The first student I won over in England

I have 150+ students.  Some could learn the material regardless of the teacher, and some would refuse to learn it regardless of the teacher.  The students I look for to remind me that I'm actually good at what I do are the students that don't think they're good at it but are willing to try.  If I get one of them to really understand a tough concept and to believe they can understand more, I feel like a true teacher.  About 4 weeks into my new job teaching physics at Kings Ely, I finally had that feeling. And darn it, I worked for it.

In my Year 11 classes, we're studying nuclear radiation.  It can be confusing stuff, which is why it's so easy for comic book writers to say super powers come from radiation.  Somehow, it seems logical because most people don't really get what radiation is and does anyway.  Radiation really just means anything radiating outward from a central point. All light is radiation.  Nuclear radiation is the light or small particles that are emitted with lots of energy, either kinetic energy (meaning they're moving very fast) or electromagnetic energy, from an atomic nucleus.  Because of all that energy, when radiation hits another atom, it tends to do "damage" by knocking electrons off and charging the atom.  That ionization can damage living cells, which is why we generally care about it.  I was trying to explain the natures of the three different types of radiation (alpha, beta, and gamma) and their respective abilities to ionize atoms, and I was getting the impression that I was doing a poor job of it.  

One girl, who I shall not name because that's kinda rude, was obviously not getting it, and she asked if she could go over the homework with me.  At NHS, I would have just said to stop by during lunch, but that's not really practical here.  I was sort of at a loss as to when to do this, and she asked when I had tutoring duty in one of the houses, and if she could stop by.  I told her Thursday evening in Hereward, and sure.  I honestly had no idea if this was okay, but I didn't see how it could hurt tutoring one student of mine while still being available for my boarding boys.  I have duty for 4 hours, and she was there for 3.  I helped my boys when they stopped by and needed help, and the rest of the time I tried everything I could to explain the differences between alpha, beta, and gamma radiation.  Bless that girl for not giving up.  As we progressed, she explained that English is actually her second language.  I honestly had no idea, which makes me think I don't know British accents that well.  The girl is from Eastern Europe, and she speaks Czech at home while speaking English at school.  I realized that she's had to deal with unfamiliar terms as well as difficult concepts.  Beyond that, she was doing it without complaint.  I really started to respect this girl, and I was determined to find the example that would make this all click.  

Through some random series of connections that made sense in that conversation and no other, I asked her to picture a rave.  Yes, a rave. Glow sticks and everything.  It's a massive, crowded rave full of people high on E and completely unaware of what's going on around them.  She is on one side of the crowd (and not high on E, because that's bad). On the other side of the crowd are two dangerous things, a horse galloping toward the crowd and a wasp that she's allergic to.  That horse is alpha radiation.  The wasp is beta radiation.  The horse, when it hits the crowd, is likely to do a lot of damage to the first people it encounters, because it's really big.  However, it's unlikely to make it all the way through the crowd and get to her, also because it's really big and will lose its momentum after those initial collisions. The wasp is much smaller, so it's likely to be able to get right through the crowd and sting her.  It's certainly no guarantee, but it's possible, and if it does sting her, she will not like it (remember, she's allergic).  So, alpha is the horse.  It's big and does lots of damage (ionization), but it won't get far.  Beta is the wasp.  It's small and won't ionize things as easily, but it will penetrate through things pretty well.  Gamma doesn't fit into this particular example, so I didn't force it.

The light bulb went on over her head.  I saw that look of comprehension, and she smiled.  Somehow, this oddball scenario I'd made up off the top of my head made it click.  She was so incredibly happy to finally get it that she went home and explained it to her mother. She still says, "Okay, alpha is the horse and beta is the wasp, so . . ." when explaining to me different properties of radiation.  She's shown up to every tutor night since, and she's brought classmates.  She's a believer now, and so am I.  She believes that she can successfully understand physics, and I believe that I can successfully teach it.  She is the kind of student that makes me love being a teacher.