Roar... or, umm.. Moo? on Care of Magical Creatures

Lawrence Marsh

September 26, 2021 11:51 AM

Beginners: This Class is a Zoo by Lawrence Marsh

Lawrence had changed with his time at the school. Though the younglings still scared him sometimes, he felt more at ease and even looked forward to seeing his students, even the youngest group, who were always the most chaotic. But today he was planning something to engage with that chaos and turn his room into a proverbial zoo.

As students entered Lawrence smiled at each of them in turn and with a flick of his wand affixed a piece of parchment to their backs.
“Please take a seat when you enter. Anywhere will do. No one is allowed to look at the papers on their backs or tell others what’s on theirs yet. All shall be revealed once we are ready.” He said as students began coming in. He wanted to ensure the game was fun, and didn’t want them getting ahead of themselves.

Once every student was in the classroom he turned to face them.

“All right class. Today we are going to have a little game to start things off. Each of you has a piece of parchment attached to your backs. This piece of paper has a beast on it. No beings or spirits. You will go up to people in the class and ask yes or no questions. After twenty questions I want you to write down what beast you think you have, and why you think that. Once you write it down, everyone will take the paper off their back and write down what they actually had on their back. There are no points for guessing the right beast, I want you to explain to me why you thought that way. Once you’ve written some down, I would love to have one or two volunteers to explain their thinking to the class.

For your homework this week, I’ll want first years to write up a simple description of the beast they are given. For second years, I think it’s time to put your magizoologist hats on,” he pantomimed putting on hat, “and I want you to write a short, one to two pages, on the environment your beast lives in, the food it eats, what other beasts or beings interact with it, and how it helps their larger creature community.”

That was a lot of words spoken before the anxious rabble, so he took a moments pause in case anyone had any questions.

“Ok. If you have questions I’ll be walking around the room. If you don’t know the beast on someones back, feel free to call me over and I’ll help as well. Now go forth and find your animal.”

Lawrence took a deep breath. He knew there was about to be a lot of noise so he steady himself for the sound of chairs screeching across the floor and kids talking.

OOC: List of beasts he chose can be found here: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_creatures

Lawrence would have chosen some easy and some hard animals, but ones that wizarding kids would have heard of.

Subthreads:

Roar... or, umm.. Moo? by Iris Cobb with Eben Sosna

41 Lawrence Marsh Beginners: This Class is a Zoo 1462 1 5

Iris Cobb

September 26, 2021 3:21 PM

Roar... or, umm.. Moo? by Iris Cobb

Iris reacted almost instinctively when she entered the classroom. She'd greeted the professor, but felt something happen to her back once she had turned her back on him. She spun and grasped for whatever it was, while simultaneously calling out her brother's name in an accusatory fashion. Halfway through her spin and accusation, she regained control and remembered that Billy (thankfully) wasn't in her classes this year. Then she saw Professor Marsh attach a paper to the next student's back. Oh, the professor had done it... that must be okay then. Whatever it was, it must be part of class. He made such a declaration, shrugged, found a seat and took out her things.

Once he began the explanation for what they were doing in class today things began to make sense. They were playing a game. One in which they had to know about both their own creature and the creature of whomever they were trading questions. Clever. She wrote down the homework assignment as he explained it. Then it was time to mingle and find out what kind of creature she was today. She couldn't help but think, yet again, that she was glad Billy wasn't here. He would most likely go out of his way to imitate whatever his creature was and make a mess of things in the process.

She stood, bringing her notebook and quill, and cast her gaze about the room to find someone she could work with to unravel their shared mysteries. She spotted a likely subject and strode up to them, "Hi, do you want to trade questions?" She turned her back to show them her paper, "Is my creature a carnivore?"

OOC: Feel free to decided what creature Iris has written on her paper. You can either pick your own and put it in your response, or let me know if I should pick one for you.

2 Iris Cobb Roar... or, umm.. Moo? 1526 0 5

Eben Sosna

October 01, 2021 9:01 PM

Caw! Baa! by Eben Sosna

Somehow, the sight of people holding wands had quickly become normal, but the sight of them flicking wands at things still had not. Everything about that annoyed Eben, probably more than it should have. It just made no sense to feel that way about it.

Not, of course, that 'makes sense' was really a phrase that got a lot of use from him lately. It also felt a little less silly now, when his corners-up mouth contortion in response to Professor Marsh's expression was in turn answered by a wand flick and the distinct feeling of something suddenly being on his back. But still. Annoying.

