IF THE LEARNER HASN’T LEARNED, THE TEACHER HASN’T TAUGHT. I was exposed to this axiom many years ago and believe it more all the time. This means that it is not enough to explain something once and then write off the student that doesn’t learn it at once as a dunce or a motor moron. You must keep working at it to earn your “teacher” title. It is a special kind of challenge to [...]
CARING Managers who are caring take time to get to know the individuals in their team. They’re genuinely interested in people’s success and personal well-being and show this by regularly checking in with people on how they're doing both at work and outside work. COACHING Managers who are good coaches focus on developing the people they work with as well as getting the job done. They ensure they have regular one-on-one meetings with team [...]
CARING Caring is the first point of communicating with your swimmers. They will incorporate your teaching points more easily and effectively if they believe you genuinely care about them. It has been said that 93% of communication is non-verbal, and we do know that tone of voice and body language matter a great deal. COURTEOUS In addition to modeling good character for your swimmers, swim teachers should always use language that is civil and [...]
When I was swimming in college, there were a few days when we had to give up some pool space in our deep water to allow the track team to come in. This was not so the injured runners could rehab by doing zero impact motions, but rather a training exercise for the pole vaulters. Using a shortened pole, the vaulters would practice their "over the bar" mechanics underwater. This allowed them to focus [...]
Today our feature is the FINIS Positive Drive Fins. These fins are able to be used in all strokes and by young learn to swim students, making them extremely versatile. They help generate correct propulsion and definitely increase leg strength, foot speed, and ankle flexibility. Fins are great teaching tools because they add propulsion, allowing the swimmer to focus on the skill being learned with greater intention.
Swim schools are high energy and high emotion businesses. The successful ones focus on superior experiences. Experiences are journeys. Great journeys are designed. Great journeys lead to high customer retention and high "WOM" (word of mouth) referral. Service design is a system for developing the relationship between your business and your customers. Service design and delivery = SD2 If you want your swim school to thrive in a competitive environment, you need to make [...]
Brent Hayden is a retired International swimmer from Canada. He is the 2012 Olympic Bronze Medallist and 2007 World Champion in the 100m freestyle. He is also a two-time Commonwealth Games Champion and still maintains the Games record in the 100m Freestyle. He currently holds 6 individual Canadian Records and was the sole Canadian champion in the 100m freestyle for the duration of his decade long professional career. We all [...]
As teachers, it’s our responsibility to ensure that both the parent and child feel welcome, comfortable, and at ease. Parents have to be relaxed in this new environment as babies feed off their energy and can sense apprehension and uncertainties. Make sure the parent feels comfortable in your class and set them up for success! Explain the activities clearly and how they are to be carried out properly so that they gain confidence. [...]
How do you fine tune kindness with your staff? Are they able to exercise empathy with the children that they teach? Children respond better to instruction when it comes with warmth and positivity, so it is important that teachers create an environment in which the child feels comfortable. Your teachers can help create a positive environment first by being aware that children often come to the pool with lingering emotions. They could be overly [...]
Free Flow Teaching Progression: "Pressing" into Efficient Swimming Regardless of your swimming goals or skill levels, there are some aspects of efficiency in swimming that are universal. Whether one is training for a high level of competition or just improving their fitness swim abilities, body posture plays an important role in energy conservation and ease of motion. In the Free Flow Teaching Progression, the mantra we repeat constantly is "Relax, Breathe, and Press". This [...]
A new skill set, be it swimming, dancing, fly fishing, whatever - requires a considerable amount of practice to become proficient. The more this practice can be strung together uninterrupted, the faster the learning. With swim lessons, the big inhibitor to learning is breathing. Students can only practice the skill as long as they can hold their breath, which is usually 5-10 seconds before everything comes to a halt. This leads to a lot [...]
Maintaining a positive work environment ensures that your staff come to work with a positive and productive attitude. Happy staff leads to happy students. This in turn leads to a better learning environment for the students. Children can feel energy, as they are very in tune with their emotions. If you have a staff member who is having a bad day and is wearing it on their sleeve their demeanor will be reflected [...]
