All thoughts here are my own and come from the experience of teaching thousands of adults and children over more than a decade.
Parents may wonder, what is the best age to send my child for swimming lessons? When are they considered ready?
In my humble opinion, the ages of 5 – 12 is the optimal time to learn how to swim.
Children at this age have the motor abilities to coordinate their arms, legs, and breathing. Plus, their mind is able to process and retain the lessons that are being taught. A child’s ability to learn at this stage of their life is amazing, and they soak up knowledge like a sponge.
For infants and toddlers below the age of five, it gets a bit more nuanced. My view is that infant swimming is mostly about gaining water confidence and perhaps drowning prevention. However, they usually can’t do a proper stroke, and are not likely to retain what they have learned in class. They can’t take instructions well. Plus, lessons tend to be expensive as class sizes need to be small. From a cost-effectiveness point of view, its pretty suboptimal.
Now looking at teenagers, they can obviously pick things up quickly. The issue is that many tend to become more reluctant to take up swimming lessons as they assert their independence and start choosing how to spend their own time. They also start becoming more self-conscious, or have built up bad experiences in the water from their childhood. These impede the learning process and willingness to learn to swim.
For adults, the main issue is that the pathways in the brain have solidified and it just becomes harder to absorb new ways to move. Many have developed a deepseated water phobia, which can take some time to overcome. On average, adults will take a longer time than children to learn swimming.
It goes without saying that individual experiences will vary. There are of course amazing exceptions of young swimming prodigies as well as seniors who have no problems picking up swimming. The most important factor is really attitude. As long as the student is willing and able, they can definitely reach their swimming goals, no matter their age.
But from the perspective of most parents who are seeking to build up crucial life skills for their child, there is no doubt in my mind that the shortest and most effective learning cycle is between the ages of 5-12.
We hope that has been helpful, and stay Otter-ly Fantastic!
