La Petite Baleen Swim Schools

If you want your child to learn to swim in a fun and child centered way, this is the swim school for you! We have two very skilled and personable teachers. Our three year old has a special bond with her teacher - and our 17 month old just started at this swim school. Her teacher is extremely patient and knowledgeable. The children in her toddler class are already soooo comfortable in the water and I'm blown away by the skills they have already.
when you see the children swimming- smiling and making progress- you know they are doing something right at this school! Also I feel comfortable with their covid protocols - and we continue to swim.

We love La Petite in Half Moon Bay! For all of our kids over many years we have requested teacher Cindy. She is by far one of the best teachers there. She is friendly and playful with her students but stern enough where she keeps them focused! I always feel like my kids are very safe with her in the pool and each one has loved her so much! She is patient and kind and uses techniques that a lot of the other teachers don't! Even my daughter who hated (and I mean HATED) water, soon learned to enjoy swimming because of Cindy! If you choose this swim school, ask for her! This woman deserves a raise, she is a kid whisperer when it comes to the pool!!

Gamechanger for Our 4yo.

We started going to LPB in HMB 6 weeks ago and in that short timeframe our 4yo son has gone from water tentative to water safe and totally in love with swimming. He has had a rotation of different teachers and ALL have been exceptional at managing the lessons and the group of 4yo boys. There are never more than 4 in any lesson and 30 minutes is ample time for everyone to get in the practice they need as well as practice taking turns, having good listening and controlling their bodies in the water. He would go every day if we let him and he has progressed so rapidly we are thrilled esp given how he regressed during the pandemic and was starting to develop a fear of swimming. Our son also loves playing in the little front park with the kids form his class post lesson.

Our 7yo daughter also goes and is already on Level 4. She loves learning stroke development as well as diving. She enjoys all of the teachers and challenges she's had thus far.


And finally, scheduling has been a breeze which was a huge challenge for us at other schools in the past. LPB helps us find lessons that work with our schedule and there are many choices to choose from. The HMB team could not be more nice, professional or thoughtful. They are all on their game.

Cute house with a swim pool inside. The party area is small. There is a slide. Changing area is also small. There is a parking lot and play structure in the front.

The swim instructors here are awesome,
especially Todd! As all with LPB schools it's the pool is always warm and the facility is always pristine. The variety of water toys always keep our son active. I have no idea what we'll do when he graduates!

I took my son to swim lessons for babies, and he really enjoyed it!
Warm water, great stuff.
My only concerns would be - tiny locker room and sometimes might be no parking available, but there is tons street parking.

I took my son here for swim lessons, which he thoroughly enjoyed. The instructor was kind, cheery and attentive with all the little babies in the class which I loved.

I had to stop taking my son due to timing. We we were scheduled for a weekend class in the middle of the afternoon, which started to prove to be hard to attend. So I decided to call and discontinue our enrollment for the time being, until a more suitable time became available.

This is where the issue began...I have spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to get through to someone on the phone to cancel. I've left multiple messages, all unreturned. I've sat on hold for 30-45min at a time on numerous occasions wondering what could possibly cause a swim school to constantly have such long waits. At this point I'm fully convinced no one is sitting at a desk to even pick up. This seems to be a regular pattern of beyond poor customer service on the business side of things. On a separate occasion prior to deciding to cancel I had tried to call their office to let them know my son would not be attending class due to illness, and that I'd like a call back to reschedule the session. Interestingly enough, I never received a phone call back but I did receive a call when they needed payment for tuition. They had switched systems for scheduling / payment so my saved credit card did not transfer over so they were eager to get me on the phone to update payment. I had mentioned to the woman on the phone that I'd called and left a message regarding my son not being able to attend and had yet to receive a call back for that, and that I had actually thought that it was the nature of the phone call I was receiving from her originally. She apologized and let me know that they're currently backed up due to the scheduling / payment system switch, but that its not a common occurrence for them to not return calls otherwise. At that point in time I was forgiving and understanding, but that quickly vanished when I realized that it is in fact a common occurrence that is basically ingrained in their business practice.

To date, I have yet to receive a returned call. I had to resort to calling my credit card company (spending even more time on the phone) and letting them know that the payments being taken from my account were unauthorized and therefore fraudulent -- which in all honestly is entirely true.

Their actual swim program is great, but if they keep up the business side like this then they are going to end up with more unhappy, disgruntled former patrons. At this point what I intended to have be a break from swimming for my infant son at this establishment might turn into a full blown break up, and joining classes at another swim school that has better customer service practices.

My 7 y/o son has been going here for the past 6 months and I'm amazed how much he has learned. The swim instructors are focused, knowledgeable and committed to teaching the kids how to swim. He gets a full 28 minutes in the water and the average class size is 3-4. He's learned 3 times as much here than at the YMCA or any other swim lessons.
The only problem is that once he gets a bit older, he has to go somewhere else.

Get in, get them swimming and get out.

This is definitely the best place for a child to learn confidence in the water, how to hold breath properly and how to swim. The instructors are great, the HMB location is cute. But once your child is swimming, move to another school.

The ribbon system here sadly ends up making your child a pawn in a game of "make more money". We don't want the ribbon - we just want to move to level 3 so she can be a better swimmer.

From the weaker swimmers in the class holding back class activities for all, to instructors not pushing the children to work on endurance but instead doing the same thing over and over again - that has no bearing on these "ribbons", to having a substitute teacher who in one class said two unrelated children were ribbon ready and would leave a note - but over a month later the regular teacher clearly has no desire to 'ribbon' them; to always having to talk to the teacher and say "this is what child needs to work on today" (just to get her to do the full length of the pool instead of half) and to speaking with the director about our thoughts only to have them not communicated....not even that it was our last class... to the instructor. Who once again said "Next week we will try again" "No as I told you all this is our last class."

My child can swim thanks to La Petite Baleen. She LOVES the water.
And now she also knows not to take other people's judging her to have any value.

I really want my child to stay naturally competitive - but after week 6 of doing everything on the ribbon chart and still not getting it - she said "I know I got the ribbon, the teacher is wrong, I don't want a ribbon and I don't want to come anymore to this place."

Bittersweet.

I went to La Petite Baleen Swim School in HMB for an Aquapole class by Sabrina. I had an awesome workout in the water, although I don't know how to swim! Sabrina is attentive, enthusiastic, and effectively teaches this aquapole exercise in a fun and easy matter! The water is 90 degrees, warm and clean. I can feel my muscles tighten up and feel happy to try out! Thank you so much Sabrina! Will come back again soon. I highly recommend this class to everybody!