How Can I Teach A Child To Swim?

First, practice the leg movements. Have the learner lie in the prone float position. He can hold onto the wall of the pool, or you might support him by holding your hand under his stomach. Now tell him to move his legs up and down from the hips in a flutter kick. This may begin to propel him along in the water, if you are holding him. Really commend him for this achievement. He is almost a swimmer!
Next arm movements are needed. A child may want to raise his arms out of the water as he has seen most swimmers do. But tell him that, to begin with, you want him to pull them under the water.
Have him assume the same prone float position, again placing your hand under his stomach for support. Tell him to reach out first with one arm and then the other. The arms should be moved in much the same way as a dog moves his legs in swimming. As one arm is reaching forward, the other is being pulled down and back.
It is now only a matter of simultaneously kicking with the legs and stroking with the arms to move the body along. When the learner can do this, he is actually swimming! He is using the so-called "dog paddle," the basic swimming stroke.
Of course, there is much more to learn to become a good swimmer. In time, the person will lengthen his arm stroke, eventually finding that he can increase his speed by reaching out over the water. Now he is beginning the crawl stroke, the fastest and most popular one. But he needs to learn to synchronize proper breathing with his arm and leg movements to do it successfully. All of this takes practice, practice and more practice.

Swimming has a lot to do with confidence, begin by teaching the child to float this will give them the confidence to do other things in the water.