Teaching a toddler to swim

SailorSam

I use to take my two nieces each week, when we started one was less than 3yrs old the other a babe in arms. I never rushed them into learning anything, just let them play and get more confident in the water, It took a long long time but in the end they both began to swim.

skintchick

My DD is 3 and goes for lessons in a shallow trainer pool in a class of mixed age and ability with one teacher. We sit by the pool. She doesn't wear any floats at all and is very nearly swimming alone ( on holiday she did two lengths on her own wearing swim discs).

But she's been going swimming since 14 weeks and until this term I went in with her. She's never worn floats though.