Start of Term 1 – Mon 30 January 2017

2017 Term Dates

Term 1: Mon 30 Jan – Sat 1 April
SHP: Mon 10 Apr – Thur 13 Apr

Term 2: Tues 18 Apr – Sat 1 Jul
SHP: Mon 10 Jul – Fri 14 Jul

Term 3: Mon 17 Jul – Sat 23 Sept
SHP: Mon 2 Oct – Fri 6 Oct

Term 4: Mon 9 Oct – Sat 23 Dec

Welcome back to our returning students and welcome to our new families. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a great break over the holidays.

Over the holidays it has again been bought home to me, how quickly and easily we can get out of our depth and into all sorts of trouble and drown. We have seen a horrifying increase in the number of drowning’s. In NSW alone there has been 20 drowning’s since Christmas.

The following is an excerpt article from the ABC by Danuta Kozaki and Clare Blumer, which is a timely reminder for us all.

“It is definitely the season of distractions — the knock at the door, the ringing phone, other children crying out for assistance; they are the things that take our attention away from backyard swimming pools.”

Michael Ilinsky, a spokesman for the Royal Life Saving New South Wales, is addressing the current spike in holiday drownings.

The unusually high number of deaths has highlighted the greater danger water poses during the holidays, Mr Ilinsky said.

He said all beaches, pools and rivers posed risks to swimmers, especially children.

What conditions should people avoid?

Colleague, Liam Howitt said awareness about conditions was extremely important for swimmers getting in the water.

“It is really knowing about what your environment is like before you enter the water,” Mr Howitt said.

“This is the same regardless of what water you are entering into — whether it be the surf, the river, the pool, always check before you swim.”

Inland waterways are actually the leading fatal locale for drownings in Australia, according to the Royal Life Saving annual report.

Seventy-five people died from inland waterway accidents between July 2015 and June 2016, with 63 dying as a result of a beach swim during that same period.

When is it safe to swim in the ocean?

There is no absolute way to stay safe while swimming at unpredictable beaches.

“We can see how quickly things can happen,” Mr Howitt said.

“The ocean is a dynamic environment, with people getting caught in rip currents.”

People are encouraged to swim between surf lifesaving red-and-yellow flags.

“Also just knowing your ability as a swimmer is critical: if you are not confident, it is doubly important you swim during the daylight hours, between the flags,” Mr Howitt said.

How dangerous are rivers and lakes?

“Inland waterways are our most lethal environments when it comes to drowning,” said Mr Ilinsky.

“Our rivers, lakes and dams claim more lives than beaches, so we are seeing again a number of incidents across summer where people have gone into these environments, which are often colder, deep, and have muddy banks, crumbling banks, and even people not wearing life jackets when they’re on boats.

A warning to parents around pools

Mark Lever from the Careflight rescue service said while everyone needed to take extra care with backyard pools, parents had a responsibility to always supervise their children.

“Well, they call it the silent killer, with good reason: In every single instance you will hear that nobody heard a thing, the child seems to have disappeared, they were out of sight for moments.”

Please take care as we all enjoy the beaches, rivers and swimming pools.

Our Team

Matt will be filling in, in the first couple of weeks and back Term 2 from his European adventures.

Please be aware a change in university workloads for many of our teachers has meant some changes to rosters.

We will be running a number of shadowing lessons as part of our teacher’s professional development. You may therefore have two teachers in some lessons as we each watch and learn plus provide feedback to each other.

This is part of our continuing commitment to ensuring we have quality and consistency in our teaching and that all lessons continue to be tailored to meet the needs of your child.

We are confident that your child will enjoy all the programs and have continued success. Please speak to me if you have further questions.

Fee Payments

At the start of term before your child goes into class you will need to pay their fees. Either by direct debit three days prior to your first class or by cash/cheque at the pool on the day of their first lesson of the term.

If your direct debit is within three days of your first class, please bring a copy of your receipt.

Unfortunately your child will not be able to swim unless payment is made or an arrangement is made with us prior to the start of term.

Please see Kylie to discuss any concerns you may have.

Direct Debit Details –
Account name: Swim Like A Fish
BSB 633-000
Account no. 140351032.

Term 1 2017 – Class Payment Calculation

Term 1 has one public holiday – Labour Day on Monday 13 March

Sibling Discount

Second and third child discounts apply where you have 2 or more children in classes (not water familiarisation or squad as they are already discounted).

