All Strokes - Steve Haufler Teaching Progressions

Important Note to the Viewer

LESSONS: 29 VIDEOS

How to Teach So Swimmers Will Learn

Swimmers learn in many different ways. They learn with visual cues – from seeing you demonstrate, or by seeing video and photos of world-class swimmers. They learn from verbal cues – from hearing an explanation of what to do – either from you or from a video. Verbal cues are even more effective when you can paint a word picture of how the swimmer should feel or what he will look like when he’s doing something correctly. Swimmers learn by doing – by having you physically guide their movements until they are part of correct muscle memory. They learn from visual feedback. This can be instant feedback from mirrors placed on the bottom of the pool… …Or it can be delayed feedback from seeing video of themselves as they swim. And they learn by using mantras – simple and easily remembered sequences of words that can be repeated in the swimmer’s mind. A great teacher will incorporate all of these styles of learning, and will be aware of which methods work best for each swimmer. My advice is to try them all. Start by having a basic teaching progression that takes you step by step from floating to whole-stroke swimming. But within that framework, try everything you can to keep your teaching fresh and memorable and fun.

What to Teach First... The Progressions

My basic teaching progression – and I use this for all four strokes with a slight change for butterfly -- is like this: Teach the correct Body Position. Teach the correct Kick (while maintaining correct body position). Teach the correct Arm Action. Teach the correct Timing (coordinating the arms and the legs). And, finally, teach correct Breathing (when to breathe and how to breathe without distorting the body). For each step of a teaching progression I try to do the following: Demonstrate. I demonstrate, give a verbal explanation, and then repeat the demonstration. The swimmer may try the skill at this point. If they need help, I go to step 2, which is to… Physically assist the swimmer through the correct movement. Step 3 is to let the swimmer try the movement without my assistance. Step 4 is feedback and correction… …or praise if they’ve done the movement correctly. Step 5 is to repeat the skill as needed until the swimmer can do it correctly on their own. Part of the art of teaching is to know when to move on to a new skill if a student is at a learning plateau. If you sense a loss of focus, or a regression in skill level, it’s usually best to switch gears. Sometimes, by taking a break and moving to something new, the swimmer can come back to the original skill and do it correctly. An experienced teacher will also know when a step may be skipped or when a swimmer is able to grasp an additional fine point. It’s usually best, though, to cover all the steps, and you should always keep them clear in your mind as you move through the lesson. You should always know where you’re headed, and know the path or progression that will get you there, which is the topic of our next section.

Teaching Progression for Breaststroke

The five priorities – or steps – for teaching breaststroke are: Body Position Kick Pull Timing Breathing

Breaststroke Body Position

The first step in teaching breaststroke is to teach the correct body position. We call this the breaststroke float position – or the missile position – and it is not the same as streamline. Missile position means the head is in a neutral position, with eyes looking down. The arms are extended, but instead of having one hand over the other, the thumbs are just touching or locked, and the fingers are pointing straight ahead. Hide your ears, and squeeze your ears with your shoulders. We make sure to tell the swimmer to finish every stroke in this position!

Breaststroke Kick

To teach a correct breaststroke kick, we start on deck, with the swimmer lying on their stomach on a kickboard or mat. We use a mantra – a repetition of words – because repetition is another way that kids learn. The mantra for breaststroke kick is: Suit (bring the heels to the suit)… …Flex (turn the ankles out)… …Circle (circle the feet out and around)… …Squeeze (squeeze the feet and legs together at the finish of the kick). We start on deck, with the coach working the swimmer. We practice it by having them hold onto the wall. And we practice it with a kickboard. We have them finish by kicking on their stomach with arms in the missile position, and tell them to hide their ears when they kick. Keep repeating the mantra – suit, flex, circle, squeeze – until they can get the correct movement on their own.

Breaststroke Pull

Once the swimmer has a correct kick in the missile position, we go to the arms and teach only the arms, with no breathing and no kick. Our mantra for the pull starts with “I” – the letter “I.” Then we press to a “Y.” And then we Scoop and Shoot. That’s it. I, Y, Scoop and Shoot. Start in missile position. Outsweep to the “Y.” Catch and scoop toward the eyes on the insweep. And then shoot through your hair and settle back into the missile position.

Breaststroke - Full-Stroke Timing

Once we have the arm pattern, we put the whole thing together with something called Separation Drill. We do the arms and the kick, but keep them completely separate. We go I…Y…Scoop and Shoot, and then… Suit…Flex…Circle…Squeeze. Do the arms only. Do the legs only. Some kids, when you tell them to do Separation Drill, do a perfect breaststroke right away. They just go right into it. Other kids, some of the real conscientious ones, do exactly what you tell them and it’s not a perfect breaststroke. So then we say OK, just start the kick a little sooner, and that usually gives them the correct timing.

Breaststroke Breathing

After we put together the body position, the kick, the pull, and the timing, we go to the breathing. We tell them that after the “I” and the “Y,” we want them to freeze for a second… …then scoop and breathe, and shoot to “I.” Once they are able to do this, we tell them to take out the Freeze. They simply go I…Y…Scoop and Breathe…then Shoot to I. There’s no pause once they go to Y. The final step is to add breathing to the full stroke. And that is a simple progression for breaststroke.

Butterfly Body Position

For teaching butterfly we start with the butterfly float. This is with arms extended not exactly straight ahead and not exactly in a “Y,” but somewhere in between. This is what I like to see, and I want them to be able to float like this on top of the water. I want them to get the feeling of being really soft on top of the water. We want them to suck in the stomach. We want them to flatten the back.

Butterfly Pull

Once they get the butterfly float position, we go to the pull, and the mantra is: Float…Diamond…Angel…Swing. We don’t push back to the legs. We pull in to a diamond… …then push out to the side to make an angel… …then swing back to the butterfly float position. Float…Diamond…Angel…Swing. You want the swimmer to float and move directly through the water with no body motion.

Butterfly Body Dolphin

Butterfly kick is really a full-body kick – or Body Dolphin. We start with hands by the sides. We press in on the chest – press in on the lungs. You’ve got air in the lungs so you press the air into the water. You press it down then come back up. We start with hands by the sides… …then go to body dolphin with hands out front in the butterfly float position. Have the swimmer do just one cycle at a time: Float…Body Dolphin…Float. Then stop. We try to avoid the “hula hands” in front. Just keep the hands and arms near the surface – just floating near the top.

Butterfly - Full-Stroke Timing

When your swimmer can do a perfect butterfly float. And when they can do arms that swing around and go back to the float position. And when they can move up and down through the water by pressing and releasing the chest, then we put the arms and the body dolphin together. I do this in two different ways. First, we start with a separation drill. We tell the swimmer to Float… …then Diamond…Angel…Float…and do a Body Dolphin with arms in front. Then we have them float and start all over again: Float…Diamond…Angel…Float…followed by a Body Dolphin with arms in front. The next step is to speed it up. Start each cycle in a float, but don’t hold the float quite so long. Sometimes you speed things up and you get a good butterfly right away because the better athletes go: Float…Diamond…Angel…and then they go, well, why not do it right now? And they lift their hips up right away when they get back to the Float position. Other kids get back to Float and they stop, so you might put fins on them to speed things up, and this is just one of the ways you can use tools to help the teaching process.