When I saw “Oppenheimer” with my friends this past summer, I noticed a curious background character who was only shown playing the bongos at certain points in the film. “Bongo Guy,” as me and my friends called him, gave us chuckles whenever we thought of him after the film had ended.
Actually, I knew the name of Bongo Guy; I just didn’t want to tell my friends for fear of spoiling our glorious moments. He was Richard Feynman, a physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project from 1943 to 1945.
Of course, helping develop the atomic bomb was only one of the many accomplishments he made throughout his career. Shortly before being called on to work on the Manhattan Project, he received his PhD in physics from Princeton University, employing the calculus he had been studying since his teens. After his time at Los Alamos, he became a professor at Cornell and later Caltech, where he further researched theoretical physics and quantum mechanics. Towards the end of his life, he was tasked to investigate the space shuttle Challenger’s explosion, where he revealed his solution on public television using a simple yet dramatic experiment. On top of all this, he was a practical jokester and wrote several popular books explaining both physics and his life experiences.
However, out of all of his occupations, it’s his role as a teacher that deserves more attention by the general public.
Among the treasure trove of memes and enjoyable content on YouTube, there exists a tiny corner of “lost” videotaped lectures featuring the famed scientist. If you have the time, pick up one of his books from the nearest library or bookstore and read a chapter or two.
Within a few minutes, it becomes clear that Feynman was a gifted teacher. Whether it’s through his writing or his lecturing, Feynman’s charisma always shines through, drawing in his audience in a magnetic way.
By far, Feynman’s most important trait was his ability to ground his lectures in relatibilty. He had a seemingly innate talent for breaking down complex thoughts in physics into simple analogies and metaphors. If he could, he would mention a personal story that, in a roundabout way, would connect with the concept he was trying to explain to his audience. He avoided the esoteric vocabulary that echoed in the research labs of Princeton and Caltech, and instead adopted the phrases and idioms of the common man. And of course, whenever possible, he sprinkled in his signature humor, which never failed to make his live audiences laugh.
Feynman, to me, is everything the average teacher should strive for. Speaking as a human being who has spent the majority of his life in classrooms, it becomes increasingly irritating when I get a teacher who simply puts in little to no effort into their job.
Great teachers don’t act snobbishly or robotically toward their students. Great teachers, like Feynman, bring themselves down to their students’ level, keeping in mind the knowledge gap between the two groups. If that doesn’t happen, then learning, simply put, is lost.
