by David K McMillin

Created on: March 04, 2010

So you are looking for some tips on learning to swim. Maybe you are wanting to enjoy some time at the water and need to learn for safety reasons, or you want to start exercising in a low stress environment, or possibly you are looking to give your kids some home school style swimming lessons. Whatever your reason now is the best time to learn.

Let us start at the beginning. The first step in learning to swim is just getting into the water. For some this is the most difficult step because of a fear of water. Getting over your fear is going to take time, persistence, and patience, patience being the most important quality. Start with entering the water. For those of you who fear the water you may have to start with sticking your feet in and then slow work your way up until you are in to your shoulders. Again be patient this will take time.

Now that you have gotten to the point of getting in up to your shoulders you will need to work on submerging your head into the water. For this step you can close your eyes but you must not plug your nose. Take a deep breath and submerge your head then as you are putting your face under water exhale through your mouth and your nose. By exhaling through your mouth and your nose you will prevent the water from entering these openings and you will have both hands free to swim with instead of plugging your nose. Practice this for a while until you are completely comfortable and relaxed.

Once you are relaxed the next step is to practice floating on your face. Put one hand on top of the other and stretch your arms above your head. Next take a breath, you can hold it at first, then lay down with you face looking down, for now closing your eye is acceptable you can practice opening them later or get yourself a pair of goggles, put your legs together and stretch them out behind you. What should be happening at this point is you should be floating on top of the water. It is very important to have your hand stretched out ahead of you and your feet stretched out behind you. This is the streamline position. Once you are comfortable floating you can add forward motion but always return to the streamline position.

From this streamline position you can learn to do the breast stroke, crawl stroke, or even the butterfly. At the end of each arm motion you will want to return to this streamline position this will reduce the amount of effort you make and certainly make swimming much more enjoyable and relaxing. The point here is relax, relax, and relax.

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