Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Side Breathing with Front Crawl

One of the harder skills to teach is side breathing while doing the front crawl because it requires more coordination and practice. This article I found especially helpful as a guide to teaching the basics of side breathing. Some of the related articles at the bottom of the article were also good, but meant for more fine - tuning.

View the comments below to see what our teachers have to say.
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7 comments:

  1. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:39 PM

    Sarah: One way I teach them is to have them put their finger tips on the edge of the pool and have them practice as though they were swimming, even though they'd just be standing in one place.

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  2. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:40 PM

    Lisa: I pretend all the kids in the class are spies and I have them put their face in the water while holding on to the wall with two hands. Then I have them take quick, sneaky breaths to their side. I tell them they have to be quick breaths to the side so they can breathe but that they are fast because as spies they don't want to get caught. Its fun and works!

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  3. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:41 PM

    Danielle: After we have practiced breathing to the side and we start to put it all together, I tell them that when their arm creates a window out of the water that is when they take a breath because once their window closes ( their arm enters the water) they have to put their face in the water.

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  4. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:41 PM

    Camille: I have them put both hands on the wall, blow bubbles and then roll their head to the side, keeping their ear in the water. Then I add strokes, but still on the wall. Then we do it out in the water with kicks, etc.

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  5. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:42 PM

    Lauren: I have my kids hold onto the wall and blow out their bubbles then breathe with one ear still in the water. then we turn around and hold the wall with our backs towards the wall and arms holding the other way because it's harder to take your chin out of the water that way, and then we do 10 more side breaths...if that makes sense!

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  6. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:43 PM

    Elissa: Hey, for side breathing a good skill to use is the pancake flip. It gets them used to turning up on their side and getting their ear in the water, also if you use it while swimming it gives them time to breath and rest if they are tired. They don't always need to but i have found that it works for some of the kids that struggle a lot.

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  7. Swim CoordinatorAugust 17, 2011 at 5:45 PM

    Madison: This session I started really focusing on having the kids do bobs with blowing bubbles out of there nose fore 3 seconds and then coming up for air. So when I teach side breathing I talk about how when they do their bobs they have to blow out their air under water to take a breath when they come up. I compare this to side breathing and they seem to understand really well.

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