As an elementary student, Laura Toney loved not only learning, but also helping her teachers around the classroom, doing things like putting up and taking down bulletin boards.

“I won’t say I was a teacher’s pet, but I liked to be the teacher’s helper,” Toney recalled.

Even though Toney relished lending a helping hand to her teachers, she had no interest then in becoming an educator. She loved animals, so she thought she might be a vet when she grew up. Or, because she had a real talent for art, she thought she might like to design greeting cards for Hallmark.

Time has a way of changing things, and eventually the idea of being a veterinarian or a card designer fell by the wayside. Toney became a teacher, and has been teaching for 20 years. She has taught in Hart, Franklin, Barrow and Oconee counties, first as an art teacher and then as an elementary teacher.

Today Toney teaches second grade at Malcom Bridge Elementary School, where the faculty recently voted her Teacher of the Year.

Toney said she is honored by the TOTY award, and she gives much credit to her family for helping her be the best teacher possible. Her sons – twins John and Will, 13, and Isaac, 15 – understand their mother’s job means long hours and hard work.

Her husband, Chuck, also is a strong supporter. She said, simply, she could not do her job every day without her husband’s understanding and encouragement.

“Chuck works in higher education and he understands what is required of an educator,” Toney said. “He knows my job means longer hours than just 7:30-3:30, and he knows weekends are rarely free.”

Toney studied at Presbyterian College, earning a fine arts degree, and later earned a Masters degree in early childhood education from Piedmont College. The field she entered after college is much different than the education world of today, she said.

“The traditional way of teaching was the class was centered around the teacher, and the teacher stood in front of the classroom and dispensed information and knowledge,” Toney explained. “That has certainly changed.”

Today, she said, a teacher is more of a facilitator, and a classroom is more student-centered.

Not only have teaching styles changed, but teaching tools have also evolved. Toney said her classroom today is full of technology that was not even invented when she began teaching. She loves all the new technological tools just as much as she once loved being the teacher’s helper.

“It is a good thing I don’t have a SMART Board at home, because if I did, I would be playing with it all the time,” she joked.

She uses tools like computers and a SMART Board constantly in her class, and she makes sure her students use them every day, too.

“I want my students to use technology every day,” she said. “The world they live in and the world they will grow up in is a very technology-oriented world,” she said.

Mary Anne Carroll is a reporter for The Oconee Leader. She can be reached at 706-310-1104 or by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

---