It was hard, as Professor Marsh talked, not to twist around in his seat to look at the paper, or just to pull it off. He was still kind of uncomfortable in robes anyway - he had never been at all about clothes that fit tightly, not one bit about them and no one could deny it, but it turned out that there was such a thing as clothes that were too loose to be comfortable, too. All the loose fabric of the robes constantly moved around his legs and ankles and under his arms, and it was crazy, and he'd been sure he was going to go crazy, too, that first week - and it was really, really obvious to him that Something was on his back that wasn't supposed to be there. His mom said he was too picky, and that half the things he found uncomfortable were all in his head, and that she'd bet he wouldn't even notice them if she put his clothes on him for him while he was wearing a blindfold, but Eben regarded this as one of the many areas, like those involving ghosts and telekinesis, where Mom just didn't know what she was talking about. Either he perceived something with his senses because it was there, or he needed to see a doctor. There weren't really other options, and since he had started wizard school, Eben was surer than ever that he was of sound mind. He'd never really doubted it, of course, but it was nice to have some adults in the world acknowledge it now for him, too.

Despite his fidgeting - or maybe because of his fidgeting, considering how hard it would have been to sit perfectly still and not occasionally wriggle around in discomfort as a compromise over snatching the thing off his back - he managed to pick up why the paper was there and what he was supposed to do about it. His eyes narrowed behind his glasses as he considered the directions. A memory challenge. This was like a pop quiz, sort of, only with less specific grading and more human interaction...Which would have been a great combo, if he'd had the mind of one of his former classmates. In his own...Not so much.

He reminded himself, though, that he wasn't at home. Here, he was kind of...normal, at least to some extent. Which also felt weird and not entirely good in its own way, but at least it posed new problems and not the ones he'd had all his life, so that was...probably good? Either way, though, he had no reputation here, and even some...slight reason to believe that developing a good one wouldn't necessarily mean having to act totally like not-himself here. He'd been pretty much himself at Orientation and had started making friends with his roommate as a result before he'd even known the guy was going to be his roommate. By his standards, that really was social success on par with being elected president or something - maybe even better, since the process hadn't involved making 49% of the class hate him. So. Group work. No reason to assume the other kids here would lie about what the picture was just to mess with him and his grade for the day, or make insulting comparisons between him and the drawing, or...anything like that.

A girl with red hair was walking, it seemed, toward him. She looked purposeful. She had not been at Orientation. A second year. And yes - she wanted to work with him instead of pushing him over. That was...a good start.

"Uh - sure," he said to the question. He looked at the paper on her back and nodded to himself. "Yes," he said about the creature, flipping in his book to double-check the name, but feeling pretty sure about that part.

16 Eben Sosna Caw! Baa! 1538 0 5

Iris Cobb

October 02, 2021 11:48 AM

Squawk? by Iris Cobb

Eben, that was the boy's name. Eben S... something. Well, his last name wasn't that important at the moment. Iris was doing her best to learn everyone's name and figured first names were more important at the moment. She thought he looked a bit uncomfortable for some reason and hoped it wasn't because of her. If it was though, he would just have to get used to it, she wasn't really planning on changing to much without good reason. Her southern accent was one of the things she did have to change, spells were so picky about pronunciation, so that she was working on changing. Thankfully, she didn't usually have to worry about it much here in Care of Magical Creatures.

The boy, Eben, consented to work together. That was good, and he answered her first question. She was only allowed twenty of them to narrow it down and so had to make each one count. On the paper she had brought with her, she wrote down 1. Carnivorous. Nineteen to go. He was flipping through his book when she looked up again. The action reminded her that he was a first year and thus hadn't been around all last year. Also that she hadn't interacted with him much so far this year. "I'm sorry, I'm Iris. Iris Cobb. You're Eben, yeah?" She was not about to do that stupid introduction thing that Billy insisted upon doing.

"Are we supposed to be trading questions?" She asked, not sure how he wanted to do this. "Or should I ask all of mine and then we do yours?"

2 Iris Cobb Squawk? 1526 0 5

Eben Sosna

October 05, 2021 8:15 PM

Quack! by Eben Sosna

She knew his name already. Was that good? It seemed kind of like it ought to be good - or, given how small the class was, at least neutral - but he had no idea how to be sure one way or the other.

