The Los Angeles Unified School District if offering free swim lessons for elementary school kids this summer.
L.A. Unified brings back their Beyond the Bell Branch Portable Pool Water Safety Program for the summer. The program, which started in 1963, teaches children between the ages of 5-12 how to swim and water safety.
"We teach the kids level one and level two water skills," said Susana D. Castellanos, who taught more than 1,000 kids how to swim with the LAUSD program. "We teach the children how to swim but we also prepare them for life threatening water emergencies."
All of their swim instructors are American Red Cross certified in Water Safety. Castellanos said they use the Learn-to-Swim Levels 1 and 2 checklist from the American Red Cross as a guide.
During Level 1, children are taught the introduction to water skills including how to step in and out off a pool using a ladder and how to blow bubbles through nose and mouth.
During Level 2, they are taught fundamental aquatic skills including the elementary backstroke, breast stroke and resting strokes.
"We teach the kids skills in Level 2 that will help them prevent treading water quickly in situations where they may need to save their own lives by staying afloat," Castellanos said.
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The program began June 11 and ends Aug. 8, 2018.
Aligned with California's water conservation and recycling initiative, pools will be open at 16 elementary schools with a 4-week rotation at each site. Lessons take place Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and run from 25-30 minutes long.
For more information about the program click here.
