Toddler Water Safety

Toddlers have a higher drowning risk than any other age group, largely due to their impulsive and curious natures.

As a result, the statistics are telling: Drowning is the leading cause of death in toddlers aged 1 to 4. Here’s what you need to know to protect your toddler from dangers in and around the water.

Create More Layers of Protection

Barriers around pools, bathtubs, and natural bodies of water can be life-saving. Install a regularly inspected fence with a lock and key that goes around your pool and keep the key out of reach of children.

See our Water Safety page for more information on creating barriers of protection as well as learning the ABCDs of water safety.

Assign Water Watchers

Grandparents, caregivers, or any responsible adult can be a water-watcher. Whether it’s at the pool or lake, encourage them to be in the water for safety reasons and, if they’re rusty at being a water watcher, remind them of the basics.

It’s always important to remind caregivers to be in arms reach of children at all times around water.

Install an alarm to monitor movement around the pool

 

It’s best to buy an alarm that beeps if doors or windows to the pool are open, and one that goes off when the surface of the water is disrupted by movement.

Install anti-entrapment drain covers

Ensure that your pool has anti-entrapment drain covers.

These drain covers avoid entrapment hazards, which can cause your toddler to become trapped underwater.

For more information on this, please see our Pool Drain Safety page.

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Empty water containers after each use

 

Don’t leave toddlers without adult supervision around filled buckets.

 

Be sure to empty any liquids from containers when they’re not in use.

Make sure kids wear life jackets in and around natural bodies of water

 Learn how to evaluate the best life jackets for your kids in the water.

Note: Water wings and floaties for toddlers are not acceptable substitutes for life jackets.

Swim lessons

 

Most children are ready for lessons by their 4th birthday. For toddlers who are just learning to swim, we recommend parent-child lessons to encourage comfort around water.

 

As we mentioned in our Infant Water Safety page, the AAP recommends starting child/parent swimming lessons as early as 1 year old.

Over 350 children, with a majority being younger than 5, drown each year nationwide

 

Sadly, Black children are 5.5x more likely to drown than white children.

69% of children younger than 5 years old were not expected to be at, or in the pool, at the time of a drowning incident

Florida leads the country in unintentional drownings by toddlers younger than 4 years old

 

The state hit a 10 year high in child drownings in 2021, with 98 deaths. This is up from 69 deaths in 2020.

~4000
people drown each year

Make swimming fun and safe for those you care about.

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