Learning To Swim For Water Safety

Summer holidays are normally planned earlier in the year, as soon as the new year holiday is finished, and most families in the U.K would love to have their summer holidays somewhere close to water. Popular destinations for summer holidays offer locations close to a river, a lake, sea, or swimming pools. Mind you, visiting waterparks is very popular over the school’s half-term breaks.

Summer also brings a big demand to buy swimming armbands specially for children who cannot swim.

This is because over the warmer months of the year when swimming gets more popular, the water safety of children grabs parental attention more.

Although RLSS UK advises people to swim at open water sites where there are lifeguards to help keep swimmers safe, sometimes help could be a long way away. There are nearly 400 drowning incidents in the U.K each year and 40 of those are children and young people. Drowning could be prevented when children know how to swim.

Swimming Armbands Cannot Replace Swimming Lessons

One of the best way to prevent drowning is to make sure you and your children learn to swim. Swimming armbands cannot provide enough protection for several reasons:

1) They give a false sense of security to children that they think they can float when they don’t. Learning to float is a skill that children must learn

2) Swimming armbands can puncture and lose air gradually when children swim with them. This could lead into difficulties which could be distressing for children.

3) Children can take them off themselves when parents are not looking and try to jump in the water without them when they don’t know how to swim.

Necessary Water Skills for Water-safety

First, one needs to be able to swim at least 25 meters (without stopping) and tread the water or float on the top of the water for at least 1 minute (without any floatation device). Sounds easy???

Well, it is not.

In fact, according to a new survey done by the Red Cross in the U.S, 56% of adults who think they can swim, they don’t even have the necessary water safety skills to survive in water.

So, are you confident that you and your children have the water-safety skills required to enjoy being in and around the water safely this Summer? Are you sure? If yes, that is great. But, if not, we could help you with that. You can book some professional swimming lessons with us before you head to a beautiful beach or to a nice hotel with a swimming pool, this Summer.

We provide swimming lessons for all ages, including adults.