Einstein biography bbc bitesize

Einstein's archetypal boffin persona, firmly lodged in popular culture, is well-earned. His ideas and theories were so shockingly revolutionary, he changed the way the Universe was imagined, not just once, but several times. Albert Einstein was proclaimed a genius while still in his 20s.

The mathematician and physicist, Albert Einstein stayed in a cottage at Roughton in Norfolk during the s, after he left Germany when Hitler came to power.

But his later work was dominated by a fruitless search for a unified theory and increasing isolation from mainstream physics. So why are we still obsessed with him? Aged just four, they sent him out to explore the local area on his own. Aged five, his father gave him a compass to play with.

A biography is a non-fiction text about someone's life.

He was captivated by the motion of the needle. This was the genesis of his interest in science. Much later, his theories would be used to explain that motion. After his parents moved to Italy for better job prospects, the teenage Einstein remained in Germany to finish his education. Despite his obvious capabilities in science and maths, his tendency to rebel against the prescriptive nature of school, where everything was unthinkingly memorised, led to some teachers giving him bad reports.

After failing the entrance exam for a Zurich technical college, Einstein studied a new syllabus at school, and entered college on his second attempt. Once there, he gained a reputation for missing classes and wasting time discussing science with friends in local cafes. At 17, he renounced his German citizenship in order to avoid military service.

For the next four years, Einstein was not the citizen of any country. This showed that measurements of space and time were relative to motion and subsequently forced physicists to re-evaluate some of their most basic concepts.