Club News & Blog

As we prepare for the holiday season and the upcoming New Year, we have some exciting new changes coming to our swim lesson program. The biggest change is that beginning with our January session, we will be going to a digital record keeping platform for most of our classes. All the pre-school (including frog) and school age lessons will transition in January. Our Crab and Duck parent/child classes will transition later this spring.

What this means, is no more wet soggy paper evaluations on the last day of lessons. You will be receiving a personalized report card via email for your child from the instructor. This email comes via DigiQuatics, which is a software program that houses our Starfish Swimming curriculum. With this new platform we have been able to customize the skills in each class and you as the parent will be able to see a live time record of what they have completed.

Going forward you will be able to see what levels they have previously completed and the skills they will be learning in future classes. In addition to this, we will now have the ability to look up an individual child and see what lesson they last took, even if it was some time ago. We do not currently have this capability, so this will be a welcome addition.

How you can help with this transition is by making sure you have an updated email in the system for each child. We will be asking for confirmation of email on the first day of lessons each session. When you register your child, ask the desk to confirm the email listed for the child. This will help streamline the always chaotic first day of lessons. We are very excited about what this new software will do to keep parents informed of progress for their children.

The second change you will see is that our curriculum which is provided by Starfish Aquatics Institute has had an update. They have streamlined skills and slightly rearranged the order in which strokes are taught. This has resulted in fewer skills needed to achieve mastery of a level. The instructors have been training on this and are excited to teach the updated curriculum.

This will go live for all levels excluding Crab and Duck in January. With the streamlining of skills and fewer skills to cover in each class, we are hopeful that this will spur faster progression through the levels. When you go to register for winter classes, register for the current level your child is in or recommended to take.

For the consumer you will likely not notice the curriculum changes for the beginner levels, as they were micro changes. As students move into the upper levels; Seahorse for pre-school and Level 3 and above for school ages, there is more of a focus on distance and endurance than the previous version. Do not be alarmed if you notice your child swimming more laps in these classes.

The curriculum has maintained its commitment to water safety and proper stroke technique. The changes were a result of worldwide instructor feedback and a commitment to best practices in teaching. We are committed to continuing to deliver a high-quality lesson for your children and thank you for choosing us for your child’s swim lessons.