The swimming pool.
Its weirdly enjoyable chlorine-y smell. When it reflects the sun and you’ve no idea who called your name or where they are. And where the loveliest, heart-melting playtime happened between two best friends. James and Ava.
Ava and James were in the swimming pool at our last Wokingham holiday club. They were playing with those dive sticks. You know, the ones you throw in and they sink and you dive under to get them.
It’s a shallow water pool. The kids can stand up in it and the water comes up to their chests or tummies. Perfect to play with water toys, have a good old splash about and get more confident in the water.
But even though it’s shallow, diving for toys or treasure is a bit tricky when you’re wearing armbands. James is still working on his swimming so he wears armbands to bob around.
But those puffed up water wings didn’t stop James and Ava from concocting a fun game with the dive sticks.
“I’m good at throwing the them," said James proudly.
“And I’m good at finding them and catching them!” Ava replied, splashing her arms around excitedly.
So James lobbed dive sticks all over the pool. And Ava zipped after them, swiping them away from the pool floor's reach.
If that wasn’t lovely enough. Now for the melty heart bit.
As they played, they told each other what a good job the other had done.
It’s hard to not smile thinking back to it.
Now, two things we love about this.
One – they knew their strengths and made a cool game out of them.
Two – their confidence. How easy it was for them to say aloud what they were good at.
When’s the last time as an adult you said out loud something you were good at?
Probably a while ago.
Holiday clubs help children get better at these skills.
New games, team sports, new things to play with, children they know and children they don’t know.
All these things combined makes opportunities to learn sharing, teamwork, communication and build self-esteem.
Maybe we should all take a leaf out of James and Ava’s book. Know what you’re good at. Say it out loud. And play to each other’s strengths.
The swimming pool's open at our Wokingham summer holiday club every Monday and Wednesday, then either Thursday or Fridays. And the dive sticks will be out.