Free Swimming Teacher Resources

Every resource on this page is free. They're the things I'd hand a teacher on their first morning on poolside: a plan to follow, a checklist to keep you on track, and a template to make your own.

Use them as they are, print them out, scribble all over them. They're here to save you time, so you can spend it on the swimmers in front of you rather than on paperwork.

Pick what you need below.

New to Teaching? Start With the Survival Pack

Those first few weeks of teaching can feel like a lot to hold in your head at once. The Survival Pack puts the essentials in one place:

- a professional standards checklist
- a five-step risk assessment framework
- a BLABT stroke analysis cheat sheet (body position, legs, arms, breathing, timing)
- poolside positioning and communication guidance
- a simple method for giving feedback
- an equipment guide
- tips for teaching different age groups

Free swimming lesson plans download for teachers

Five complete, ready-to-teach lessons, each with warm-ups, a main theme, teaching points and assessment notes. Pop your email address in and they come straight to your inbox.

Teach them exactly as written, or use them as a starting point and adapt them to the swimmers in your class. That's how I'd use them.

30 minute swimming lesson planning checklist

A 30-minute lesson goes by in a flash. This checklist walks you through the 10 parts every lesson needs, from your aims and warm-up through the main theme, your contrasting activity and how you finish.

Run through it before every lesson and nothing gets missed.

A Blank Lesson Plan Template

Prefer to plan your own lessons? Here's the same layout I use for my lesson plans, left blank for you to fill in. Save it, print it and use it as many times as you like.

10 free swimming games for children

Ten games that use the power of play to teach the basic building blocks of swimming: moving through the water, breathing, floating, submerging, gliding, kicking and pulling.

Each game tells you the skill it teaches, the equipment you need, the key phrases to use and how to progress it. They're written for parents, but every one of them works just as well in a class of nervous beginners.

Pop your email in and they come straight to your inbox.

Free Guides for Your Learners

I also have free technique guides for people learning to swim: how to float, plus a basic guide to each of the four strokes. They're ideal for pointing adult learners and parents towards between lessons.

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