11 Best Swim Coach Gifts

Best Swim Coach Gifts in 2023

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

Why Swimming is a Great Sport for Kids

One of the best decisions I ever made was to enroll my children in swim lessons. Although all three have gone on to swim competitively on a swim team, the experience for each has been very different and very positive.

What is the right age to start your child in swimming? It varies. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, children aged five generally have the skills to learn to swim. Before the age of five, there are many good parent-child classes and aquatic fun classes that allow you to interact with your child in the water and help to build confidence and security. Remember, early exposure to water activity should be a fun and positive experience. To me, nothing is worse than watching a parent force a terrified child into a swimming pool.

It is perfectly normal for some children to be reluctant to get in the water. It is a good thing to have a little healthy fear of water. We have all seen the child that will jump straight into the deep end while a parent tries frantically to stop him. I have great respect for lifeguards but I would not rely on them to "save" my non-swimmer child. Unless your child can swim the length of the pool easily, you should not leave them unsupervised, and in fact, should keep them in sight and at arm's length.

As a person who enjoys fitness and spends a lot of time around pools, unfortunately, I have pulled children from the bottom of a swimming pool three times. On two of these occasions, the child had been playing in an inflatable tube (Attention parents these are not safety devices!) and on the other, a toddler slipped off the side and into the 6ft while his mother chatted with a friend at the baby pool! (Her reaction was to spank him and continue her conversation without a word to me. Nice.) Toddlers and young children who have participated in learn-to-swim programs and are able to float and "dog-paddle" do not have the skills to be safe alone in the water and should be closely supervised.

One of my first jobs was working for the YMCA. I saw first-hand how beneficial it is for children to be able to swim, both for recreation and fitness. I involved my children in swimming early. I started with parent-child classes and then enrolled each in learn-to-swim programs at the YMCA. It was always important for me that my children learn to swim while young. That said, until they were between eight and ten years old and were strong swimmers, I was never comfortable leaving them alone at the pool.

Participation on a summer swim team has been a wonderful experience for my children. They each have varying degrees of competitiveness and swimming talent and have enjoyed being on swim team for different reasons. I will say that competitive swim programs aren't for every child. And that is fine. Our particular program allows children to be on the team, participate in all the fun activities and choose whether or not they want to swim at the meets. If you can find a good program, the benefits of this kind of team atmosphere can be just as important as the actual swimming. Your child will learn discipline, develop self confidence and sportsmanship, and make lots of friends!

The concentrated swim workouts are a great bonus. A good swim coach/instructor will know the exact balance of swim drills and rest time, based on age, to keep your child interested and motivated. If you are in a summer swim program, from June-July your swimmer will practice in an age group four times a week and have a swim meet every week. Depending on your child's age, he/she can learn to dive and the basics of all four swim strokes in this amount of time. So, you will see good progress and importantly, with all the fun social activities mixed in, it won't seem like work to your child.

Swimming is a wonderful sport for children because they learn skills that will last a lifetime. In addition, the physical benefits of swimming are well documented and the negative impacts are few, especially when compared to sports such as gymnastics and football.

Two years ago, my then 8 year old was playing fall baseball, soccer, and flag football. As the season progressed he began to limp around and was clearly in pain. I took him to an orthopaedic sports medicine specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center who diagnosed him with Sever's Disease: an irritation of the growth plates in the heels. We had two options. Our son could continue all his sports and suffer through the pain, or cut back on the physical activity. We decided to cut back. The doctor told us that of all his activities, swimming was the only sport that wouldn't aggravate his feet. He had been a good summer swimmer and decided to join a local year-round swim team. We found that not only did his foot pain improve but he also stayed in great shape.

While my youngest son enjoys competitive swimming, he likes too many sports to commit to "just" being a swimmer. There are many kids though, who "live to swim". We have found out that being in a year-round competitive swim club takes a huge commitment on the part of the whole family. Not only will your child need to swim three and up to seven days a week as a high schooler, there are volunteer and fund raising commitments, as well. The payoffs can be big though, with many good high school swimmers receiving full college scholarships!

With so many sports to choose from it is difficult to decide what will be best for your child. Do check into local swim programs and see what your community has to offer. It may be something your child participates in, loves, and wants to do competitively. It might be a skill that your child masters and decides to do recreationally. Either way, you have given him/her confidence and safety around water and a sport that will maintain fitness for life.

For more information visit the American Academy of Pediatrics website at www.aap.org/.

The YMCA has been teaching people to swim for over 100 years their information can be found at www.ymca.net