So, today I swam in my pool for the first time! Wonderful, I hear you say sarcastically! However, I should explain why it is so wonderful, for me anyway! I have been lucky enough to house sit during the lockdown – in a huge, slightly dilapidated house. When I moved in, the pool was empty and full of leaves and animals (dead and alive). So I thought “great, I’ll just fill it up & swim” Little did I know the weeks of work this would take! Cleaning with hydrochloric acid, angle grinding paint off, cutting out the rotten cement, re filling & finally painting...Oh & fixing the pump. It had some strange fungal growth in it that looked like rotten smoked salmon! Not pleasant at all... I’m not even going to go into the crash course in pool maintenance in this blog. That’s a tale in itself
It’s been a labour of love, but finally I can swim in it
However, after a few lengths and a lounge around on the lilo, I was starting to get a bit bored (&wrinkly!) But there is no way I’m allowing myself to lose interest after all the time (and money!) its cost me to get this far… so time to look on the internet and find some fun things to do.
There’s lots of web info for “fun things to do in the pool” as, now summer is here, it’s time to take the plunge and get fit.
There’s race and tag games, battle games and order giving games, all, unsurprisingly, involving swimming. One of my favourites is one based on nautical terminology (all to starboard!)
Funnily enough, a lot of the games I’ve looked at can be adapted to teach English.
For example, on this web page https://icebreakerideas.com/swimming-pool-and-water-games/, there’s the “categories” game. In this one person choses a topic and then tries to guess what the other people chose. Simon says is easy and a great silly game to play in the pool too. Some of the most fun vocabulary games can also be played in water. For example, chose a variety of objects, throw them in the pool, then shout out the name ( or description) of an item. The race is on to collect and return it to win! Floating foam letters could be used to make an “alphabet soup”; the longest word wins ( or the correct spelling, on a topic, to answer a question). If points, and of course prizes, are awarded, this is a great way to spend some time in the sunshine.
During the long, hot summer, spend some time with your friends and family learning English – and splashing around in the pool
But as I’m in lovely sunny Spain I thought I could combine this with learning Spanish!
! ir al lado de estribor!!