Engaging Your Staff to Promote Development Try this exercise: "Celebrate Success with Your Staff" by having a weekly "add to the jar”. Have your staff submit short notes into a “staff jar”. These thoughts could be about a successful teaching moment, “thanks for covering my shift”, or affirmation of a colleague. Every week go over the notes in the jar and choose a favourite. The favourite gets put into the “session jar” and all [...]
When hiring staff for a swim organization it is no secret that you have to be extra selective, after all we are dealing with young swimmers in an aquatic environment! I sat down with Carla Zarifeh, Managing Partner at Aquaventures Swim Centre in Vancouver, BC and here’s what she had to say on this topic! What are the characteristics that you look for when interviewing candidates for a position within your organization? We hire [...]
Swim safety is always most important. Children get excited especially when going for a swim with their parents so it’s very important that the parents enforce the same safety protocols as during lessons. For example, make sure children always walk, not run on deck. Parents should always be the child's "water watcher" and always be within an arms reach. Parents be sure to give children the queue to jump! Be sure to say..." big [...]
All Learn to Swim Programs have the responsibility to teach students Personal Safety Survival Skills such as floating, sculling, treading water, cold water survival, etc. Here are a few progression pointers for teaching treading water: Show then teach the child the hand motion of sculling. While standing, scull hands outwards then inwards. Hand and forearm act as one entity to cover a larger surface area. Then get the child to kick vertically while sculling hands [...]
A common teaching error is to have students repeatedly practice a skill with poor performance. Practice does not make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect performance. Break the skill down, into parts... work on body position, breathing and kicks before adding any arm propulsion. Work from basic body alignment positions of floats and glides before adding any propulsion from kicks. Check muscle tension, to efficiently perform, muscles must be relaxed; neck, shoulders, hips, legs, feet. Gradually [...]
Creates a hydro-dynamic position to allow the swimmer to move efficiently through the water with the least amount of resistance. This is particularly true in freestyle and backstroke, as well as the extension phase in breaststroke. Allows the body to roll naturally through freestyle and backstroke. This position helps the water provide a natural lift to the hips so the swimmer doesn’t need to exhaust themselves keeping their body in line at the surface. Reference [...]
According to Hootsuite™ “becoming a social business involves integrating social media across departments, teams, and business functions.” The goal to becoming a successful social business is to have Social Organization. Defined by Hootsuite™, Social Organization “occurs when a company has an organization-wide governance model and has implemented a single social media policy and strategy across the organization.” Quality Control at Your Swim School One of the key positions in your swim organization is a [...]
As swim teachers, repetition is key. Whether it’s the skills that are repeated for the children to master, songs with purpose or even the act of teaching daily, we must make sure that staff does not get complacent from doing classes over and over again. As children progress through the session, it’s important to make sure the staff remains on point and are always one step ahead and being proactive. Make sure staff prepares [...]
Your curriculum organization is extremely important. Having a learn to swim program stemming from Waterbabies and pre-school ages accumulates a large database of information pertaining to activities, drills, safety, skills, and stroke progressions, to name a few. The easiest way nowadays is to have your curriculum in an online database which allows you to have everything in one place. This kind of easy access gives you the freedom to provide your teachers with instructional videos [...]
Running a business takes a massive commitment not only with time but with learning. Whether it's the trends on social media or running a day to day business, there's always room for learning and improvement. In today's day and age, we are overwhelmed with the amount of readily available information that is out there on the web, and who's to say it's always the right thing to guide us. That's why, as swim school [...]
Swim equipment has come a long way! Not too long ago swimmers only had pull buoy’s and kick boards to aid them in bettering their strokes and in gaining stroke strength within the water. Nowadays there are alignment snorkels, a vast array of paddles and fins that are even stroke specific. Our feature today is the FINIS alignment board. What’s so cool about this board is that it can be used for the learn [...]
1. Systemizing Your Swim School: Successful swim schools have created different systems so their school runs smoothly. One system that can help your school run more efficiently is lesson planning and staff training! Swimagine is an all in one platform that provides you with a library of over 250 activities, skills, drills, songs and games for all ages and levels! The resources provided give you detail on how to perform the skills for the teachers [...]
