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Poolside parody

Time to mime in support of safe swimming, as we tackle poolside and open water dos and don’ts.

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You’ll need

  • A4 paper
  • Pens or pencils
  • Bowls
  • Scissors

Divide and fold

  1. Split everyone into small groups of between two and four.
  2. Divide a sheet of paper into equal sections and write a pool safety rule in each section. Cut these out with scissors, fold them in half to hide the rule and put them in the bowl.

Action!

  1. Each group should come up with a place in the local area where it’s possible to go swimming. This might be a leisure centre, lido, sea, river or lake. They should also think of features of their swimming area that make it a safe place to swim and features that might make it risky.
  1. Go around the groups and see what they’ve come up with. Each group should share one feature of their swimming area that makes it a safe spot for a dip and one risky feature that swimmers need to look out for.
  2. Each group should come forward one at a time and pick a rule out of the bowl. They should keep the rule to themselves. Without saying anything, each group should work together to act out their rule with motions, as you would in a traditional game of charades. Everyone else should try to guess the rule being acted out.
  1. When a person correctly guesses the rule being acted out, their group should go next. Play until each group has had a couple of turns, or until you run out of rules to pick. You could also have groups take turns to make sure everyone gets a go. Groups should then keep score of how many they guess.
  2. The group that guesses the most acted-out rules is the winner.

Reflection

Working together should’ve helped each group give a convincing demonstration of each safe swimming rule. They were able to act out scenarios and mimic shapes from signs. Communicating the rule without speaking is still a challenge though – how did groups work around this? Did using body language like this, instead of spoken words, make the rules easier to remember afterwards?

Safety

All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.

Scissors

Supervise young people appropriately when they’re using scissors. Store all sharp objects securely, out of the reach of young people.

Active games

The game area should be free of hazards. Explain the rules of the game clearly and have a clear way to communicate that the game must stop when needed. Take a look at our guidance on running active games safely.

Restrict the movements of players to make this activity tougher. For example, each person in a group could only be allowed to move one limb. In this instance, groups may need a moment aside to plan how they’ll work together and act out the rule.

Make it accessible

All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.

Swimmer Stage 1
Swimmer Stage 2
Swimmer Stage 3
Swimmer Stage 4
Swimmer Stage 5

Plan a visit to a local pool, beach or lake to see how many of the rules from this activity are featured on signs or handouts. Look out for any new ones too.

You could book a free visit from the RNLI to learn more about water safety. 

Let everyone share their swimming experiences wherever possible during this activity. Some people might have visited saunas or Turkish baths or used hydrotherapy pools and hot-tubs. Find out what the rules were for using these.