Swimming Pool Games

Marco Polo is a classic favorite but as a lifeguard, it is not one that I'm a huge fan of.  In above-ground pools with only one water depth, it can be fun.  In a pool with multiple water depths and various abilities of swimmer, not so much.  It's never fun having to rescue Marco from the deep-end because they weren't looking where they were going.
As a daycare lifeguard, I split up the students' free swimming time with game time.  Game time usually occurs after fifteen minutes of free swim but you can start it any time that you see your swimmers are beginning to grow restless.

Sharks and Minnows
In this game, there is one chosen shark while the rest of the players are minnows.  Minnows stay on one side of the pool while the shark stays on their side of the pool, looking outside of the pool.  The Minnows objective is to sneak as quietly as they can to the Shark's wall and touch it without the Shark tagging them.  The Shark cannot peak to see if Minnows are coming, but can only use their sense of hearing to listen for Minnows trying to cross the pool.  Once the Shark has turned off their wall to begin catching Minnows, no Minnow is safe until they touch the Shark's wall.  Any Minnow captured by the Shark can either: be caught on the stairs for the remainder of the round OR becomes a Shark too.

Categories
In this game, there is one chosen category leader.  The remaining players stay on one side of the pool while the leader stays on their side of the pool, looking towards the other players.  The leader decides on a category (i.e.: colors, tv shows, pets, etc.).  The players mentally choose something in the category.  The leader will then begin calling out items that fall in the category (i.e. colors: yellow, red, green, etc.).  When a player's choice is called out, they must attempt to swim to the leader's side of the pool to touch the edge before the leader catches them.

Winter Soldier
In this game, every player is given a word then told to swim as normal.  When the caller says their word, they "activate" and begin trying to capture the other swimmers and store them at the stairs.

Splash Attack
In this game, everyone is spread out to different places on the wall.  At the lifeguard's cue, they hold the wall and begin to kick with their legs making giant splashes.

Wave Pool
In this game, you require noodles and/or inner tubes.  Students use their flotation toy to rock the water as much as they can before jumping on their flotation device and ride the rocking waves.

Races
This is just various races from swimming races, bouncing races (yes, in the shallow end), and other various ways of moving across the shallow end.


Feel free to share your own with me.