Swimming Club

Magdalen Court School runs a swimming club throughout the year. Run by qualified ASA (Amateur Swimming Association) swimming teachers & assistant teachers. We take advantage of the close proximity of Exeter University St Luke's Teacher Training Campus, only a short stroll from our school. They have a lovely swimming pool which we not only use for our swimming  club, but also for our canoe club.

Lessons run every Thursday, during term time.

We usually have 5 groups, following the new ASA, NPTS (NATIONAL PLAN FOR TEACHING SWIMMING).
These are divided into 2 separate sessions

• Non Swimmers, Beginners & Early Improvers
• Intermediate & early competitive swimmers.

We also run special sessions through the year for: 

• ASA Helper (Junior swimming assistant course), usually linked into The Duke of Edinburgh Award
• Personal Survival
• Life Saving 
• Kayaking introduction
• Kayaking: learn to Eskimo roll
• Learn to snorkel

We try to ensure our sessions are FUN, yes we do ensure technique is developed in the four swimming strokes, and this is the core of every lesson, but we always play games to, sometimes this is: water polo, Octopush (underwater hockey), tag, underwater frisby, kayak games, retrieving objects of the pool bottom & many more. Swimming is the doorway to an enormous amount of fun on, in & under the water & Exeter is sat in a fantastic location to take advantage of this.
We have on our doorstep the:

• relative flat South coast
• wild north coast, surf & tidal races
• reservoirs up high in the hills
• costal estuaries, some of the prettiest in our land
• slow meandering rivers
• exciting & challenging white water rivers, pouring down of Dartmoor & Exmoor

The school is lucky to have our swimming club co-ordinator, as a qualified coach in: swimming, scuba diving, kayaking & canoeing. He is also a keen sailor & surfer, although his wakeboarding skills need a lot of work. Water courses, under, over & through him & this enthusiasm is infectious.

A little about the NPTS. (follow this link to the ASA web site)
The NPTS (National Plan for Teaching Swimming):

Article from Swimming Magazine Jan. 2006 explaining NPTS

• Develops a wide range of skills - the content of the NPTS prepares swimmers to participate in a variety of different disciplines and in so doing develops a more rounded and more skilful performer. This will increase the range of opportunities open to the swimmer in terms of future development whilst at the same time provides a sound skill basis for those wishing to progress to the competitive aspect of the sport.
• Provide assessment against clearly identified outcomes - assessment is a critical aspect of the NPTS as this forms the basis for progression from one level to another. The outcomes are clearly stated and provide a reference point by which progression can be easily measured.
• Provide a direct link to the ASA Awards Scheme - the ASA incentive Awards Scheme provides an excellent means of motivating swimmers of all abilities whilst at the same time provides a simple way of measuring progress. The development of the NPTS has provided the opportunity to produce twelve new awards, the criteria for which match the outcome of the various levels of the Plan. The provision of the awards now becomes a logical consequence of the teaching process.

Below are a few of the experience we build into Magdalen Court School's Outward Bound Program,
which utilize the above skills outside of our swimming lessons.

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