Sweden have strong cultural connections to water as well as movement inorby.These cultural connections also display in the mandatory school curriculum in physical education and health with a demand to swim 200 meters, of which 50 must be backstroke. The teachers in physical education face students every day with different cultural backgrounds, some of which lack the experiences of water habits. Through qualitative interviews we asked physical education and health teachers about how they adapted their teaching methods and focus on their experience teaching newly arrived pupils in swimming. The study also focus on teachers´ perceived working terms and possible further education after the framework theory of Dahllöf and the habitus theory which was originally coined by Bourdieu.

The teachers mainly adapted their education in swimming after the challenges of verbal communication and the danger of hubris from the newly arrived students. Many teachers adapted methods in which non-verbal communication became important to show and explain swimming as a physical knowledge unfounded by language. They also pointed out the importance of smaller classes. The working terms of having swimming classes with newly arrived students have been strained to some degree according to the majority of participating respondents.