They are calculated at $18.00(1^st Child), $16.00(2^nd Child) and $14.00(3^rd Child) per class pro-rata of how many weeks there are in the term, taking into account any public holidays that occur. ($14.00 per class for each child beyond 3)

Water Familiarisation Classes

Tuesday 9.30am – 10.00am & 6.00pm – 6.30pm
Wednesday 9.30am-10.00am
Thursday 9.30am-10.00am
Saturday 9.00am – 9.30am & 9.30am – 10.00am

Where the Parents are in the Water with their children.
New Water Familiarisation starters commencing after the first week work out payments pro rata of $14.50 per class. There are no discounts for Water Familiarisation as this is already discounted.

Swimming Squad Classes

Tuesday 5.00pm – 6.00pm
Wednesday 5.30pm-6.30pm
Term 1 fees are $162.00
There are no discounts for squad classes as these are already discounted.

Missed Classes

Missed classes are not to be deducted from the fees. Make up lessons are available for any missed class for any reason where class sizes permit. As I’m sure you understand we have to pay teachers each and every week once term classes are set.

Swim School Policies

Just a reminder all our policies are now online or  you can pick up a brochure at the pool.

Finally as always as we have moved many students into after school classes, made various kinder changes and so forth – there have been many challenges.
Thank you to everyone for your patience and assistance, no doubt our start of year will still provide lots more.

If you have any queries please phone us on M: 0433 446 403 if you don’t catch us at the pool.

Many thanks, Kylie

Start of Term 2 – Mon 11 April

2016 term dates
Term 3      Mon 11 Jul  – Sat 17 Sept
Term 4      Mon 3 Oct – Sat 17 Dec

Welcome back to our returning students and welcome to our new families.

Thank you to everyone for spreading the good word about us, this term we are welcoming many new families into our classes due to word of mouth. 

Swim And Survive All Year Round

The importance of continuing swimming and water safety lessons during the colder months?

Despite the many myths associated with swimming lessons in winter, it is a great way to stay active and healthy during the colder months. Given that exercise contributes to a stronger immune system, children are less likely to catch a cold and more likely to stay confident and remember those vital survival skills.

Research tells us that pretty much all people know they should swim between the red and yellow flag. Surprisingly, two-thirds of people who think they can identify a rip current actually can’t.

Rip Current Survival

1. For assistance, stay calm, float and raise an arm to attract attention.
2. While floating, rip currents may flow in a circular pattern and return you to an adjacent sandbar.
3. You may escape the rip current by swimming parallel to the beach, towards the breaking waves.
4. You should regularly assess your situation. If your response is ineffective, you may need to adopt an alternative such as staying calm, floating and raising an arm to attract attention.

These may sound like simple options, but rip currents are complex, dynamic processes and all responses also have their pitfalls. Therefore, the best thing you can do is avoid them!

The best ways to do this are:

• Always swim between the red and yellow flags
• Learn how to spot rip currents and avoid them

For further information on rip currents, videos and finding a safe beach near you, visit: www.beachsafe.com.au or visit your local Life Saving club and have a chat to a Life Saver.

And if you, or somebody you know, are interested in gaining further knowledge through beach safety training, visit: www.lsv.com.au

NEVER SWIM ALONE – SWIM BETWEEN THE FLAGS – BE AWARE AND PREPARE

https://www.holdfast.co.za/single-post/2014/12/16/Beach-Safety-Tips?page_id=640 

Our Team

We farewell Nick at the end of this term. Nick is our longest serving staff member having been with us for over 5 years. His enthusiasm, dedication and commitment has been greatly appreciated by staff and students and we wish him every success in the future as he completes his Masters.

Swim School Policies

We have formalised our policies in a brochure. These are available from the desk or online from the website. There are no changes in policy, we are just updating our documentation.

Goggle-wearing children need to learn to swim without wearing goggles. Goggles serve as a swimming aid and like all aids (including backpacks and floaties); they should not play a permanent role in your childs aquatic development. Swimming without goggles will allow your child to experience the blurriness of the underwater environment and the physical sensation of opening their eyes underwater. This in turn will aid the child in learning to orientate themselves in this environment.

Swim files (v14.1.2)

Fee Payments

At the start of term before your child goes into class you will need to pay their fees, either by direct debit three days prior to your first class or by cash/cheque at the pool on the day of their first lesson of the term.

If your direct debit is within three days of your first class, please bring a copy of your receipt.

