Are swimming lessons for young children really worth the cash?
Last year the children’s Grandma and Aunty Becky gave them each a sum of money for Christmas and birthday presents (they also came with a mountain of gifts but that’s another story). We were thrilled as it meant we were able to buy them each booster seats for the car.
The remainder of the cash stayed in an envelope in my bedroom while I thought long and hard about what the kids needed (nothing really). It was only when we left London in June and I became a full time mummy for the first time that I found out the local swimming pool holds swimming lessons for under 4 year olds each day of the week. Given that a huge UK river is at the back of our garden and the local town floods each winter I figured it wouldn’t be terrible if the kids were able to swim (although I do recall from first aid training that just because a child can swim in a swimming pool doesn’t mean they can swim in freezing cold water with heavy currents)
I signed them up for Friday lessons at a cost of £5 per child per lesson which meant that for the whole school term I was handing over £100.
Today we received in the post an invitation to sign up for next term’s lessons but I have decided that we won’t be doing it again for a while and I thought I’d share my reasons here on this blog:
(a) Each Friday sees me even more twitchy as usual as we try to get to the pool on time with clean swimming cossies, dry towels, change for the parking meter, change for the lockers and two small excited people running in all directions save the one they need to go in (eg. both dashing into the blokes loos just as the lesson is about to commence or into the showers where I can’t haul them out without getting my lovely fluffy jumper soaked). I also have to make sure we have a stash of sweet treats and a drink for afterwards.
(b) They do very little in the 30 minute lesson. Each child is taken across the pool by the teacher with a couple of floats tucked under each arm and told to kick legs etc. All the other children wait for each child to have their turn (yawn).
(c) My son generally gets shouted at for the whole lesson and invariably made to sit on the side for a period. He is inquisitive and chatty and finds it extremely hard to stay still (even at the dinner table or while sleeping). This kind of character does not go down well with the swimming teacher which is a shame for him as he is always very keen to do the right thing and not do anything construed as being ‘bad’. Poor love.
(d) Edie is a little water babe, loves swimming and always has done and even she claims it is boring and doesn’t want to go.
(e) Apart from one lovely mum who has four children (!) all the other parents seem really snooty.
(f) I’m finding that I’m resentful of having to be at the same place each Friday afternoon when we might want to do something else in that slot. If/when the kids go to school we won’t have the option to go for a walk, visit relatives etc during the week anymore so I’d like to maximise those opportunities while we can.
(g) We’d prefer to save for something a little nicer!