Adult & Pre-school Classes
For ages 3yrs-5yrs
The Adult and Pre-school programme teaches children to be happy and safe in the pool. It develops essential water confidence and lifesaving skills. Classes are packed full of fun activities and games!
The swimming teaching is highly responsive to individual needs; skills, games and practices are developed to ensure individual needs are met for you and your child, and that they can progress throughout the course of lessons, to become confident, independent swimmers.
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St. Michaels Middle School
Colehill Ln, Wimborne BH21 7ABWe offer a range of morning and afternoon times weekly during term-time.
Tuesdays at 10.30 a.m.
Thursdays at 10 a.m. and 10.30 a.m.
Fridays at 1 p.m. and 1.30 p.m.
All lessons are 30 minutes in duration.
Free badge and certificate for each term your child attends.
Small class sizes of maximum 4 or 5 per class.
Flexible lessons: If you can’t attend your usual day, you are welcome to swap to another day in that same week.
Spectators are welcome in our poolside viewing gallery. Invite family members along to see how your little one is getting on!
Both parents/grandparents are welcome in the pool with baby.
Lessons are payable in a block from when you start. You can start anywhere in the term.
Swimming lessons are term time only.
A taster lesson is available to book and is only £12.
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Each 30 minute lesson includes a wide variety of water toys, resources and games to encourage development of the key water skills. During each lesson, children learn to enter and exit the water safely.
St. Michael’s swimming pool is a 17m pool, heated to a warm 30/31 degrees Celsius.
Instructors are experienced and fully qualified. They have extensive experience of children with special needs. Lessons are planned carefully and delivered to met individual children’s needs.
Floatation Aids: Children can use our disc arm bands or bring their own disc arm bands. Lessons use a variety of buoyancy aids, such as disc arm bands, noodles, small floats, or no buoyancy aids at all.
A typical lesson starts with a warm-up game on the poolside, then the fun starts in the pool. Children use our big frog floats for their kicking practise, or play treasure hut games. They learn to push and glide off the wall in streamline, float on their front and back, turn in the water, jump in from the wall or from big floats, or pick up sinkers from the pool floor.
All lessons are taught by fully qualified and experienced Level 2 Swim England/STA Swimming Teachers, with full DBS, Teacher Rescue Award qualification, and Swim England Safeguarding in Aquatics trained.
Adult & Pre-School class overview
Children learn best through play and having fun in the pool!
Our classes are packed full of fun and games to develop water confidence and water safety skills. We use songs to promote learning through repetition, rhyme and movement. During each lesson, children learn to enter and exit the water safely. They enjoy jumping in and child led under water swimming.
Lessons include games and songs that help develop:
Buoyancy and balance
Travel and co-ordination
Rotation and orientation
Aquatic breathing
Streamlining
Games include: The traffic light game, treasure hunts, the hungry crocodile game, swimming through hoops, rockets games, and many more.
Each lesson includes a wide variety of water toys and resources to encourage development of the key water skills.
Our resources include: Flashing dolphins, egg flips, dinosaurs, unicorns and transport water toys, colourful animal floats, large floats, large hoops, woggles, spongy and squirty animal toys, brightly coloured balls, floating bricks, buckets and watering cans, diving fish, and a turtle and a duck family! We also have our own ‘Baby Annabell Learns to Swim’ doll, that the children love!
KEY WATER SKILLS
Children will learn many of these skills in their pre-school lessons: Star floats on the float and back, rotating 180 degrees and 360 degrees in an up right position or in a log roll, pushing and gliding on the front and back using a streamline shape, jumping into the water (with or without support), blowing bubbles, submerging completely, kicking on the front and back, using arms and legs to travel in the water, learning a doggy paddle stroke on the front and a back paddle on the back, mushroom floats, and retrieving sinkers from the bottom of the pool.
Many of our children begin their pre-school class with disc arm bands on, and progress onto being able to swim independently without buoyancy aids or support.
FLOAT To LIVE!
We are very passionate about teaching self rescue skills, to help keep children safer near water. Children learn how to roll on their back to ‘Float to Live’, which is a very strong element of the RNLI water safety programme. Child learn how to jump in, turn and swim directly back to the wall. Learning these skills can help save lives.
Benefits of Pre-School Swimming Lessons with your child
Pre-school swimming lessons with your child offer vital safety skills, builds confidence and enhances physical development.
At Mini Manta Ray’s Swim School, we have found that having a parent/carer in the water with each child increases progress substantially, (compared to lessons without parents).
Children tend to be more relaxed and happy in the water with their adult present. Providing one-to-one ensures safety and boosts confidence. The immediate proximity allows for constant, active support, where adults can model skills to the child directly from the instructor. Skill development is accelerated through increased practise time, and no waiting around on the wall for the swim instructor.
Benefits include:
Bonding and fun: Participating in lessons together provides quality time together, strengthening the bond between you and your child.
Increased engagement: Parents can help keep children focused on the lesson, ensuring that they stay engaged and active rather than losing focus.
