Swimming Teachers

Swimming is a great fun sport. Teaching it is even more fun, one of the few skills you can share that may actually save someone's life. Always have a lifeguard watch your class as you may not be able to spot an emergency when you focus on your lesson.

Swimming teachers help people of all ages and abilities to develop swimming skills and techniques, and to exercise in water. They often work in teams, some also work as lifeguards dressed in red and yellow uniforms.

Swimming coaches train and develop competitive swimmers. If you are a good swimmer, and you could motivate and inspire others to develop their skills, this job could suit you well. You would need to be a good communicator and have the ability to encourage people and put them at their ease.

As a swim coach or teacher you won't move as much as your class. Keep warm by wearing suitable clothing in the pool.

Sun Safety

Prolongued sun exposure can damage your skin. Sun lotions are not the answer as they come off in the pool and pollute the water. If you work outdoors protect your skin from sunburn with light clothing.

It looks more professional if you dress the part and show sun safety awareness. Even casual clothes like jeans and hoodies are better than bare skin.

Lycra swim shirts with soft and breathable anoraks and jackets work best in the pool or on the beach. They are lightweight and quick drying, so you can wear them all day long in and out of the water. Encourage your swimming class to cover up when outdoors.

Swimming Lessons

You can teach this in a pool with a good sized shallow end where your students can get familiar with the water in a safe way.

Introduce some simple swimming skills, like "doggy paddle" just for fun. Then show front crawl and breaststroke, maybe some simple rescue tows.

Next get your students to wear different kinds of clothes in the pool so they get used to swimming in clothes rather than being shocked or overwhelmed if they fall into the water later in life.

Advanced Swimming Lessons at University

Posted by Adrianna in Malaga, Spain

At our university I teach advanced swimming lessons and aquatic survival. This includes aquatic boot camp, boat handling and resistance swim training.

Everyone is encouraged to swim in clothes for best effect. Nobody is allowed topless. Most swimmers wear long pants with sports shirts or anoraks. T-shirt with jeans and hoodies are popular too among the hardcore swimmers.

My classes are mostly attended by male students, I don't know why. It's always nice to see all those cute guys jump into the pool in their colourful clothes. Every week they show up in different kit.

As a warm up we swim four lengths, each set using one of main four swim strokes. Then we do the push-up runs where you swim a length, get out to do some push-ups, swim back and do sit-ups, and then repeat until exhaustion. This is hard for those in jeans and hoodies.

Next we relax and play with inflatable boats. Climbing in is quite a challenge in heavy waterlogged clothes, falling back in is an easy reward. Several rescue skills round off the programme.

As the session comes to the end we splash around a fair bit and then relax in the shallow bit to talk about what we've learned and enjoyed.