Kids love water, and many are naturally drawn to sparkling pools, bubbling spas, and exciting lake shores. Even the bathtub can entice curious children. Unfortunately, that curiosity can lead to disaster. In the United States, drowning is the leading cause of accidental death in children ages one to four, with an average of 350 drowning deaths per year.[1] As a parent, the best protection you have is to teach your children to swim. Traditionally, swimming lessons were encouraged for children starting from around age four. As you can see, that approach leaves infants and toddlers vulnerable. Survival Swim starts teaching your baby how to survive an encounter with water as early as six months old.
Survival Swim vs. Infant Swimming Resource
There are two leading methods for teaching infants and toddlers how to swim: Infant Swimming Resource (ISR) or Survival Swim. While ISR teaches babies how to float until they can be rescued, the Survival Swim method focuses on survival and self-rescue. It teaches the technique of swim-float-swim, which helps your child combat fear and fatigue in the water while helping to get them out of the water as soon as possible.
What is Swim-Float-Swim?
Swim-Float-Swim is a technique that teaches children as young as six months old to float and breathe for an extended period of time, with intermittent periods of swimming toward the shore or pool edge. The child uses kicking while on their stomach to swim toward safety, and then they roll onto their back when tired and float face-up or to kick in that position toward the side of the pool or the shore.
As soon as our Survival Swim swimmers are walking, they are ready to learn self rescue. Once the child reaches the side of the pool or shore, they are taught to pull themselves from the water to safety.
Survival Swim is for All Water Depths
While most people think of drowning as being related to pools, spas, or open bodies of water, nearly one-third of child drownings happen at home, with most of those incidents occurring in the bathtub. Survival Swim teaches infants and toddlers to survive an encounter with any depth of water, from the shallowest bathtub to the deepest lake.. It can even be practiced in the bath at home!
Survival Swim Leads to Recreational Swimming
The basic skills of floating, kicking, and paddling give children the confidence and comfort around the water that can lead to a lifetime of recreational enjoyment. Once they reach an age where they can participate in recreational swimming lessons, they’ll become even stronger, safer swimmers much faster and with less fear. Survival Swim graduates even go on to compete in recreational swimming competitions from a very young age.
How to Get Started
If you have a child between the ages of six months and four years old, you can use the Survival Swim method to teach your baby life-saving swimming skills. And Survival Swim isn’t just for babies. These are skills that can be used to teach anyone how to swim — even adults.
Find an Instructor near you and get the Survial Swim App so you can start teaching Survival Swim to your young swimmers today.
1: https://www.poolsafely.gov/blog/know-the-facts-fatal-child-drownings/
