How to Teach a Kid to Swim, With Dolls

July 4, 2025

This swim season, make a splash by teaching your child to swim with a little help from their favorite LullaBaby doll. Featuring tips from a swim instructor, these playful ideas combine practical water safety with splish splash fun.

Practicing these key swimming fundamentals, with lots of encouragement, is a great place to start if you want to know how to teach a kid to swim. And with a little help from their LullaBaby bath doll friend, learning to swim becomes even more fun.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Getting Comfortable in the Water

The number one thing to do is help your child feel safe and relaxed in the water. Start by letting them bring their LullaBaby bath doll into the pool. This simple comfort can make a big difference.

Get in the water first so your child sees you’re right there with them. Hold them close as they hold their doll, and start with gentle, playful activities. Sing songs, splash gently, or lie on a pool float and pull them around the water.

If your child is in the water and smiling, you’re winning. Their doll becomes a trusted companion and helps build water confidence.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Splash Games

Next, introduce movement with a bit of imagination. Splashing is a great way to build familiarity with water. Use your imagination and pretend you’re making pizza or baking a birthday cake. Stir the batter, chop ingredients, and spin around in the water until the imaginary food is prepped.

These fun pretend-play tasks get kids splashing, reaching, and kicking, without even realizing they’re practicing swim motions. No toys are needed, just creativity and enthusiasm.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Collecting Pool Toys

To keep building comfort in the water, bring out floating pool toys for a new collecting game.

You can extend your pizza game by assigning roles to the toys: yellow ones are cheese, red ones are sauce, etc. Ask your child to gather ingredients by swimming toward them and bringing them back to a designated spot. It doesn’t have to be pizza. You can collect anything, fish for an aquarium, animals for a farm, letter to spell their name. Anything that gets them moving and excited.

Support your child by holding their waist, especially if they’re still holding their LullaBaby doll for comfort. Being by their side keeps the experience fun and safe while helping them practice leg kicks and arm movements so they can one day swim on their own.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Blowing Bubbles

Blowing bubbles is a crucial step in teaching kids how to avoid getting water in their mouth or nose. Get face-level with the water and show them how to blow gently through their mouth to create bubbles.

You can even tie it into your imaginary splash games. Play in the water as you make an imaginary birthday cake, then make a wish and blow out the candles! Start by blowing on your index fingers above water. Then, gradually sink your fingers under the water until you blow lots of bubbles.

Celebrate every try with big smiles and cheers. This simple act builds the foundation for underwater swimming later.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Jumping & Dunking

Jumping into the pool can be a big, brave step for little swimmers. Start small: hold your child’s hands while they jump from the side into your arms. Reassure them with cuddles and show them that even if their head goes under, it’s not scary, it’s fun.

Use their LullaBaby bath doll as a guide. Let them throw the doll into the water first, then jump in to follow. This gives them a visual marker for where to jump, helping them avoid getting too close to the pool’s edge when they leap.

You can also practice dunking. While holding your kiddo under the arms, dunk your head under the water to show them that it is safe. Then, go underwater with baby doll at the same time. By the end of this exercise, all three of you, parent, toddler, and babydoll, should go underwater together. Babydoll is there every step of the way.

How to Teach a Kid to Swim: Practicing Floating

Floating is another essential skill when learning how to swim. Start with back floats. Teach your child to lie like a starfish, arms and legs out, with water over their ears. Demonstrate how their LullaBaby doll floats, because she’s an expert, and ask them to copy.

Then introduce belly floats. These might feel uncomfortable at first, but they’re great for teaching kids how to swim with their faces in the water, which they’ll need to do when doing front strokes.

You can also make it fun with the pancake game. Pretend to mix pancakes with your child, mixing and choosing ingredients together in the water. Then, demonstrate how a pancake is cooked with their Lullababy doll, flipping the doll from back to belly until you baby doll pancake is ready.

On your child’s turn, be sure to hold them under the arms and rest the back of their head on your shoulder for reassurance while they float on their back. Make sure their chin is up and their arms and legs are outstretched. When it’s time to flip, help your little pancake roll over to their stomach for a front float. Encourage them to blow bubbles while their face is in the water to combine skills. The bubbles mean the pancake is ready.

Remember: the key to a successful float is to relax.

Final Tips on How to Teach a Kid to Swim

Teaching a child to swim takes time, patience, and a sense of play. By bringing a comforting toy like the LullaBaby bath doll into the pool, you can reduce their anxiety and get them comfortable and excited about swimming with a friend. With your gentle support, creative games, and consistent encouragement, your child will learn at their own pace and have fun doing it.