00:00At Blyer Primary School in Strood, some of the Year 5 pupils are diving into a new challenge.
00:05This 1.2 metre deep mobile swimming pool has become the newest addition to the playground
00:10and will sit here for six weeks.
00:13Access to the local authority swimming pool is quite tricky for us.
00:19It would take at least half a day from curriculum time for our children
00:23and it would also have an increased cost in terms of busing the children to and from
00:28or walking them backwards and forwards to the swimming pool.
00:31I mean, we live on an island. That's always my starting point.
00:35There's rivers, there's lakes, you know, in very close proximity
00:40and we just want our children to be able to save themselves.
00:43One in four children leave primary school unable to swim 25 metres
00:47and even more worryingly, unable to save themselves should they end up in danger in the water.
00:51We feel that every child should be able to swim and especially where we live near the coast.
00:57It is one of the most valuable skills that a child will learn.
01:01It's both the theory and the practical side of what to do,
01:05whether they fall into a body of water, they see somebody else.
01:09We teach them how to float on their back, they fall off the ladder.
01:13We teach them of the different things they would do down the beach,
01:16the safer areas for them to swim, what colour the different flags mean.
01:20So we do a whole session on that as well, survival skills, if they were down the beach or near
01:26a river.
01:27Keeping the pool for this stint costs the school ÂŁ15,000.
01:31But the head says the price tag is a drop in the ocean of its worth for children here.
01:36The BFC, Blythe Fundraising Committee, they give us some of the money towards it
01:40and that money obviously comes from our community, comes from our parents.
01:4420% of our children have swimming lessons prior to swimming as part of our curriculum offer here at school.
01:51So it would be 80% that wouldn't have formal swimming lessons before having the opportunity to do it here.
01:57So the cost is the cost, but you win back in lots of other ways.
02:24While there's not much that can be done about sharks,
02:27the teachers here are hopeful that the pupils won't be out of their depth
02:31for the next time they put their swim caps on.
02:33Chloe Brewster for KMTV in Strood.
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