2006-2007 Fall/Winter Directions - Friends' Central School

FEATURES – CURRENT FACULTY
Exceptional Teaching at Home
The current faculty at Friends’ Central is a group of teachers without parallel, and a list of their accomplishments and credentials
would fill the next few pages. But what really sets them apart is their remarkable ability to demonstrate how much
they care about their students’ moral and intellectual development as well as their mastery of the course material. So while
much of their time is spent on the mechanics of teaching—tying shoelaces, filling paint jars, devising syllabi, leading and
monitoring discussions, and grading tests or quizzes—they are also always seeking ways to encourage questions and
emphasize the connections between their lessons and the world at large. They are attentive, encouraging, creative, and very
original. For this issue, we’ve selected one teacher from each division to highlight, but the work and dedication of all our
teachers deserves a resounding round of applause.
ou DelSoldo is one of the few teachers
at Friends’ Central whose influence reaches
from the youngest child to the oldest.
Right now he is the Assistant Principal at
Lower School, a role he assumed after first
teaching pre-kindergarten and kindergarten
here for nine years and then serving as Director of Early
Childhood Education. His office is at the Lower School, he
works closely with Cynthia Harris, Assistant Director of
Admission for the Lower School, and he knows every student
there by name. But Lou also knows quite a
few members of every graduating class as
well, and not only because he remembers
them from their days in second grade.
Several times a week, Lou comes over to the
City Avenue campus to teach an introduction
to psychology course to seniors, and
once a week he welcomes his seniors to the
Lower School, where they work with the
younger classes on objective behavioral
descriptions, event and time sampling, and
data collection. Lou always knew he wanted
to be a teacher, and he still misses getting
down on the floor with four-year olds (not
to mention the regular snack and rest time).
His psychology class provides him with the
Lou DelSoldo
direct contact with young people he so
enjoys, and it allows him to share his passion
for teaching. This year, he has had the
unprecedented chance to see two of his former psych students
return to FCS and practice some of what he taught them in their
new roles of assistant kindergarten and pre-kindergarten teachers.
When asked about the challenges and rewards of teaching,
Lou is quick to say that for him, there is no greater reward than a
class well-taught. He is equally quick to acknowledge that the
flip side of that statement is also true—there is no greater disappointment
than a class gone awry. The real challenge for all
teachers is to find their own style. “I don’t believe one style of
teaching works for every person—teacher or student,” Lou says.
“Here at Friends’ Central, there is not a lot of regimentation
about how to teach. We are all given the freedom to become the
teachers we are. I have found that I like to flirt with chaos. I like
to raise ideas that are provocative. I like to trigger a buzz in the
46 DIRECTIONS Fall 2006 / Winter 2007
classroom as my students get excited about a topic or question.
But I also want to be able to pull their attention into focus and
keep the conversation centered.”
As for the unusual range of ages with which he interacts, Lou
loves it! “Teaching is the greatest professsion,” he says. “You are
being paid to learn, plus being around kids all day keeps you
young, alive, and growing. I have the best of both worlds. In
Lower School, I get an awful lot of hugs, and with my seniors, I
get to share the energy and vitality of the next generation.”
lexa Dunnington ’98 went in to teaching
after working in the National Trust for
Historic Preservation in Washington, D.C. “I
worked in a cubicle, and then one day I realized
I needed to be working with people.”
Teaching was the first thing she thought of
since she had tutored all through college and
always enjoyed young people. She returned to
Philadelphia and worked as the permanent substitute at FCS for
one year. During that time, she also took a graduate course at
Arcadia College with Leif Gustavson, her eighth grade Language
Arts teacher, called “Writing to Improve Literacy.” The course
convinced her that she wanted to become a Language Arts
teacher, and serendipitously, the very next year, Friends’ Central
had just such an opening.
Today, Alexa teaches seventh grade Language Arts. She has
named her course, “The Writing and Reading Workshop”
because of her expectation that her students will work together to
become better readers and better writers. She also coaches varsity
field hockey and Middle School girls’ lacrosse. As a teacher, Alexa
has two main goals: to teach her students to appreciate the power
of language and the ways we communicate, and to disprove the
notion that you lose
Alexa Dunnington ’98
your imagination
when you get to be a
certain age. “The
students I teach are
developmentally at
an age when learning
how to communicate
well is essential,” she
says. “But they are
also struggling with