Swimming 1 year old

[Sparklisam]

I've been taking my Lo swimming. What are the best swim aids to use. I put some armbands on him and he freaked. It didn't keep his head above the water coz he hasn't learnt to paddle yet. Would a swim jacket be safer ?? Or the round armbands rather than blow up ones ??

Thanks xx

 

[MrsS143]

My nephew has like a little life jacket thing x

 

[Pumpkin9]

I've been taking my son swimming since he was 4 months old. We go to a baby class and he's never been in arm bands etc.. I support him in the water until he starts to achieve more on his own. Perhaps worth a Google as to how you can do this?

 

[Kiagirl]

I've always had armbands on Lucie, at first I had to support her as she went under but not for long. She is 19 months now and v confident in the water and will jump in etc. I did buy her a swim vest and tried it last month and she hated in and clung to me so I don't intend on using again. I tried a rubber ring too but she just likes armbands lol

 

[Lilmisshopeful]

We don't use anything on Oliver just hold him. Will buy a jacket or floatie suit soon as he cal walk tho and he will want me to let go lol xxx

 

[queenriccy]

Olly has been doing swimming lessons since he was 11 weeks and he is so confident in the water. Obvs he cannot swim yet, kicks and does tiger arms but it will be a while yet. He has just moved into the bigger class where the other kids are between 2-3 and they wear swimming disks. He hated them at first but saw the other kids wearing them and wanted a go and loves them so I bought our own. They are called 'Delphin Swim Disks) you get 3 disks for each arm and the arm hole is elasticated so can be used upto 12 years of age. They arnt cheap , £24 from amazon but I was looking at a jacket for holiday in May and they were £30 and will only fit him for this year. The disks are great, they keep buoyancy upright so if they fall backwards for forwards into the water he will always float to a standing position. All the kids swimming classes use them as they are the best. The jackets will keep them afloat but if they fall forwards into the water it wont bring them back upto standing position and they could potentially drown.

Hope you find this helpful

cc

 

[queenriccy]

Also I forgot to add they are great for teaching them to swim alone, i let go of Olly now in the water (deep end) and it encourages him to kick his legs and arms to move, Eventually as he gets better at it I can reduce the disks to 2 and then 1 and then eventually zero

xx

 

[littlemonkey]

I've not taken my LO swimming for a while after he went through a stage of misbehaving and pooing in the pool every time we went!

Before that we didn't put anything on him. He didn't seem to like either the jacket or the armbands. I think he didn't like the way they made him float without him having to do anything. He seemed to be much happier without anything and working out floating for himself. Our local pool has a sloap down into the shallow end and he enjoyed laying on that, then lifting his legs up and using his arms to kind of walk while paddling his legs into the water. Then at deeper bits he would hold onto one of us and do the same, but only needed to hold one hand.

 

[Sparklisam]

Thanks for all your help. It's great xx