Why Swimming?
Drowning is now the 2nd most common cause of accidental death for children under 5 in the UK, so it’s really important we’re teaching our children about water safety from a young age and the first place we can start doing that is of course, at home in the bath!
Bathing baby
Now it’s not the 1950’s anymore; you will be allowed to leave the hospital without having to prove to a midwife that you can bath your baby! That being said, many of us return home and when it comes to that first bath time or the inevitable poo-explosion, we sometimes have a little panic about what to do.
If you’ve seen a newborn baby in person or even on the TV, they come out covered in this cheesy yellow substance. It looks a bit gross, but it’s actually really handy! It’s a moisturisation layer called vernix. Because of this, you don’t need to give your baby a bath for about the first 10 days of it’s life. Instead, your midwife will advise you simply top-and-tail wash them. That’s all well and good until you have that inevitable poo-explosion! So whenever you bath them, here are a few helpful tips that have come from our swimming mums and dads over the years!
We want to create a positive association with water from the beginning, so it’s important to make sure that during bath time baby is both safe and comfortable. You can use either a plastic baby bath or your adult bath from birth – like with everything in parenting, it’s about choosing what’s best for you and your situation!
Roll up a towel and place it in the bottom. It absorbs the warm water so it keeps baby warm, it’s comfier than the plastic backing, and although you won’t be taking your eyes off baby, it acts as an extra non-slip surface so you know that if you need to reach for the shampoo bottle, baby isn’t going to slide down the bath.
Make the room warm - We all remember swimming as a child – the transition from the pool back to the changing room was horribly cold! Just because you’re having a bath it doesn’t need to take place in the bath room - just wherever its warmest really- in the lounge or on the kitchen table. Maybe you’ve had the heating or fire on downstairs? If you’re using your adult bath, stick the shower or hot tap on and steam the room up for a few minutes. Also, wrap baby’s towel around a hot water bottle before you give them their bath so it’s nice and warm when they are finished!
Feed them in the bath- this creates a lovely association between water and their favourite thing – feeding! Bath time is normally done before bed when tired and hungry - so great idea to have a little feed in the water. Have baby on your chest at shoulder depth in the water to keep them warm but keep an eye on their face so it doesn’t go near the water.
What to do in the bath
Word Association –It’s all about teaching children not to panic if they fall into water, as you’ll remember my statistic at the start of this talk – the children that drown do so because they’re so overcome by the sensation of falling into the water. What this skill does is it helps normalise that startle response so they can start focussing on what’s next – kicking to the top and holding onto the side. It’s also great for hair washing later on! Name, ready, go – big bucket over the head! Done! Sit baby upright, say their name (to get their attention), are you ready (because we’re asking them a question) and then ‘go’ – go is our keyword for triggering baby’s gag reflex. You could use any word whatsoever to form this word association, and in our classes we use name ready dive, name ready splash, etc, but go is our underwater keyword. As long as you use the same words every time it doesn’t matter what you say but keep it on topic! Babies are super clever. They’re born with a natural response called a gag reflex and this is where a valve at the top of the windpipe shuts off anytime their face is immersed in water on the surface or underwater. Because they elicit the same response on the surface as well as underwater, it means we can utilise this from the start! So once we’ve said name, are you ready, go, we pop a handful of water over their face and wipe it away with the same hand action. You’ll find by the 3-4th week of doing this a few times every bath time, you’ll say the words and baby will close their eyes and purse their lips because they know what’s coming.
Back floating – It's important to get used to having ears in the water as it’s a hard thing to ‘un-teach’ with toddlers who join us with no experience. Back floating is the first chance baby had to experience their own balance and buoyancy in the water so it really stimulates all four quarters of the body and gets them moving. It's a great skill for building confidence and independence like these two Water Babies Charlie and Harrison, who are showing the various progressions of a simple back float in the pool!
Moving onto swimming
There are a few things to consider when taking baby swimming.
• Immunisations – NHS advice is that you can take your baby swimming at any age, both before and after they have been vaccinated. It doesn’t matter if they haven’t yet completed their course of vaccinations. It used to be that the polio vaccine given to babies was live and babies were advised to wait until they’d had their full course, but this was stopped in 2004, and that’s when the guidelines changed to ‘from birth’ – many older Health Visitors give out-dated advice!
