Children's Academy Class Details
Children's Academy Learn to Swim Age Groups
Children's Learn To Swim classes are normally grouped in the following categories. This can vary at times due to current swimmers or individual strengths in the pool, but every care is taken to ensure swimmers are with those of a similar age and ability:
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Ages 4-6yrs, Ages 5.5-7yrs, Ages 7-10yrs, Ages 9-11yrs, Ages 11yrs+ and Ages 13yrs+
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Children's Academy Learn to Swim Class Names ​
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We run the STA Learn to Swim Pathway but we have added Swim England Level Comparisons here if that is the Level you know. There can be a few variations to this depending on individual groups and when they begin in the programme, but we take care to match classes on the skills and strengths they have, and their ages and development requirements.
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New Starters (STA Stanley 1 or Swim England Stage 1 equivalent - new and nervous swimmers)
New to lessons or nervous, can paddle with a back float/support aid and woggle, not confident with water on the face/blowing bubbles
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Beginners (STA Stanley 2/3 or Swim England Stage 1 equivalent)
Can travel more confidently with woggles and able to blow bubbles
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Beginner+ (STA Stanley 4/5 or Swim England Stage 2 equivalent)
Can travel with just floats, confident in the water and able to put faces in, can paddle/travel short distances unaided or trying to swim independently
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Improvers (STA Stanley 6/7 or Swim England Stage 2/3 equivalent)
Can swim approx 5m without floats on front or back. Able to submerge fully and jump in
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Improvers+ (STA Goldfish 1/2 or Swim England Stage 3 equivalent)
Can swim approx 5-10m. Able to swim this distance on front and back. Confident in deeper water
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Swimmers (STA Goldfish 3/Angelfish 1 or Swim England Stage 4 start of Stage 5 equivalent)
Can swim approx 15-20m front and back. Confident in deeper water
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Swimmers+ (STA Angelfish 2/3 or Swim England Stage 5 equivalent)
Can swim 25m+. Confident in deeper water.
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Children's Academy Advanced Series Level Names
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Advanced 1 (STA Shark 1/2 or Swim England Stage 6 equivalent)
​Advanced 2 (STA Shark 1/2 or Swim England Stage 6 equivalent)
​Advanced 3 (STA Shark 3 or Swim England Stage 7 equivalent)
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Progress Charts and Awards
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Progress Charts
Once booked onto a course, your child's Home Portal will be visible and then from the first class onwards, progress will be updated by the teacher. This means you can follow along as skills and swims are marked down in the following grades:
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Tried - This skill/swim has been taught for the first time in class.
Repeated - This skill/swim has been tried again and/or items have been added to build on the basic first try.
Improving - This item has now being tried a few times and is now improving.
Capable - We are confident that the first completed attempt at this swim/skill has been done.
Competent - Your child is regularly completing this skill/swim comfortably and so can be completed on their chart.
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Once they have completed 100% in all areas, the teacher will award the level/badge and this will show on your Home Portal.
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Awards/Badges
STA personalised online awards (sent by email) are available for all parents to purchase. These are not compulsory as we want to give parents the option to buy these if they want to. The award and date of the award is also visible on your Home Portal.
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We use an online award service as this reduces costs for our swimmers, saves wastage on poolside with soggy certificates, and also means we can send these to you directly quickly after payment is received. Online awards are sent directly to parents on receipt of payment (just £2 per award) and you can then use this for whatever you would like - posting online on social media, sending online to family/friends, or if you would like to, you can print these off directly, the choice is yours!
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Hard copies of these awards are also available to purchase directly through the office. These cost £4 per award and include the certificate and badge. Please note that these will be delivered to the pool for collection at lessons as soon as possible but they do take longer to process. If you wish to have these posted then there is an extra £4 fee per delivery.
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Purchase details are sent to all booked swimmers each month.
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If you have any questions, please ask the office directly!
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