Laura Lyons, faculty
personae
Problem Solver I
n eighth grade, Laura Lyons did so well in math that her teacher summed up her achievement with a memorable comment. “You think like a boy,” she told Laura. To a sensitive adolescent, that was far from a compliment. Laura’s mother, who fostered her daughter’s love for reading, and her father, who patiently solved puzzles with Laura, promoting her love of math, thought practically about the future: they encouraged Laura to go to secretarial school. Laura had other plans, but it took many years before she would study the subject she loved. After high school, Laura became a certified fitness instructor and spent about ten years teaching at a health club. A health scare briefly interrupted her aerobics career: one day, a sharp pain in her leg led doctors to discover that a rare benign tumor, known as
subject can appeal » “The visually, analytically, and numerically.” an atrial myxoma, was blocking 90 percent of her left atrium and required immediate emergency cardiac surgery. Laura was working out again in eight weeks. While she was teaching fitness classes, she was accumulating credits at Fitchburg State University, and graduated with a bachelor’s in math in 1994, winning the School’s math award. She quickly landed a job teaching algebra and AP calculus at a public high school in Spencer, Massachusetts. Laura 8
Groton School Quarterly
•
Fall 2013
knew her math, but didn’t realize how much she also had to know her students. “I didn’t understand the importance of delicately treating the psyches of my students, but I loved math so much,” she says. She gradually came to understand the kids, and in 1996, moved to Gardner (Massachusetts) High School, where she stayed for eight years and received the school’s Harvard Book Club prize for teaching excellence. Laura heard about an opening for a math teacher at Groton from her high school friend, Admission Office Manager Rhonda Collins. Rhonda and Laura and their husbands had double-dated in high school. The School needed an AP Calculus teacher, a subject Laura had taught for 10 years. She believes that experience helped her land the job. At Groton, Laura felt at home almost immediately. “I loved school. I loved to teach math to students who were interested,” she said. “I loved meeting with students after class.” Laura also may have felt at home because she grew up in nearby Pepperell, Massachusetts; her first job was scooping ice cream at Johnson’s in Groton. Laura married her high school sweetheart—he sat in front of her in Algebra 2 Honors—and they have two grown daughters. It’s hard to believe that Laura, even as a novice teacher, ever found it challenging to understand her students. Today, that ability is taken for granted, and her care and nurturing—in the classroom and elsewhere—contribute to many students’ success. “I love to participate in their learning process and in their overall growth,” Laura says. “In the classroom, I am fascinated by the way they develop knowledge: through listening, conjecturing, communicating, devising solutions, reflecting,