Safety & Survival: Swimming lessons teach essential water safety skills and reduce the risk of drowning. Adults can provide hands-on assistance, resulting in maximum safety.
Confidence & Independence: Learning to swim builds self-confidence. Having a trusted parent/carer close by builds comfort and a positive association with water, minimising fear.
Socialisation: Children develop social interaction with their peers, other adults and instructors, developing listening skills and the ability to follow instructions.
Physical Development: Swimming is a full-body workout that improves strength, endurance, coordination, and flexibility, benefiting growth.
Flexibility
Our swimming instructors teach from the side and in the pool. If you are unable to go in the pool with your child on one week, there’s no need to worry - our instructor can assist with your child from the pool for this week.
Getting you child ready for after school/school swimming lessons
In the final half term of the year, (in the Summer Term), before your child starts school, we offer a gradual transition, where the child learns to become independent and confident without their adult in the water with them. The adult spends increasingly more time away from the child in the water, and then (when the child is ready) the adult comes away from the pool and sits on the side during the lesson. This is gradual and optional, but we have found this approach very successful in preparing the child for their next steps when they start school.
Certificates and Badges
Your baby/child will be awarded a free badge and certificate for each half term of lessons that they attend. The Adult and baby/toddler & Pre-school lessons follow progression through the Swim England National Plan for Teaching Swimming (formally ASA).
The Adult & Baby and Adult & Toddler lessons will focus on Discovery Duckling award skills.
The Adult and Pre-school lessons will focus on the Duckling Award skills. All awards can be achieved with or without floatation equipment or support.
In our Adult and Pre-school Classes, children start at DUCKING 1, and then progress to Duckling 2, 3 and 4. After this, children can work towards achieving ‘I CAN’ badges, or distance award badges, such as the Puffin badge, or 5m and 10m badges.
The Swim England ‘I CAN’ Awards are perfect for babies, toddlers and pre-school aged children. The Awards recognise achievement of specific single successes for early learners. Your child can enjoy receiving a special badge and certificate for nine types of skill development:
…enter the water safely
…jump in
…float on my front
…float on my back
…roll over
…blow bubbles
…swim
…enter, turn, return
…exit safely
Badges that your child can receive at Mini Manta Ray’s include:
I CAN AWARDS (for jumping in, blowing bubbles, floating, for example).
DISCOVERY DUCKLING AWARDS (Levels 1 – 4).
DUCKLING AWARDS (Levels 1 – 4).
Puffin 5m badges (swimming with aids).
Rainbow distance awards, such as 5m, 10m an 15m badges (swimming without aids).
All lessons are taught by fully qualified and experienced Level 2 Swim England/STA Swimming Teachers, with full DBS, Teacher Rescue Award qualification, and Swim England Safeguarding in Aquatics trained.
ALL CLASSES
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Adult & Baby
For ages 0-18mths
Packed full of fun songs and activities to develop water confidence and water safety skills. -
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Adult & Toddler
For ages 18mths - 3yrs
Each lesson includes a wide variety of water toys and games to gently simulate toddlers and to encourage development of the key water skills. -
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Adult & Pre-school
For ages 3yrs - 4yrs
The Adult and Pre-school programme teaches children to be happy and safe in the pool. -
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Swim Lessons (Stages)
From 3yrs + to 12 years
Swimming lessons are from beginners with parents to Stage 4, and taught by our fully qualified Level 2 Swim England/STA Swimming teachers, with extensive experience with children of all ages and abilities, and children with special needs.
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Private Lessons
For all ages | 1:1 or 2:1 sessions
Private swimming lessons in an indoor heated Endless Pool in Corfe Mullen -
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Adult Swim Fit
For ages 18+
For recreational swimmers to triathletes/club swimmers/open water swimmers training for events. -
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Junior Swim Fit
Ages 13-17yrs
Stage 8 to club level.
The hour training sessions will include stroke technique work, drills, speed and endurance work. -
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Adult Mermaid Class
For ages 18yrs+
Mermaid classes for Adults are a fun and exciting way to get fit, meet new people and enjoy the freedom of swimming with a tail! -
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Mermaid Experience (5-8yrs)
For ages 5yrs - 8yrs accompanied by an adult
Our children’s mermaid experiences are an amazing way for your child to experience swimming like a mermaid, in a safe and friendly environment, with a fully qualified and experienced mermaid instructor. -
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Mermaid Experiences (8-14yrs)
For ages 8yrs - 14yrs | able to swim independantly and confidently
Learn to swim like a mermaid, in a safe and friendly environment, with a fully qualified and experienced mermaid instructor. -
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Mermaid Parties
For all ages
These private mermaid experiences will be great for hen do groups, birthday parties, open water swimming groups and anyone who wants to try something new, different and exciting. -
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Sensory Swim
0 - 24 months
Brand new Adult & Baby/Toddler Sensory Swimming Sessions in our indoor Endless Pool, in Corfe Mullen.
