Powers of Two

  Friday afternoon, my students are taking a test and I check my school email.  The Tech department sent out a URL for us to consider blocking in our classroom because the students are playing some kind of addictive game.
  You know what I'm thinking at this point, right?  I promptly surf over to the site and start playing the game.  Gotta check out what the student are up to these days, right?

Do you think the exams were graded super-fast? Well, I had an important weekend project...

Saturday Conversation at the Rideouts

Isabelle (2nd grade):  "Daddy, tell me again about the multiverses and how there could be other universes?"
Me: "Well, everything we can currently or will ever be able to see is the Universe, but there are (or could be) other universes out there but we'll never have any evidence for it."
Isabelle: "Then it's not really science, is it?  It's just an idea."
Me: "True, but the idea of multiverses is consistent with the science we do know."
Isabelle: "But why would you say we'll never be able to see something far away? If we wait long enough, won't the light eventually get here?"
Me: "Good point, but the universe is expanding so the distant objects are actually getting more distant all the time"
Isabelle: "But the light it emits now, before it moves away, will still get to us eventually, right?"
Me (starting to sweat): "Yes it seems that way, but it's actually the space between us that is expanding and so that makes it hard for the light to get to us."
Isabelle: "Expanding faster than the speed of light?  I don't understand that"
Me: "Um, yes, well, if the object is really far away then there is a lot of space and every piece of it is expanding, then the object could actually be moving away from us faster than the speed of light."
Isabelle: "But the light should still get to us!"
Me: "But the light is traveling through space that is expanding too, so it's like the light is running towards us while the floor itself is getting bigger and it's as if the light is running in place."
Isabelle: "I don't get it"
Me: "Me neither."(thinking: maybe I shouldn't show her any more episodes of Cosmos)

Those Who Can't Do...

... Teach.

I once said this to a math teacher when I was a high school student.  I hope he knows that I am now a teacher and savoring the irony.  I didn't mean it maliciously, but I did say it.  I've been thinking about that moment a lot recently.

Just the other day I said to a colleague only partly in jest, "I used to have such a high aspirations for myself - now look at me!"  He looked at me a bit incredulously and said "What could be more important than the work you do now?"  I guess part of me agrees but another part of me can't help but compare where I am now to where I thought I would be so long ago (perhaps a writer, a scientist, or, better yet, both!).

Validation comes in many forms but one of the best is the years-later thank you.  I've been teaching for 12 years now which means that my former students are doing all kinds of things.  Some are research scientists, some are switching careers or going back to school, some have even become (*gulp*) physics teachers.  One of the many perks of this great job is when you get an email, letter, or shout out of some kind from a former student who is now an adult and feels that I had some positive influence way back when.  (I'd like to give a special shout-out to DK who recently wrote a really great story/letter to me that got me thinking about this stuff.)  Clearly these people are delusional, but I take it all at face value and, puffing out my chest, turn back into the (classroom) fray to push back the tides of darkness.

Funny how life is full of twists and turns.  I never even considered teaching as a career until I was in my 30's.  Turns out to be the job I've enjoyed the most and, just maybe, the most important one I could have aspired to...

Someday when I grow up, maybe I'll send a shout out back to my former teachers, I bet they'd like that!