Swimming

After only 3 or 4 trips to the pool, my daughter is now swimming widths with armbands and treading water without, and my son is having a great time splashing about both with and without armbands quite confidently (not sure if he is actually swimming or not as he splashes around so much!). But if I had needed any back-up for my decision not to put them in swimming classes, it was provided today when some swimming classes were going on for school children in the other pool while we were there. I was actaully quite shocked at how bad they were - they did the classes in groups of around 10 children - the others had to sit in the gallery and watch until it was their turn - and even when the the small group was actually being taught, it consisted mainly of them standing around on the side of the pool while they ignored the swimming instructor and messed around until they got shouted at. Then they had about 5 minutes in the water, then out and in with the next lot. Several of them were watching me and my kids rather wistfully as we swam and played about. I felt really sorry for the kids in the classes, it certainly looked dull to me.