• Call the pool to check temperature and quiet times. You don’t want to turn up during aquafit or school lessons as it’ll be a sensory overload for baby. The pool needs to be warm enough for baby - Under 12llbs-12 weeks need hydro around 35° Over 12llbs-12 weeks then pools should be 30°
What to pack?
• Happy Nappy System- pass around happy nappy and inner reusable nappy. We think they’re called ‘happy’ nappies because they keep our pools happy! Paper disposable swim nappies aren’t designed to hold anything. They can’t contain the absorbant chemical that normal disposables do otherwise they’d swell up! Chlorine kills wee but not poos, and poo can contain something called cryptosporidium, which could make everyone using the pool very sick. So erring on the side of caution, anytime a poo escapes, the pool must be evacuated and closed for back-washing. No one wants to be the Mum whose baby pooped in the pool, so double-up with the nappies – the neoprene nappy has snug bands on the waist and legs to keep any nasties contained long enough for you to notice and hop out.
• Towel (hot water bottle)
• Hat for afterwards as babies lose heat through their heads
• Wetsuits if pool is cool
• Favourite toy for positive associations with the water
In the water ‘what do I do now’?
If you’ve been swimming already, did any of you get in and then just stand there thinking ‘now what?’ – I was guilty of that! • Name Ready Go – same as in the bath
• Swim Position - Cup your wrists together and keep eye contact, and move them head first with you walking backwards.
• Back floating – same as in the bath
• Check the temperature and keep an eye on your little one, normally can tell if cold as lips and fingers tips will start to look blue, or mouth with chatter. Underwater swims
• Gag Reflex - Like I explained before, we can utilise baby’s gag reflex. Practice some name, ready, go’s on the surface then when they’ve cracked it, have a go at taking them underwater.
• Underwater Swims:
There are two main reasons that we at Water Babies swim little ones under the water.
1. Safety – So like I said previously, it’s about removing that startle response to falling into water and working on what comes next.
2. Toddlers learn to swim underwater far sooner than on the surface – it’s much easier for them to take a breath, push off and glide than it is to coordinate their breathing, stroke and technique on the surface.
• It's important not to take them down vertically. Have the conviction to follow through. Make sure their whole head goes under – there are nerves in the top of their head that tell their body when they’ve gone underwater, and in turn they help the body know when it’s fully back out of the water and trigger that first breath. We don’t want to confuse baby so make sure whole head goes under. Once up, have a cuddle and bounce them up and down. Some babies do a bit of a funky chicken after going underwater, some cry, and some have a really strong gag reflex (especially if they’re young) so they may still hold their breath for a few seconds. It can feel like forever, but just bouncing them up and down in that cuddle will help them feel the water coming off their body and will help them know to take a breath. Also tickling their feet can do the same!
• Babies will be super tired and very hungry afterwards. 30 mins in the pool is like 3 hrs at the gym for us – I couldn’t last that long, so it’s no wonder they’re sleepy and hungry!
Why take them swimming?
• Mainly, because it's splashes of FUN!!!!
• It's amazing what babies can actually do! They’re like sponges, taking in so much information. It's a great way to encourage that learning.
• Swimming position increased muscle strength and tone and hand eye coordination, better sleeping patterns.
• Bonding opportunity for you, Dad, or whoever wants to take baby!
• Skin to skin – helps regulate babies breathing, body temperature and heart rate.
• Make friends with other mums – all learn to be confident together
• Starting so young means they never have the feeling of ever learning to swim. Happy and confident in water is so important in the area we live! Picking a swim school
• Babies and toddlers that swim are miles ahead in certain aspects of their development than their non-swimming friends...
Food for thought
• Regulations in baby swimming came in only a few years ago. Check for teacher qualifications (are they qualified to assess and award swimming stage awards, or are you just getting the equivalent of a chapter badge every term), are they insured?
• What do you want out of lessons? A lesson plan, progressive classes, just a bit of fun, lots of songs, courses or no commitments? Shop around and find what works for you.
• Added extras – we incorporate baby signing into our lessons, for example.
• Check for hidden extra costs – cheaper isn’t always better!
• Are they ‘Water Babies’? Having been the leaders of the pack since 2002, we swim over 50,000 children every week in the UK alone! It means that a lot of people try to copy what we do, and although it’s flattering, we think if you want the Water Babies experience, then why settle for anything less than the originals!
Any questions, please contact me on saira.wood@waterbabies.co.uk!
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