Here’s a parenting Pro Tip: summer swimming lessons are for the birds.
For the last four or so years, we’ve signed our kids up for summer swimming lessons. They flounder a bit at the beginning of summer, but by the time August rolls around, they make a little progress. All this progress is then thrown on the ash heap as soon as the opening bell of school rings. Come next June, they are once again floundering and afraid to blow bubbles in the water.
So, this school year, I decided to bite the big inconvenient bullet and continue to sign my kids up for swimming lessons all year round. And yes, I mean it when I say inconvenient. There’s nothing quite like wrangling a toddler into a swimsuit while simultaneously trying to get dinner on the table so the whole family can be at the pool by 6:30 p.m. (Yes, Katie is in a preschool class, now that she’s three.)
Has it made a difference? Well . . . with some of our kids. And by “some” I mean Eleanor. After repeating the Youth 1 class a few times, she’s finally figured out this swimming concept and is doing backstrokes across the pool in the Youth 3 class. If she keeps this up, she’ll graduate to the fabled Deep End of the Pool in no time.
However, the boys . . . are still stuck in Youth 1. The past few months, they come very close to graduating, but not quite. It’s frustrating. Jeff is far and away the oldest kid in that class, and part of me wonders how much his lack of progress is caused by a personality conflict with his teachers (Jeff spends a lot of class time goofing off).
And, well. Nobody expects much of anything from Katie. She has no fear of the water, which is why I signed her up for the class in the first place. She’s cute as a button and frequently looks up from the water to wave and say “Hi Mom!” At the end of each class, her teacher gives the preschoolers floatie rings and then makes them into a “caterpillar” and tows them through the pool. It’s ADORABLE.
Casa Camisas 