"Y - yeah," he said. "That's me. My other name's Sosna," he added, since she had included her last name. Iris Cobb. Was that a 'normal' name, he wondered? Irises were flowers and lots of people were named after flowers - Rose, Lily, Willow, Violet, and so on - but then 'cob' was part of a piece of corn, which was a lot of plants to put into one name. The alternative, though, was that irises were also parts of eyeballs, which was the kind of thing he was pretty sure would have been seized onto in his old school.

"I mean - I think it would make more sense to do yours all together and then mine all together after?" he said when she asked about protocol, voicing the opinion hesitantly. Organization was another of those areas where Mom and sometimes his teachers said he was too picky when things didn't go his way. It was stuff like that, he reflected, that had made him just answer 'no' that time that the substitute teacher had jokingly asked if he was supposed to be the good twin or the bad twin. He'd thought that would qualify as a funny answer sort of, like a mathematician's yes, but it had just gotten him a strange look. "So we don't get mixed up going back and forth?"

16 Eben Sosna Quack! 1538 0 5

Iris Cobb

October 08, 2021 2:15 PM

Neigh! by Iris Cobb

Iris mentally noted down Eben's surname. It wasn't one she'd heard anywhere before, but it was hardly the first one to slide into that category. Most of the people in the school fit into that category after all. She gave him a reassuring smile, "It's a pleasure to officially make yer acquaintance Eben." It never hurt to be polite. She debated on whether or not to ask him if he was new to all this magical stuff, but decided that might be considered rude. Instead she moved on to process the response to her question.

She bobbled her head slightly as she thought about his response. It made sense, but it did seem a little one sided. "I suppose so." Iris responded, almost adding on 'as long as you don't mind', but that seemed unnecessary. It was his suggestion, it would be silly of him to suggest a course of action that he didn't agree with. So, she would keep asking more questions. "Alright then, does this creature mainly move along the ground, as opposed to flying or swimming?" She didn't much like the question, because if it came back negative she would need to waste another question to narrow it down to an earth, sea or sky creature.

A thought lurking in the back of her mind swum forward rather suddenly and Iris remembered that she had another task this year. She should find a boy to take her to the ball. Eben was a boy. Hmm... maybe. She'd wait and see how this went before coming to any decisions, she still had lots of time.

2 Iris Cobb Neigh! 1526 0 5

Eben Sosna

October 20, 2021 9:57 PM

Baa by Eben Sosna

Eben blinked in surprise behind his glasses when Iris said it was a pleasure to officially make his acquaintance. Pleasure, official, acquaintance - so there really were people who always talked like this? He had just assumed that kind of phrase was the kind of thing people would make fun of him for saying because it only existed in books!

"Uh - yeah - thanks," he said, his lack of eloquence and inability to roll with conversational punches feeling even more sharply outlined than usual by comparison with someone being pleased to officially make his acquaintance. Was this what that stereotype was about - the one where people like him thought Southerners were always acting instead of just...being people, and where they thought people like him were rude for not doing that? Was that a real thing, then? "Sorry," he added awkwardly. "That was, uh, that one was a first for someone to say to me, but - nice to meet you, too." He cut himself off in the midst of the explanation, suspecting for some reason that talking more might just make any accidental offense offered much, much worse.

He checked the book against Iris' next question and nodded after a second of thought. "It...looks in here like it only really stays on the ground, yeah," he confirmed. Perhaps one word in the description could imply it briefly left the ground when attacking, but there was a long way between jumping and flight even if that was what the word was meant to imply. Plus, it might not mean that at all. Words were frustrating sometimes.

16 Eben Sosna Baa 1538 0 5

Iris Cobb

October 21, 2021 8:18 PM

Ribbit! by Iris Cobb

Iris wondered for a moment as Eben seemed to trip over his words. It wasn’t quite the reaction of someone who didn’t know the English language well… or someone who hadn’t understood a word she had just said because of her accent. It was more like he was having trouble having a conversation? Was that a thing? Maybe. She’d grown up surrounded by the same folk all her life, and they’d all just talked and knew each other. Maybe it wasn’t like that for everyone though? What kind of life had Eben had before he’d come here? It was an interesting thought, but probably one for another time.

