Swimming and a new term, new start

Bizarrely, our swimming terms don’t always fit with the school terms so it really confuses me.  Especially when they run into each other like last and this term did.  We had to miss the first week because we were away (although I did manage to take N on a ‘leisure’ swim to make up for it), with the second week being missed due to a suspected ear infection.  I say suspected because 111 wouldn’t agree to get me an out of hours appointment until a few days had passed – all I wanted was to know for definite if he had an infection or not, then I’d know whether he could go swimming.

After 2 weeks off, it’s always a mystery to see how N’s going to react and what he’ll do or enjoy.

To my relief, there was no need to worry.  He was quite happy paddling away, and doing most of the activities.

Anything with a ball he loves, and ‘popping’ the ball to practice his tiger arms (serious failing there, his are more like a little moggy doing breaststroke than long reaches!) just makes him laugh.  What with the laughing and all the talking he does throughout the lesson, I’m surprised he doesn’t swallow more water.

He’s a chatterbox all the time anyway, but you would think he could be a bit quieter during lessons.  But no, he talks all the way through.  About the teacher

‘Lynsey’s got a ball, Lynsey’s swimming, what’s she doing?’

and about what he’s doing

‘I popped the ball, I’m blowing bubbles, jelly on a plate, sit on the floor mummy’.

It’s non-stop.  Maybe one day he’ll concentrate on actually swimming rather than talking.

Stopping talking so much might also help him with being more relaxed and trying out a star float more frequently.  We now look at his Stick Man book by Julia Donaldson, and watch Stick Man star floating down the river.  Maybe seeing that will help in the pool as well.

The new term did flummox him a bit seeing new children in our class again.  There’s often a bit of a swap around, either children who’re way ahead moving up a class, or moving from a Saturday morning class which is at a small pool to our pool (as they grow and progress, they need to have more space to build up stamina).  They have to readjust to getting used to new children and making new friends in the changing room where they’re previously used to their original classmates.  But I’m sure they’ll all muck in together after a couple of sessions with no problems.

Do you see many changes from one term to the next with your swimming classes?  Do you have chatterbox swimmers?