Point at or tap any part to see its name. Tap the outer electron to take it away. Tap it again to put it back.
In later pictures, amber dots show current, the flow of electricity. Here each blue dot is one electron.
The charge number counts in electrons. A charge of +1 means the atom is one electron short.
The red-orange balls with a plus sign are protons. The gray balls are neutrons.
A proton and an electron carry the same amount of charge. A proton’s charge is positive and an electron’s is negative. That is why equal numbers cancel.
Neutrons have no charge, so they do not change the charge of the atom.
The rings are a simple model. Real electrons do not move in neat circles.
The picture is not to scale. The real center is tens of thousands of times narrower than the whole atom.
In a wire carrying current, loose electrons move from atom to atom. The wire as a whole stays uncharged. Atoms in a wire never lose protons. The number of protons is what makes an atom copper and not some other kind of atom.
An atom that picks up one extra electron has a negative charge.
Here a tap takes the electron away. In a wire, an electron that leaves one atom moves on to the next atom.