Water Wise System of Learning

Water Wise Swim Squad has a series of levels of stroke progressions and skill development. Each level has an “Advancement Goal.” When your child first joins our squad we give the parents a list of our advancement goals. This way you can see the path of development we are shooting for with your children. When Coach Jeff or Jody see that a student has attained the skills for advancement, the student will be awarded a gold sticker for their chart. This serves an award for improvement as well as an affirmation that they are doing well. These stickers really keep the kids motivated and it is fun to see how excited they get when they earn one.  

When the kids get to the point of graduating from level 10, they will earn a WWSS trophy! And they really do EARN it, by having developed the skills to swim at least 350 yards freestyle (20 lengths in our pool) in ten minutes, was well as swimming a 100 Individual Medley (IM) with proper form! Quite a feat! 

Students in our Water Wise classes are grouped into their appropriate level based off their age and their swimming skills. Our age range is 6-12 years old. The minimum requirement for six and seven year olds is to be able to swim freestyle (“big arms”) for at least 35 yards (two lengths of our pool.)  Students eight years and older should be able to swim 50 yards freestyle (3 lengths) at least 17 yards backstroke (1 length.)

We teach the kids the four competitive swimming strokes – freestyle, backstroke, butterfly and breaststroke. We also teach the kids how to do flip-turns, racing dives, streamlines, circle swimming and treading water. We even have little “mini meets” during classes so they kids can get a taste of the sport of competitive swimming. These meets also also a great learning opportunity for the kids as we are always stressing that the best way to “swim fast” is to “swim smart”… so they are being challenged to try and really focus on swimming with good form while trying to go as fast as they can. Easier said than done!

Below is the list of our Levels. Each new student will have an in-water evaluation to determine their skill level. This evaluation is typically done during the registration period for the upcoming session. It takes only a few minutes but it helps us get an accurate placement for the child’s skills.

Level 5: Freestyle
Level 6: Backstroke
Level 7: Individual Medley (IM) Awareness
Level 8: Breastroke or Butterfly
Level 9: Breastroke or Butterfly
Level 10: Mastery – Graduation