He apologized and she smiled in return. “Don’t think nothing of it,” she replied casually. He was maybe a bit awkward, but still nice. He wasn’t out of the running as a potential ball date yet. Still, as protocol went, her date was going to have to ask her to the ball not the other way around. So even if she did decide upon him, she’d have to figure out how to get him to ask her anyway. That was a problem for later though, she had another one at the moment.

“It stays on the ground,” Iris repeated as she scribbled the note on her paper as her second bit of information. Well, thankfully she didn’t need to waste another question on that piece of information. Then she stopped to think for a few moments, what would be another good question to ask? Maybe what type of creature it was, what were those names again? “Eben?” She asked, “Do you remember what those names for the different kinds of critters were? There were the furry animals, and the lizards, and…?” Dangnabit, why couldn’t she think of them right now? “And whatever those other groups were.”

2 Iris Cobb Ribbit! 1526 0 5

Eben Sosna

October 28, 2021 10:59 PM

Chirp, chirp by Eben Sosna

Double negatives were technically positives, but it hadn't taken Eben long after he'd learned that bit of grammar to learn that nobody was going to accept the built-in loophole as a valid excuse when it was used strategically to lie without lying. He still needed to do more research to make sure it had no applications in wizardland - were there magic deals and contracts and stuff that could be gotten around with that kind of trick? Not that he was planning to ever take a deal with the devil even if it was possible, but it was the kind of thing it was probably best to know about the rules of, just in case - but on the whole, it was a no-go. Therefore, he used context and his knowledge of colloquial norms appropriately, divined what Iris actually meant, and smiled gratefully. "Thanks," he said.

He applied the same factors to her question, and was pretty sure what it meant. Still, he looked faintly anxious as he said, "Do you, uh, do you mean, like...amphibians, birds, fish, invertebrates, mammals, reptiles?" He rattled off the categories all in one breath, without pausing or slowing down. "Sorry - I start getting mixed up and forget one if I don't, uh, say them like that," he explained. "I've...read about other words in books at home, cryptozoology and stuff, cryptids and the undead and stuff...though, would those be new categories, or just magic mammals, like they were when they were alive?" He bit the inside of his cheek, thinking off-task for a second. "Huh. I'll have to think about that. Yeah, though, this book...could be a lot clearer about that stuff," he said, giving his textbook a reproachful look. "Sometimes it'll say 'bird' or 'fish,' but...the thing on the paper on your back, it doesn't say what it is," he concluded apologetically. "My best bet is maybe mammal, just because it...can walk upright? Even if it look a little reptile-y...."

He realized, belatedly, what he was doing and flushed deeply. Saying 'reptile-y' was bad enough, but also... "Aaaand I'm not doing this game right," he announced. "Sorry. Got kind of...carried away there."

16 Eben Sosna Chirp, chirp 1538 0 5

Iris Cobb

October 30, 2021 10:51 AM

Cluck, cluck by Iris Cobb

Iris couldn't help but giggle mirthfully at Ebon's response and apology even if she'd wrinkled her nose at the unpleasant mention of the 'undead'. He had given her way more information than he should have by the rules of the game, but she really wasn't sure she was much closer to guessing her animal despite this flood of information. "It's alright," she reassured him with a smile. "Those are the words I was looking for, I was going to ask if it was a mammal. We'll just say that you told me 'yes'." She wrote down '3. Mammal' on her paper. They had a ways to go yet.

"So far I've got a walking, carnivore mammal." She paused for a moment, "That doesn't cut it down much at all." She thought it only fair to try and follow the rules as much as possible, "Does it walk upright, and does it look a little reptile-y?" She inquired of her partner while writing the answers already given on the sheet under numbers four and five. That last question looked a little suspicious, but she didn't think that the Professor would come around and check out all of their papers, hopefully.

Gosh, now she had a mammal that walked upright and looked a bit like a lizard? Her first thought was of one of them dinosaurs that walked on two legs, but that wouldn't be a mammal at all. She tapped her quill on her cheek as she thought of another question to ask Eben. Maybe she could narrow it down by location? "Does it primarily live on this continent?" This was going to be another string of potentially wasted questions if she had to ask for each continent to narrow down where it lived. She'd learned that if Eben got talking, he was prone to give away free information, but that was cheating. She was supposed to be smart and do this properly. "No, forget that one." She interrupted before he could answer, there was something else she could do to cut down the possibilities more, "Is it bigger than I am?"

2 Iris Cobb Cluck, cluck 1526 0 5