Swimming lessons are not just for the warm dry months!
Continuing your child’s swimming lessons during winter has many benefits.
Here are 10 reasons why your child should keep up with their swimming lessons year-round:
1. Continuing With Baby and Toddler Swimming Lessons During Winter Can Actually Improve Your Child’s Immune System and Build Resilience.
Many parents are concerned that exposing their little ones to the elements may increase their risk of catching the flu and colds.
So does swimming in a heated indoors pool make our children more prone to sickness?
Studies show the importance and benefits of swimming during winter for the immune system and general wellbeing, with children who keep swimming year-round found to actually be less prone to diseases and sickness compared to children who are overly protected from the elements!
While flu and colds are more common during winter in general research finds that catching them is not related to being exposed to the natural elements or being exposed to the cold with wet hair (like many of us think).
The flu and colds are viruses, and are spread more likely through people spending more time in proximity with each other in closed indoor places.
Swimming through winter can improve children’s immune systems by keeping them fit and active, which over time and continuous practice reduces their risk of catching colds, and helps build resilience to stress and illness.
2. Year-round Exercise Keeps Our Little Ones Fit and Healthy.
Maintaining fitness levels year-round is beneficial to general physical and mental health, and swimming is a great way to keep fit and healthy during winter especially in an indoor and well-ventilated environment.
Physical activity helps release endorphins which also means happier, healthier kids.
Keeping up with children’s swim classes during winter teaches your child an essential life skill that will remain with them for the rest of their lives, whether for leisure, or for general health and fitness.
When we take a break from exercise activities and resume after a while, stop again, and so forth... our immune system can weaken. It’s kind of like driving in first gear all the time. Children can often get sick after their first class back after a break...their bodies have become less familiar with the activity and the environment.
3. Swimming in Winter Boosts Our Child's Brain Development.
Swimming has been found to increase blood flow to the brain which means more oxygen. This can help to improve memory and cognitive function.
Swimming lessons have been shown to benefit brain development, and for children it is regarded as vital for the development of academic performance, as well as coordination, motor skills, balance and concentration.
Skipping swim classes or avoiding going swimming for a few months of the year can halt the wonderful cognitive progress our children have been making through their swimming lessons!
4. Swimming Lessons Are a Great Option for an Indoor Activity.
Get the kids out of the house, away from screens, socialising with their peers and keeping active!
During winter, kids can get restless not being able to run around and stay active because of the cold weather. Swimming lessons are a great way to cure your little one’s cabin fever, have fun and move their bodies.
Winter swim lessons burn off excess energy and gets kids ready for summer months activities with school, family and friends.
We all know that children and adults sleep better after a swim too!
5. Builds Confidence and Helps Maintain Their Aquatic Skills.
Children simply forget! Even after a short school holiday break we find a lot of young students lose stamina and need reminders of skills they have previously mastered even just two weeks earlier!.
So, imagine what a few months can do to kids’ retention and performance in the water!
In some cases, it can take quite a while for kids to regain previous skills learned, with those who have taken a break during winter taking much longer than those who practice year-round.
Generally, it seems the longer time spent away from the water, the harder it is to get back into it.
6. Helps to Combat Your Child’s Fear and Anxiety While They Learn To Love Independence in the Water.
The chances of a child developing fear and anxiety around water increases the longer they avoid it.
Continuing swimming lessons is a great way to maintain and fine tune skills, and also to encourage feeling safe, confident and joyful in the water in general!
7. Repetition is Key for Long-Term Skill Retention in Children.
When children learn to swim, repetition and practice are key.
They need to maintain and reinforce existing skills in order to advance and develop their ability in the water.
Such maintenance and reinforcement are particularly important for infant, toddler and pre-school- aged children when long-term skill retention and muscle memory are starting to develop.
To help retain their skills and not regress it is recommended to keep children swimming year-round. Practising across winter will keep them confident in their swimming skills and parents can feel more certain of their child’s water skills come Summer - when it is time for beach swims and splashing in outdoor pools as well as our warm water lessons!
8. Water Safety is Not Just For Summer.
Learning to swim and being confident around water helps keep your child safe - water is around us in every season!
Accidents can happen at any time of year in the water, so it’s important that children understand how to handle emergencies and stay confident in the water.
Maintaining swimming lessons throughout winter helps to reinforce children’s aquatic and safety skills so they are prepared if something goes wrong.
Accidents don’t just happen in summer (Royal Life Saving found that 34% of drownings happen in the Autumn and Winter seasons), making swim lessons important during every season of the year.
Regardless of their skill, ability or confidence level, all young children must be supervised around water at all times!
However, giving children opportunities to learn and develop aquatic skills increases the chances of them triumphing in a challenging situation physically and mentally.
9. What’s More Aussie Than Swimming?
Swimming is a big part of Aussie life, especially along the coastline of Western Australia. Our children’s daily lives can includes going to the beach, pools, fishing, boating, camping by lakes and rivers, school swimming carnivals, water parks and the list goes on…!
Swimming is the exercise of choice for many Australian adults, even during the colder months. Indoor and heated pools are quite accessible in Perth making keeping an active and fit lifestyle while enjoying water easy.
Australians take pride in our nation’s swimming abilities and our participation in international swimming championships where Australians often dominate!
Giving your children this important life skill will unlock opportunities during their childhood and adult life that help promote their well-being, physically, psychologically, culturally and socially.
Ask Emma McKeon if she ever skipped a training day because it’s winter time. Our bet...probably not!
10. The Water Is Always Warm at Aquanat!
Aquanat’s pools are heated to 34-35degrees year-round. They are indoors, with warm showers and cosy changing rooms just metres from the pool’s edge (in the same warm building!).
Keeping group classes small and having ONLY one baby swim group class in the pool at a time means less time waiting for a warm shower or changing bench table space. In fact, most of the time parent’s can slip out of the warm water and straight into a warm shower and warm clothes.
Our Alfred Cove centre has been designed to offer cosy, comfortable and beautiful change spaces which feel, spa-like and luxurious. No cranky babies and stress when you leave the pool!
So if you thought it’s better to have a break from swim classes in winter, think again, because the benefits of keeping your young kids in swimming lessons year-round are profound!
Come on West Aussies! When’s a little rain ever scared us away from wearing shorts and leaving our umbrella at home?!
Thankfully winters in Perth are quite friendly, so get your bathers on and let's keep showing the world what awesome swimmers we are!
Worried about feeling the cold and the rain? No worries, Aquanat has got you covered!
We have comfortable facilities to make winter swimming lessons easier and enjoyable.
Get in touch with us to start your child’s journey to becoming a strong swimmer today!
