Having been a swimming teacher for many, many years, I know I am a pickier than the average parent and I was super impressed with the program put on by the Clive Aquatics Center. Ellie's teacher, Alex, was amazing with the little kids and made great progress with each and every one of them over the 8 days of lessons.
I am also in love with the Clive pool for young kids! The zero depth entry pool is a decent size and there are lots of different things for the little ones to do. On Friday afternoon we went to the Ankeny Aquatics Center, and while it was very nice (I liked the bathrooms better) and had more for all ages, the Clive one is superior in my mind for young kids (and closer location-wise for us). We have yet to go to the WDM Aquatics Center (it is on our list of things to do before it closes), but I have heard it is more for older kids since it has a lot of slides.
Now that Ellie is done with lessons, she can:
- hold her breath under water for over 10 seconds (the first time she did this I lifted her out of the water because I was a little scare since she was under for so long)
- float on her tummy unassisted for a few seconds (after a little assistence to start)
- float on her back with a little assistence (she could do it on her own, she just tenses up when you move your hands away)
- kick with a kick-board by herself (her favorite--- enough so we went out and got her a kick-board)
- retrive items off the bottom of the pool (completely submurged)
- jump into the pool by herself (although she prefers to jump to someone)
- go under water when she jumps in
- do the beginning stages of the front crawl arms with her front float
I am hoping to sign her up for one or two sessions next summer depending on our vacation schedule and if she can do lessons through day-care!
Here are a few pictures from lessons. I forgot the real camera, so these are from my phone (and maybe not the best).
Love my little fish!!!
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