Meet Shannon O’Lear of Little Loggerheads Swim School

Today we’d like to introduce you to Shannon O’Lear. 

Hi Shannon, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I put my 6-month-old daughter in aquatic survival lessons as we had a creek in our backyard and swimming lessons were important. At the time, I did not know drowning is the leading cause of accidental death for children under the age of 4 but I have come to find this statistic all too real. When I saw the method and what my daughter accomplished in a few weeks, I thought it was the most amazing thing I had ever seen and was determined to become an instructor. 

Ten years later, I trained with Infant Aquatic Survival and opened Little Loggerheads Swim School in 2011. I advanced my training with swimsprout, LLC, to make lessons more efficient for and easier on a student’s learning process. The method takes six to eight weeks of daily 10-minute lessons for a child to gain independent self-rescue skills in the water. Lessons are short to enhance muscle memory, learning retention, and reduce fatigue. Young children also have a short attention span. 

I have personally trained more than 2,000 children between the ages of 6 months and 8 years old. I have received countless reports from my clients of how these lessons enabled their child to survive an aquatic accident when the scenario could have been much different without aquatic survival. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The biggest obstacle I and other survival instructors face is pool space. Most community pools do not want to rent to survival instructors because our young clientele cries, which is how non-verbal children communicate. Community pools are often too cold to safety provide lessons to young children either. 

We also have a proven methodology to equip children with life-saving skills instead of advancing unskilled children through aquatic programs that do nothing to prepare them for independent swimming. While none of us think pediatric drowning prevention should be a competition, most facilities do not see it this way. 

I “pool hopped” for nine years before opening my own pool. Clients often offered their private backyard pools in order for me to provide lessons. Now, with my own pool, I can teach far more students life-saving skills. 

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
We are the most established survival school in Columbia. We are well-known for teaching babies and toddlers life-saving aquatic skills in a matter of weeks, not years. 

I am most proud that many of my students have put their skills to use when the time came. Vigilant parents know accidents can happen in a second and preparing their child in every way possible is important. 

Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
Watching a child execute their aquatic skills by swimming and floating in just a few weeks never gets old. And watching parents be amazed at what their very young child can accomplish is also up there. 

Contact Info:

• Email: Littleloggerheads@hotmail.com
• Instagram: @LittleLoggerheads
• Facebook: Little Loggerheads Swim School
• Youtube: Little Loggerheads