Tuesday, December 2, 2008
4:00PM-5:00PM
3rd-7th Years


Please refer to Classroom Information and Classroom Rules & Regulations. The rules and regulations are attached to the wall next the board.

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Declan had thought long and hard about what to do for the midterm. He didn't want it to be some boring test- mostly because they wouldn't really learn anything from it, they would just cram study and pass based on that. So he had come up with a solution. Declan was actually going to give his students a choice- they could either do a partner project, or they could take a ridiculously long and detailed test. He figured that most would choose the project, which would work in his favor.

On the table off to the side were various boxes of varying sizes. In each box was an egg- not that his students would know that. This was going to be their choice of mid term project. Take a test, or take care of an egg.

"Everyone come in and settle down, today is important. We're going to discuss your midterm and the options that you have for it. Today's class will be relatively short in comparison to others, because after we are done discussing and assignments are handed out, I'm going to allow you to be on your way. You're going to need the extra time, trust me."

Josh was the first to turn up. He was looking slightly tired, since he had just come from herbology and it was the last class of the day. Of course, that also meant that it was finally the last class of the day. Still, they would be deciding what to do for midterms today. Josh was hoping to avoid a long test. Sitting down, he got a quill, parchment and an ink bottle out to take notes with.

Figaro was on time and had been on time every class period since November 18 when he'd been locked out and had to take a zero for the day.  However, even though he was displaying a very responsible trait, the rest of his persona was as rowdy as usual.  He had found a roll of Spell-o-tape in the Great Hall and was wrapping it around all the fingers on his left hand and talking loudly about the Quidditch match coming up on Friday.

"I don't know who I'm rooting for - but I'm hoping to see a giant swan dive from thirty meters up," he declared.  Truth of the matter was, he'd be rooting for Ravenclaw if Sasha hadn't been suspended.  Now his loyalties were split between Not Giving a Flying Crap and Who The Hell Cares.  But the match would be a good reason to shout and he really enjoyed shouting.

Figaro's discussion was interrupted when the smug Professor began speaking to the class.  Figaro ignored the part about the project and the exams, but definitely heard the bit about leaving class early.  The four in the afternoon classes were always the hardest to get through.  Way at the end of the day, right before dinner.  Getting a reprieve was like early Christmas.

"Mad for it!" he grinned.  Then he leaned forward in his desk to rap Joshua Harcroft on the shoulder with his taped hand. 

"Josh, hey.  Lend me some parchment."

When Fauna walked into class, she shot a wary glance at the professor, and an ever warier glance at the boxes lined up on his desk. No way, no sir would she be going near those unless instructed. She'd learned her lesson last time about setting creatures loose and embarrassing herself.

She took a seat next to Fig, even though he was usually rowdy and distracting. Fauna felt a strong solidarity with the Hufflepuffs in this class, especially since Professor O Morain loved to insult them so much.

As the professor began talking about their midterm, Fauna got out her supplies, glancing over when Fig pestered Josh for an extra piece of parchment.

She stifled a chuckle and shook her head. "What did you do to your hand?" Fauna whispered at Fig, curious about how he was going to write and avoid tipping over his ink well with his new, do-it-yourself flipper.

Roxanne was the first third year to enter the room. She didn't have anything else to do because all of the other third years were too busy running around the castle to get rid of their Herbology books and nab their CoMC supplies. Too bad Roxanne didn't really care. She had emptied her bag of everything except her necessary books for the four classes she had throughout the day, parchment, quills, and ink. Anything was discarded to her trunk in her dorm.

When she entered the classroom, there weren't but three students. The girl frowned and glanced up at the clock in the classroom.

"Am I that early?"

She considered leaving and coming back just before the bell rang, but to what point? That was too much effort and she had no where else to go anyways. A groan escaped her as she collapsed into her desk carelessly and waited for everything to begin. The students in front of her were discussing the upcoming Quidditch match. Since she could only speculate from here, Roxanne leaned forward to join the conversation, but Professor Móráin started his droll routine. She would have tuned him out were it not for the words 'class' and 'short' being used in the same sentence. This time, the third year sat up straight in her seat and listened.

Midterms hadn't frightened her since her first year when she passed a good deal of them (except DADA). She found out in her second year that most students over-studied. While Roxanne wasn't good with tests because they required way too much effort, she had decided to only write down a specific set of notes that were less in number, but higher in importance. Whatever the teacher stressed on, Roxanne's notes were focused upon that particular subject. She had been doing this all year although with so many teachers switching out, it was difficult to figure out what the exams were going to cover. The mid-term exams for this year would be able to make or break her hypothesis: a person didn't need to write down everything and over-study; all they needed was to center their notes on whatever the teacher talked about either repeatedly or sternly (as if the tone of their voice could actually imprint the information onto the students' brains). If her notes weren't sufficient enough and the exams did in fact cover what she hadn't written down, it wasn't a huge deal. She'd fail mid-terms and make up for it later. Big deal. Experimenting was half the fun of school.

