With temperatures predicted to reach into the triple digits this week – and many more 100-plus degree days anticipated this summer – local youngsters are learning that the pool is a pretty cool place to be. Not only can they visit during the day for public swim but many are also taking advantage of the chance to learn how to swim so they can enjoy the pool for years to come.

“She’s doing great and she loves it,” mom Cali Roberson said of her daughter Aubrey, 5, enrolled in the Level 1 swim program, just getting started. “She loves the teachers and she’s eager to please.”

A recent lesson saw swim instructors Kaylee Biedermann and Hunter Wheeler working with the Level 1 group, covering everything from kicks to floating, blowing bubbles to doing starfish poses. Working primarily in the shallow end of the pool, they also spend some time in the wading pool to practice putting their face under the water and retrieving objects.

Elsewhere, a group of Level 4 swimmers were busy in the deep end with instructors Amada Smith and Dalsin Alves, working on other skills including treading water and jumping in off the side of the pool and the diving board. They also worked on specific strokes, swimming laps in the deep end.

Smith, serving as the pool supervisor for the first time this year, said they had roughly 40 students enrolled in swimming lessons in the morning for the first session, around 50 in the afternoon sessions.

The second two-week session will begin June 25; sign-ups are still being taken and the cost is $40 for the first child, $30 for each additional child from the same family. A Mommy and Me class costs $35. Sign-ups are at the recreation office in City Hall on McHenry Avenue.

The lessons run Monday through Thursday and feature a variety of levels. Smith said the swim instructors also serve as lifeguards at the pool. On the staff this year are Smith, Alves, Biedermann, Hunter and Lexington Wheeler, Emily Bavaro, Karsyn Beckham, Brandon Craighead, Grace Fitzgerald and Jack Fitzgerald.

Morning lessons run from 10:15 a.m. to 12:15 pm. and the afternoon lessons run from 4:45 p.m. to 6:45 p.m.; Mommy and Me is at 12:45 p.m.

The pool is open for public swim, $2 per person, Monday through Friday from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. A family swim pass, for four people in one household, can be purchased for the summer for $120.