Unfortunately your child will not be able to swim unless payment is made or an arrangement is made with us prior to the start of term.

Please see Kylie to discuss any concerns you may have.

Water Familiarisation Classes

Tuesday 9.30am – 10.00am & 6.00pm – 6.30pm,
Wednesday/Thursday 9.30am-10.00am
Saturday 9am – 9.30am, 9.30am – 10am & 11.30am – 12noon.

There are no discounts for Water Familiarisation as this is already discounted.

Swimming Squad Classes

Tues 5.00pm – 6.00pm & Wed 5.30pm-6.30pm

There are no discounts for squad classes as these are already discounted.

Missed Classes

Missed classes are not to be deducted from the fees unless relating to serious injury/illness and must be discussed with Kylie first – catch up lessons are available for any missed class for any reason where class sizes permit. As I’m sure you understand we have to pay teachers each and every week once term classes are set.

Term 3 2016 – Class Payment Calculation

Direct Debit details:
Account name: Swim Like A Fish
BSB 633-000
Account no. 140351032.

If you have any queries please phone us on 0433 446 403 if you don’t catch us at the pool.

Many thanks,
Kylie

Term 4 – 2015 Information Bulletin

Term 4 Mon 5 Oct – Sat 19 Dec

2016
School Holiday Program -TBC
Mon 18 Jan – Fri 22 Jan

Term 1 Wed 27 Jan – Thurs 24 March
Term 2 Mon 11 Apr – Sat 25 June
Term 3 Mon 11 Jul – Sat 17 Sept
Term 4 Mon 3 Oct – Sat 17 Dec

Welcome back to our returning students and welcome to our new families. I hope everyone had a great break over the holidays.

Are you a Water Hero?

Take the online quiz at www.waterhero.com.au

• Be Aware – Don’t let kids out of your sight

• Be Secure – Keep fences and gates locked up tight

• Be Confident – Learn to Swim, and how to get to safety

• Be Prepared – Always have a plan in case of emergency

What are the Benefits of learning to Swim Several Strokes

• When you swim several strokes you use more muscles and your body gets a better workout.
•  The risk of a swimming injury is decreased because you don’t always stress the body with the same movements and the musculature is more balanced.
• Your swimming fun is increased because your lessons are more varied when you can choose among strokes.
• The skills that you learn in one stroke can often be transferred to another swim stroke. For example, the balance skills that you learn for the freestyle are also needed in backstroke. Or the body undulation that you need for the butterfly stroke is also an asset while swimming breaststroke.
• Knowing several types of swimming strokes can also be a big advantage for those in triathlons. Obviously, if you know freestyle you will swim faster and tire less than if you only swim breaststroke during the event. Switching to breaststroke in turn can be interesting when you need orient yourself, as you have better visibility than when you are swimming front crawl. And if you know backstroke, you can roll on your back when you are tired and take a few strokes in that position to recover.
  (Enjoy swimming Aug 2015-Christophe)

  Our Team

Please be aware we have some changes to rosters.

We will be running a number of shadowing lessons as part of our teacher’s professional development. You may therefore have two teachers in some lessons as we each watch and learn plus provide feedback to each other.
This is part of our continuing commitment to ensuring we have quality and consistency in our teaching and that all lessons continue to be tailored to meet the needs of your child.

Swim SAFER

A couple of years ago we became part of Swim Australia’s SwimSAFER program. Across all the program, the one central idea is that nothing we do can make children “safe”, but all the things we do in combination can go a long way to reducing a child’s risk around the water.
This includes things children themselves become aware of and do.

National Swim SAFER Week is from
Monday 23 November – Saturday 28 November 2015.

We encourage all children to practice all of the SwimSAFER week’s activities without their goggles on. Although this can be uncomfortable – in reality they would rarely have goggles on in an accidental fall in. During Swim SAFER week we will swim in clothes for each lesson apart from water familiarisation.

Swim SAFER talks about “LAYERS OF PROTECTION”

Four levels of safety measures that must be applied together and at all times in and around any aquatic environment.

Be Aware – Don’t let kids out of your sight
Be Secure – Keep fences and gates locked up tight
Be Confident – Learn to Swim, and how to get to safety
Be Prepared – Always have a plan in case of emergency

BE SECURE

If you have a home pool now is the time to check and make sure that the fences and gates are still SECURE.

