Now you’re in the water we want to look at building your confidence and a strong foundation for you to build your strokes upon. Before we place our face into the water we need to look at breath control, this is something that we don’t think about on a daily basis but for many can be the most challenging thing when learning to swim. Take an easy breath and slowly in a controlled manner breathe out, try breathing out through your nose as this can be associated with calming and relaxing activities such as mediation, practise this continuously until you feel confident enough to do it with your face in the water.
Now were going to move around the pool within our depth, placing our shoulders under the water, once you feel confident enough to do so, start to place your face into the water and count how long you can keep your face in for and every time you do it try and beat the previous time.
Once you’ve completed your previous step confidently, were going to move on to floating on the water, we’re going to start on our back. Get your friend to stand behind you, start to slowly lay on your back and get your friend to cradle your head in their hands. Lay back with your ears in the water and relax as much as you can, let the water do its job and float your body, your legs may sink don’t worry about this to start with.
When you’re feeling relaxed and confident doing this, repeat it again but imagine there is a string running through your fingertips, all the way through your toes and someone is pulling on this tight. Keep your legs together and try to perform a long straight pencil float.