Josh's eyebrows rose as Figaro came in, with his hand taped up for some reason. Oh well, it didn't look tight enough to restrict the bloodflow, so who gave a flobberworm? He cared slightly more about Figaro apparently not having brought any parchment, however. Reaching into his bag, he got out a piece of parchment and gave it to Figaro. “Fine, this once, Figaro, but do try not to forget it next time. And what in Merlin’s name have you done to your hand? Josh asked, not noticing that Fauna asked the same question at the same time.

"Fanks," Figaro said to Josh and snipped it up out of his hand, already needless creasing it.  "Won't happen again."  Josh was one of the nicest of the fifth years, even if he was a know-it-all.  Fig liked him, but he was easy to mess with.  So earnest and honest.  Figaro figured he could ask Josh for parchment every day and he'd give it to him.

He also liked Fauna, and gave her a grin as she joined him and Josh.  "Why are we whispering?" he asked, not whispering himself.  The Professor didn't see to be quite ready yet, but Figaro wasn't good at telling that sort of thing. 

When both Josh and Fauna asked about the tape-work he was doing to his hand, he looked at it as if he'd just noticed it.  "Oh, this?"

He gave it a look as if they'd asked him what that freckle was for.  It was just tape on his hand.  He gave them both a look and then held it up into Fauna's face and folded his fingers over into a fist, making the tape crinkle, crackle, stick to itself and bunch up.

"I put tape on it, der," he responded with a grin.  And people said he asked stupid questions.  He crunched it again and again. 

"You're too easily amused, Sellaphix," Bella teased with an accidentally harsh tone. "Any more abnormal and they'll be sendin' you to the loony floor."

The fifth year dropped into her own empty seat where Xavier and Beatrix would be, hopefully, sitting with her that afternoon. She was early because she'd scarfed down her lunch to get to class on time. This was the only class other than DADA and Arithmancy that Bellatrix rushed to and arrived at not only on time, but also early. Professor Storm was making his class increasingly exciting for the Slytherin girl whereas Arithmancy was becoming more necessary to keep her relaxed. CoMC was obvious: she had a school-girl crush on the professor and, more noticeably, she was taking an interest in the class itself. The educators had more impact on the subjects than she had previously thought.

Bella would have removed her supplies were it not for the briefing that the professor gave them. They would be on their way shortly? What did that mean? Yes. He was still most assuredly her favorite professor! Letting them out early. What a cheeky guy he was! Bellatrix grinned at the less-than-holy announcement that they wouldn't have a long class (no matter how interesting the classes were, she would always rather do something else with her time) and settled back waiting for the rest of the class to arrive. She wished they'd hurry because she wanted to get out as quickly as possible!

Adrienna came into Care of Magical Creatures class with a bit of dread in her stomach.  She was intelligent, sure, but she absolutely loathed taking tests.  And if this test had anything to do with the boxes on the professors desk, she was destined to fail.  She could see the test now... "PLease examine the firemouth beetle's pincers and write down what you observe." ... Adrienna shuddered at a face full of hot flames as she scribbled, "It breathes fire... at anything".  That was the thing about these CoMC tests, the options were completely wide open.  They could be subjected to practically anything creature-related, which was actually quite a lot. 

But she didn't think the professor would make them do anything life-threatening.  Besides, she was more nervous about a hand-written test than a hands-on one.  So she took a deep breath and sat down next to Josh.

Xavier took his usual spot next to Bella. He was surprised the Slytherin girl was actually in class not only on time but early. He had never known her to be early for any class and was somewhat suspicious as to why. He bit back a scowl when he saw the way Bella looked at Professor O Morain. He didn't think he had ever been jealous of a Professor before but then again he had never been falling for a girl that had a crush on a teacher before either.

He gave her a smile when he sat down next to her and was equally surprised and excited at the prospect of leaving class early. He didn't want to be stuck in the classroom the whole time especially if they weren't going to be doing any real work. He couldn't wait for the weather to warm up so they could start having classes outside instead of in the stuffy feeling classroom.