Remember just because your child has had swimming lessons and can swim does not mean that they are SAFE in the water, they are SAFER, NEVER SAFE.

What is the history of swimming?

Human beings have been swimming for millennia. According to Wikipedia, Stone Age cave drawings depict individuals swimming and there are written references in the Bible and the Greek poems “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey” dating back 1,500 to 2,000 years. There are even Egyptian clay seals from 4000 BC showing four swimmers doing a version of the crawl, and the most famous swimming drawings were apparently found in the Kebir desert and were estimated to be from around 4000 BC.
According to the Encyclopaedia of Traditional British Rural Sports, literature specifically related to swimming grew in the middle ages. It is believed that the first book devoted to swimming was Colymbetes by Nicolas Wynman written in 1538, and a more widely recognized text, De Arte Nantandi, was published in Latin by Everard Digby in 1587. The encyclopedia also reports that swimming was required of knights and that Romans built bathhouses and pools in the cities they conquered to serve as social clubs and places to exercise.
Organized swimming began in the 1800s and 1900s with the creation of swimming associations and clubs(for example, the Balmain Amateur Swim Club in 1883 – the oldest in Australia) that competed against each other. There are reports from that era of swimming clubs in Australia, England, France, Germany, and the United States. High-profile events also contributed to swimming’s visibility. For instance, Matthew Webb swam the English Channel in 1875.
Competitive swimming continued to grow in popularity during the 1800s and was included in the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896. In 1904, the Olympics in St. Louis included the 50-, 100-, 220-, 440-, 880-yard and one-mile freestyle, the 100-yard backstroke and 440-yard breaststroke, and a 4×50-yard freestyle relay.
By the 20th century, swimming had become mainstream. Indoor pools were beginning to appear, most towns with populations over 20,000 had public outdoor pools, and swimming clubs became increasingly popular for recreation. Women participated for the first time in swimming in the Olympic Games in Stockholm in 1912.

Fee Payments
At the start of term before your child goes into class you will need to pay their fees. Either by direct debit three days prior to your first class or by cash/cheque at the pool on the day of their
first lesson of the term.
If your direct debit is within three days of your first class, please bring a copy of your receipt.
Unfortunately your child will not be able to swim unless payment is made or an arrangement is made with us prior to the start of term.
Please see Kylie to discuss any concerns you may have.

Term 4 2015 – Class Payment Calculation

Tuesday classes are a 10 week term due to Melbourne Cup and Mon, Wed, Thurs, Fri & Sat are an 11 week term.

Sibling Discount

Second and third child discounts apply where you have 2 or more children in classes (not water familiarisation or squad as they are already discounted).
They are calculated at $17.50(1st Child), $15.50 (2nd Child) and $13.50 (3rd Child) per class pro-rata of how many weeks there are in the term, taking into account any public holidays that occur. (It’s $13.50 per class for each child beyond 3)

Water Familiarisation Classes

Tuesday 9.30am – 10.00am &
6.00pm – 6.30pm,
Wednesday 9.30am – 10.00am
Thursday 9.30am – 10.00am
Saturday 9.00am – 9.30am, 9.30am – 10.00am & 11.30am – 12.00noon.

Where the Parents are in the Water with their children. New Water Familiarisation starters commencing after the first week can work out payments pro rata of $14.00 per class. There are no discounts for Water Familiarisation as this is already discounted.

Swimming Squad Classes

Tuesday 5.00pm – 6.00pm
Wednesday 5.30pm – 6.30pm
There are no discounts for squad classes as these are already discounted.

Missed Classes

Missed classes are not to be deducted from the fees unless relating to serious injury/illness and must be discussed with Kylie first. Catch up lessons are available for any missed class for any reason where class sizes permit. As I’m sure you understand we have to pay teachers each
and every week once term classes are set.

Direct Debit details

Account name: Swim Like A Fish
BSB: 633-000
Account no: 140351032.

In working to reduce our carbon footprint, unless requested, receipts will be emailed for cash and cheque payments only from the Wednesday the week after you have paid.

2016 School Holiday
Intensive Swim Program

Mon 18 Jan – Fri 22 Jan 2016
The classes run for one hour each day and cost $110.00 per child.
There is still a maximum of 4 in each class. If you are interested please complete the signup sheet on the table at the desk at the pool or speak to us to book in.
If you have any queries please phone us on
M: 0433 446 403 if you don’t catch us at the pool.

Many thanks, Kylie