You know what I hate? Paying for swimming lessons. But I do it because I feel like it is a critical skill for my kids to learn!
It took me a little bit to find a swimming school that was a good fit for us. In the end it came down to Goldfish Swim School and Aquatics Academy. Guess who won? Read on.....
I first started my son at Goldfish Swim School, and yes. He screamed the whole time! But they are so good with screaming kids! By the time the third lesson rolled around he liked going.
Let's talk about the pros of Goldfish Swim School first:
-The first pro is that it is a really fun swimming environment. The way the pool, the watch area, and dressing rooms are set up is great! Parents sit behind a glass window and don't have to listen to screaming kids. But they still get a full view of their child during their lessons.
-The teachers are really fun with the kids. They are very patient and do their best to make the kids feel comfortable in the pool.
-You get your first lesson free! Your kid will get to go to a lesson and the instructor will help determine which level your kid is at.
-You get free make-up lessons. If you can't make it to one of the lessons you are scheduled for, instead of losing the money you paid for for that lesson you are able to choose when you would like your child to make-up the class they missed.
-They have Family Swim times. As part of the annual membership fee you pay, you are able to take the whole family swimming there during the designated time they have for it.
Let's move onto cons:
-They do not offer private lessons (at least I couldn't find anything on their website regarding private classes). The classes have a 4:1 student-to-teacher ratio. So your kid is sharing their 30 minutes with 3 other kids. That doesn't give them a lot of time in the water.
-You pay $99 for 4 lessons each month. I just barely mentioned that you have 4 kids in a class. So you are basically paying for your kids to have maybe 5-7 minutes in the water (but not all at once) with the instructor, and then for them to just watch for the rest of the time. Expensive!
-They have a yearly membership fee that you have to pay.
-You need to give them a 30-day notice if you want to quit swimming lessons there. So you are forced to keep going for that last month, or just lose the money you paid for the month. They do not offer any refunds.
Let's move on over to Aquatics Academy. This is where I first started my daughter and yes. She also screamed her whole first lesson!
*On a side note: No, her headphones are not waterproof. We take them off before she gets in the water. It helps when her ears are under the water to muffle loud noises. If you are wondering why she is wearing headphones, I wrote an article about it here.
-They only offer private lessons. This is a huge pro to me! Your kid gets a full 20 minutes in the water just with the instructor. They won't have to sit on the side of the pool waiting for their turn to try a skill. And since they are private lessons, the instructor is able to focus 100% just on your child and see what skills need to be developed. Both my kids have progressed so fast!
-The teachers are so good with all the kids! Despite the screaming kids who are just starting out, they still are patient and fun.
-They focus first on survival skills. They start by teaching your child what to do if they fall into the pool. They keep working with your kid until they have mastered that, and then they move onto strokes and diving.
-At the end of each lesson the instructor will take a minute to talk about the swimming lesson. We got ideas of what we could do at home to help my daughter become more comfortable putting her face in the water. The suggestions have helped her so much!
-You are in charge of your own schedule. You pick when your kids go, who their instructor is, and how many times a week you want them to have lessons. It is incredibly flexible and they have so many different time options that work for different families. And a bonus: you do all the scheduling online!
Now for the the cons:
-They do not offer make-up lessons if you can't make it. Their policy is that if you can't make your lesson, you need to let them know 24 hours in advance. If you don't then you lose the lesson you paid for. However, you are able to purchase cancellation insurance for an extra $25 a month. If you do the insurance then you can cancel your lesson up to 1 minute before it starts and not lose your lesson.
-Time slots get filled up really fast when the scheduling session opens for the upcoming month. On the 15th of each month at 8:00 am the scheduling opens up for the following month. So for example: On May 15th at 8:00 in the morning, I am able to log into my account and start scheduling my kids for June lessons. The hard thing is that if you find a teacher that you really like, it can be hard to consistently schedule your child with that teacher. I remember one month I was so frustrated because I was logged in right at 8 and already so many time slots were taken for the specific teacher I wanted. I actually reached out to them wondering how they go filled up so fast. That is when I learned that you can sign up for recurring lessons with an instructor, and boy! Did that save me a ton of stress!
-Expensive. But really, where can you find swimming lessons that aren't expensive? You can either pay $27 per lesson, or $260 for 10 lessons. With the 10 lessons, you can divide them up however you would like. I divide them between both my kids. The recurring lessons are $3 extra per lesson.
-Their website isn't the best, it just isn't very intuitive. But they seem to slowly be making updates to it.
Those are the three cons I have for Aquatics Academy! I personally love Aquatics Academy more than Goldfish Swim School. Overall, the way they run their swimming lessons just works better for us!
If you do choose to go to Aquatics Academy, I would super appreciate it if you would use my referral code NC5134. Like I said, I hate paying for swimming lessons and that referral code will help me get free lessons 😇
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