He was about to comment on Fig's taped up hand but caught himself before any sound came out. Fig had been one of his truest friends and now because he had been a total coward they weren't even talking to each other. He told himself countless times that it had been Fig's fault anyway, he had been the dumb git who cast a spell outside of school but he couldn't shake the guilty feeling he had about the whole thing.

Ayla entered the classroom and sat down near Fauna and Figaro. She looked exhausted and frazzled, she had been trying to catch up on her homework. With everything that was going wrong this year she didn't want to take any chances that she'd be able to just coast through her mid terms like she had been able to do for the past two years.

She cocked her head to the side at the sight of Fig's tapped up hand but figured it was better not to question the older Hufflepuff. He had always been a little weird, having his hand wrapped up in spellotape was actually normal for him. She shook her head and looked around the rest of the class regretting the action almost instantly.

Not far from where she was sitting with Fauna and Figaro were Xavier and Bella. She was still feeling rather stung by the attack the Dark twins had made on her birthday party. She was thankful for Dahlia for helping her out but it was bound to just make matters worse. It might have been better having the girls think she was the slut of Hogwarts rather than a useless little girl that needed her eleven year old sister to fight her battles for her.

Declan hadn't assigned seats yet. He was going to do that over the break and have it for when they returned from holiday. A welcome back present, so to speak. He was using the classes to get a feel of who shouldn't be with whom. Too bad he couldn't just rid himself of all Hufflepuffs and all Gryffindors. "Mr. Sellaphix, for coming to class unprepared I will be taking five points," he called out, watching as someone else gave him some parchment. "This is a learning environment, even a Neanderthal such as yourself should be fully capable of realizing that. Come into my classroom one more time unprepared, and I'll start taking points off of your final grade."

"Now, on to the assignment at hand. As I said, today we are going to discuss your mid-term!" That word, in and of itself, seemed to quiet everyone down. "There will be two ways for you to complete your mid-term assignment. One will be a standard test- one hundred questions, one point per question, covering everything in the first seven chapters of your book- including topics we have not discussed in class." That sounded terrible, he knew it, he was banking on it.

"The second choice," he said, over the quiet groans, "is to do a team project. Two per team, and you will given a project to complete by the day before the Hogwarts Express leaves for the holidays. That day we will have a small get together- something like a party- to present the final results of your projects. I know that some of you are not good at working together- or have no desire to- hence the option. What I need from you, is a decision on which you prefer. I'm going to pass around a small container, and if you wish to work on the team project, write your name on the slip of paper and drop it in. Your partners will be chosen randomly."

Figaro made a fart noise with his mouth when Ó Móráin took points from his house.  He had come to class prepared - he'd come to class with Josh.  But whatever; this new mid-term project thingy sounded like an afternoon at the park.

He delcared his approval of the second option with a loud rrrrrrip tearing a big strip off the parchment he'd come 'prepared' with.  Immediately, without thinking he raised his voice.

"Hey, Josh-" and then he clammed up.  Instead he sunk down in his seat and leaned closer to Ayla Collins.  "Nick a pen from you?" he whispered.  Unprepared? Ó Móráin had no idea. 

In a more normal tone, he made his opinion about the project known to no one in particular.  "Crazy putting a test up against a partner project.  Who's going to do a whole test when they can sit on their bum and made a diaramma? Get a shoe box, throw some dirt it and put yer name on it: bam, flobberworm habitat." He flicked his hand and grinned.

"Best project ever."  He craned his neck looking about wondering who he'd pull from the hat.

" Hi Adrienna" Josh said, then listened to what the professor was saying. so it would be a test, or a a partner project. he was going to go for the project, and wondered what Adrienna would choose. She'd make a good partner for this, since she knew a lot about the subject, like him. " No, Figaro, I won't lend you anything else" Josh said, before Figaro had finished speaking.

OOC: Just to clarify, Josh said that after Sellaphix called bis name, not after he asked Ayla Collins for an quill.

A test vs a project? From the way he announced the test, she was willing to wager 2 Galleons the man was hoping they'd pick the project. Why spoil his plans? On top of that, they were doing it in pairs. She warily glanced around the room at the other students. Whomever turned out to be her partner, Roxanne wouldn't mind dumping the egg off on them and letting them take care of the majority of it. She would, of course, do some of the work on the project, but when it came to choosing who would do what, Roxanne would volunteer for the job that required the least amount of effort.

"I'm game," she reached for her quill.

This was going to be more interesting than a test. It wasn't that Roxanne hated the actual test, but the amount of effort required to actually take the test was ungodly! She had to pass it, though, otherwise her mum would chew her out from head to toe. A project definitely sounded better for a mid-term than a test.