Aqua-Tots Swim School Midlothian

I will be honest we’ve only had 2 lessons but I’m incredibly impressed. I have a daughter who’s extremely headstrong and stubborn. I worried she would scream the entire time. She had the greatest instructor today who worked patiently with her and did amazing! Having worked in an ER I think water safety is so important for little ones and so far aqua tots is delivering.

This is a great place to take your kids to learn water safety and basic swimming skills. If you are a parent who needs to be hands-​on all the time, this probably isn’t the place for you. They do not allow parents into the pool area (you can watch from outside, however). We paid for lessons at our neighborhood pool for two years and my son refused to put his face in the water. During lesson 1 at AquaTots, they pushed him under the water. Guess what? No tears, no anguish, nothing. Win!
My only gripe with this place is the constant turnover with the teachers. My son would have one teacher who would be talking about him moving up to the next level. That teacher would leave and the next teacher would tell me that he needed lots more work on certain things. Then that teacher would leave and the next one would tell me that he was almost ready to move up. After several sessions like this I’d had enough and pulled him from AquaTots.
While he was there he did learn how to swim and actually their water safety skills saved his life during one very scary event at an unfamiliar pool. I would definitely enroll my youngster there for a while and let them learn the basics and how not to be afraid of the water. For more focused instruction after that, I would find a private instructor who can work with them on the specific areas they need help with.

Fantastic place. Our five year old has had trouble picking up swimming despite lessons at our pool, so we brought him here on a friend’s recommendation. We are so impressrd by the professionalism of the instructor, Alex, who improved his swimming more in three lessons than we had in months on our own. There is something much better about having a different person than the parents teach, but who is better than a teenaged lifeguard. Excellent.

WARNING — Do not take your infant/​toddler here. There are vastly better options that won’t terrify your child or fail to disclose unfair policies.
Chaotic environment: BEWARE that your child will be in a lesson with up to four children and that lesson will be one of eight different classes with different instructors going on in a small pool simultaneously. That means a couple of things:
–The environment will be incredibly loud and chaotic making it incredibly difficult for kids to focus and respond to the instructor’s direction. NOTE: I would highly advise against Aqua Tots if your child is vulnerable to becoming overstimulated in loud situations with lots of varying activity.
–The eight tiny squares of pool allocated for each class are inadequate for learning and practicing any significant movement or stroke technique as children progress
–For classes with little ones and their parents, infants and toddlers cannot hear the reassurances their parents are providing to build trust for things that are scary to them (like being completed submerged under water). This often results in one or more screaming babies throughout the entire class with the instructor’s reaction being that the screaming «happens all the time» and moving on to the next activity. I do not consider the screaming normal when I take my toddler to our quieter, neighborhood pool and practice the same techniques with all smiles and no screaming.
One-​size fits all, Assembly Line approach: Instructors are young and follow a very regimented set of activities for every class. In addition, classes have children that are within the same age group but at varying levels. For example, a class might include one child who is in her first week and another who has been going for several months. A child must do the same activities whether it is his/​her first week or several months in with minimal modification available. If a child struggles or isn’t getting it, there is no time to practice or try alternative approaches before jumping to the next activity. This results in spending money on a lesson but sometimes seeing little or no progress because there is not enough time to work any one child through a place where they might be stuck.
Deceptive Billing Practices: When we called to cancel, we were told we would be charged for an additional month’s membership that we would not use because they required 30 days’ notice for cancellation. This policy WAS NOT DISCLOSED to us during the sign up process and basically would have required that we cancel the membership before our child’s first lesson to avoid being charged for another month. This deceptive practice basically guarantees that they will get at least $ 150 out of every child that tries the program even if they decide it is not a good fit after the very first class!
Conclusion: Please do not get lured by what seems like a good deal. They will snag you with what seems like a reasonable monthly membership rate and then nickel and dime you for a lot more with «required» accessories and unfair cancellation policies that are not disclosed up-​front. Not to mention the fact that the environment is completely unsuited for effective instruction. You can do a much better and more compassionate job teaching your little ones to swim on your own. If you are not comfortable with that, spend a little more and go to a reputable and caring program that will teach your child at their own pace and not risk making them fear the water by forcing them to do things they are not ready for in a loud and chaotic environment that makes it impossible to build a child’s trust. They will learn much faster which will produce much better results in much less time. Our experiment with Aqua Tots-​Midlothian was a complete waste of $ 200. Lesson learned and we will certainly warn Midlothian friends, neighbors and family not to repeat our mistake.

I wish I could give more than 5 stars! I could not disagree more with the one negative review on here. We have done two sessions with Aqua Tots and have had a wonderful experience! The staff are friendly and knowledgable. The instructors are patient and understanding. The lessons given are designed to meet your child where they are in terms of comfort, fear, etc… while encouraging both confidence in the water and safety around the water! As a mom and a pediatric nurse, learning to swim was not an option — it’s a safety issue and my responsibility to make sure my child learns this skill. Aqua tots has served this purpose beautifully and my daughter now LOVES the water! We will continue to come and highly recommend this business!

Aqua tots is amazing! My son had no concept of swimming at 6 years old and has learned so much in so little time. I was apprehensive of the price, but have discovered that it is so well worth it!
The staff is fun, kind and kid friendly all while still being structured and focused. I would highly recommend (and have) this place to anyone looking to get the most out of swim lessons.