a while before deciding to compete. She’s swam with a lot of kids that had other things as their primary interests and all seemed to enjoy the group swimming.

Nobody is going to know what all pools do. Given how spread out the pools are in Canberra might be worth phoning the close ones and asking them what they have for your needs.

Try calling the royal life saving society and see if they can help you.

I would recommend their holiday programs. They include a mix of swimming skill and swim and survive skills which are fun and a great thing to learn. She could also look in to getting her bronze star life saving badge and later her bronze medallion.

Another option might be water polo which is great exercise.

“Playing in a pool with friends is great fun but it’s doesn’t stop them loosing their swimming edge.”

Well, if you want them to maintain that ‘edge’ then they’d need to swim in a squad. I think you’ll find if they spend time in water that is over their head with friends the ‘edge’ will be maintained just fine. You didn’t see too many kids drowning in the diving pool at the Olympic when I was a kid, no matter what height they plummeted from.

There is swimming and there is ‘not drowning’. Swimming is done in squads. Not drowning is the fun part, done with friends

Buy a waterproof mp3 player (which are surprisingly cheap on eBay) and dump her at the pool for a few hours a week.

Playing in a pool with friends is great fun but it’s doesn’t stop them loosing their swimming edge.

Many children develop good swim skills through regular training up until senior primary school then when they stop by mid to late teens they often regress to being poor swimmers.

The motivation for my original post is to find classes that will maintain a child’s swimming skills and to have fun with other children so as to keep their interest up.

Before someone says why don’t I do this imagine trying to order your tween aged daughter to do pool laps in a public space, the result would be either laughable or traumatic.

have her go to the pool with her friends.

it will meet all your requirements, and you don’t have to pay for an instructor.

I’d be interested in this too as our son is nearing the end of his swim school levels, though he still has at least another year to go. But I have been wondering what next after he finishes up.