Teach Freestyle to Children
Have you ever wondered if there was an easier, step-by-step approach to teaching freestyle to young children? Teaching freestyle techniques to children requires knowledge of innovative techniques that will help them to engage fully with the stroke in a way that they view the learning experience as both doable and fun.
Steps
- Practice the freestyle kick. Start your young students off with a kickboard. Check that the child knows how to hold the kickboard properly, as described here:
- Thumbs on top
- Fingers on the bottom
- Arms straight and on top of the board
- The chin should be at or near the surface of the water
- The bottom of the board should be held just in front of the student's chest.
- Teach the freestyle kick fundamentals first. By starting with kicking technique, you can get children enthused because this part is easy. In developing their kick, it is helpful to use cues such as: "fast feet," "small and fast," "straighter legs" , etc., so that they are immediately aware of what they are doing and how to fix it. By the way, this doesn't mean that their legs should be perfectly straight, however, "straighter legs" is still a good correction cue for beginners who have excessive knee bend. In addition, children will tend to make a lot of splashing (because they can) and while this can be tolerated initially, it should be discouraged over time or they will develop a bad kicking technique.
- Practice back kicking. The best method for teaching children back kicking is to use "back kick progressions". This means not just kicking on the front (stomach face down); it is important to practice on the back (stomach face up) too. The flutter kick skill practiced on the back transfers nicely to the freestyle flutter kick and for some children it is helpful because their face is not in the water to begin with.
- Practice a variety of breath control drills. The breathing aspect of freestyle is important to ensure a smooth, gliding stroke that takes the swimmer further. For children, such drills can be turned into a "game" to begin with. Examples include:
- Hopping Frog Bobs
- Stationary side breaths (this is demonstrated in the video sample below).
- Cues such as "Breathe in the mouth, blow out the mouth and the nose" work well too.
- Teach side breathing drills. Use both stationary and moving drills while using cues like "ear in the water breathe, face in the water blow it out."
- Practice the freestyle as a whole and in parts. It is always helpful to break everything down when teaching children, while still giving the children a taste of the whole stroke placed together. So, practice the stroke in parts as an excellent way to isolate different aspects of the stroke, but always end your lesson by having your child "at least" attempt to put the stroke all together. As described above, make good use of cues like "Breathe, stroke one, stroke two."
- Use kinesthetic feedback. No form of feedback is more effective than "kinesthetic feedback". This simply means allowing your student to "feel" the movement while you manipulate their arms, head position, or legs through a given movement pattern.
Tips
- Note on the highlight video several teaching techniques, such as the use of cues, feedback, check for understanding, and strategies for maximizing practice time. Take these examples and work them into your teaching repertoire.
- Note the various drills such as Hopping Frog Bobs, In-line Kick, Back Kick, Stationary Side Breaths, etc. – these are important because they help to break the stroke down into achievable steps and progressions, making it seem more achievable for a child.
