David Ascencio is a part of SCVi’s amazing 2/3 team. Although this is Mr. Ascencio’s first year with SCVi, it’s not his first year with iLEAD. He has been a part of our iLEAD family for the past two school years, working at both iLEAD Encino and iLEAD AV.
You may have heard that Mr. Ascencio signs as he speaks to the kids in the 2/3 classroom. Although he downplays his skill at American Sign Language, it’s pretty impressive how quickly the learners in his classroom are picking up ASL as well.
Mr. Asencio’s skills at ASL are completely self-taught through books and videos. His desire to learn ASL and teach himself fits right in with iLEAD’s philosophy. He started signing while he worked as a preschool teacher for 11 years, and the kids would learn all their letters, colors, numbers, and shapes in sign language. When he joined iLEAD, he would sign with the kids and even taught the ASL Friday workshop at iLEAD AV last year.
He is dad to an awesome 10-year-old son, and he absolutely loves his work as a facilitator. When people ask him how he does it, he replied: “How do you work with children all day long? How do you not? True, I go home exhausted at the end of the day, but it’s a good kind of exhaustion. I love it!”