Here's the next chapter I hope you enjoy it. Please read and review love Angel x
Neville had already decided that he was not going to be predictable like Professor Snape was. They were the youngest teachers in a century but everyone knew Snape's speech he said to new first years off by heart and it did little to inspire anyone. Yes not an hour ago Neville had used fireworks to get his classes attention and that was great but as he knew it would be all over the school by now he decided not to use it again. People needed to learn to expect the unexpected which they wouldn't do if he did everything the same as Professor Snape always did in his own classes. He had looked at his schedule and seen that he had his old year group next. This would be fun. He used the charm to project his voice like that Dumbledore used in the Great Hall and stayed silent watching them all as they entered. They all seemed extremely confused that he was standing there and not hiding away in his office. They had been looking forward to the fireworks and he could tell.
"WELCOME CLASS TO DEFENSE AGAINST THE DARK ARTS!" he hollered making them all jump. It was his aim to scare his first class of each year group in some way in order to assess how they coped with shocks. It would tell him how good they could be at their studies. "Now that I have all of your attention I should say that they only one of you worthy of a mention at all today is you Miss...Greengrass thanks for that. I am sure I will remember all of your names soon enough. Five points to Slytherin for quick thinking. Can anybody tell me what Miss Greengrass did right?" he asked as everyone looked around in awe. Hermione Granger put her hand up tentatively. "Yes Miss Granger!" he called on her as she looked delighted to be called on. In fact she looked a bit too happy he felt as though she felt she should have been called on anyway. He'd have to watch that as if it developed in her she'd have no friends later on.
"She blocked didn't she sir!" she said as he looked at her in surprise. "Yes indeed you are right. She didn't know what was wrong and realised that anything could have happened and so she chose to block. It is a spell some first years know but it is not a problem if you don't know it as we'll be covering it in this lesson. In my lesson there is to be no sneering at anyone who doesn't know the answer. If you find that you know the answer and someone else does not do not immediately think them lower then you because they have not found the answer as easily as you. I should tell you a burnt out brain is a useless brain. There is to be no reading of anything other then what I prescribe you in your classes as if you read to much your brain will be overloaded with useless information. Having a desire to learn is wonderful but wasting that desire on things that you will quite frankly never need to know is pointless so we will be learning only what we actually need to know. I would advise some relaxation and patience for you all and remember to always give other children the chance to try and answer as well as no one likes over eager people anywhere. Yes Mr Malfoy that does also include you. If you feel you want to know more about something you can always ask me about it. There are many different ways to block spells and the strength of your shield depends on how much you put into it. It's a little bit like flying as the more power you put into that the further you go. Or for those muggleborn students among us like a car and the petrol you put in it. Now stand up please and come to the top of the room!" he ordered politely while waving his hand out as the desks arranged themselves in a far back semi circle.
"First things first we need to learn a charm to block from. The charm I will be teaching you today is the stinging jinx and it is called stupify. You wave your wand like so and call out the words stupify. Everyone please practice the movements with your wands without the words for the moment. You should all know that correct pronunciation of a spell teamed with correct wand movements yield the best results. Without one of these you are sure to have a serious accident and or fail. Ok now everyone line up here in two lines one facing the other. This line here is line a and over there you are line b. Line a is to fire the spell at their opponent in the line opposite them once and then move on to the next person opposite while line b people are to block the attacks. When you have faced the same opponent twice switch over to line b now does the firing. Are we all ready for that part of things?" he asked looking around to see if everyone understood his directions so far.
"Good now before this happens we are to all practice in our lines the protego charm our protection charm. Now as the wand movements are the same as the other charm we only need to know the words correctly. Remember what I said about putting power into your spells. Also belief in yourself despite what some people may say will help you always. Note that anyone from any house including Gryffindor itself who says you are not good or tries to belittle you because of blood status or magical core are cowards who know that they themselves are not up to par but say these things to you as they cannot face it. No bullying of any kind will be tolerated in my class. When I count to three you may begin. If anyone begins before I have even said three they will be disqualified and forced to watch the lesson. Ok so one, two, three and you may begin!" he said watching as people fired and protected spells. Ron and Hermione were currently fighting as she tried to tell him how to do things but he was having none of it.
"For gods sake just listen to me will you? You're saying it wrong and you'll take someones eye out if you go on like this much longer. It's protego not protega! Oh honestly did you listen at all in that last part of Professor Longbottom's lesson?" Hermione snapped angrily. "Oh shove off you menace it's a wonder you haven't got any friends with an attitude like that I can see why everyone hates you! Go home you stupid girl!" he shouted.
"STOP EVERYONE AT ONCE. Weasley and Granger front and center now! Hermione you do not know everything above everyone else so please stop acting as though you do. If you wish to give advice or help do so in a way which helps and doesn't belittle Mr Weasley. As for you Ron you were not listening and while Hermione should have said what she said better you would have hurt yourself badly had she not intervened. No one hates Hermione here and with that attitude maybe it is you who should go home. You have both earned yourself a punishment for not listening to a damn thing I said a while ago! For your punishment you will each have to wait here while I find one. Have a pumpkin juice and calm down the both of you while I retire to my office for a moment" he said as they downed the potion laden juice to his satisfaction. It was laced with an empathy potion. They would have to walk a mile in each others shoes all week long well at least until Friday.
He emerged from his office. "The punishment has already been administered from my office. We will see how differently you both feel on Friday. I hope you both learn your lesson. Five points each from Gryffindor for lack of empathy or understanding the way the other person feels!" he said seriously. The class were in awe wondering what he'd done to them. However as they saw no difference they knew it wouldn't cause any real problems. "Ok now everyone yes you two included get back to it. Ron please repeat after me Pro-te-go just like that very good now all you need to do is say it faster. Ok now move your wand exactly like me. Imagine I am a mirror and copy everything you see like you would do with your own reflection. Very good now try both! Well done. You see Hermione that with actual encouragement and listening on both parts Ron here can be taught how to do the spell correctly. Never forget I said that ever. It is achievable with the right attitude. Ok very good everyone now before we switch over I do have a question for people in the class that is to be answered honestly. I am not out to embarrass people but you should all know that a wizard is only as good as his wand. This means that every student should have their own wand as they cannot hope to do well here without it. Does everyone here have their own wand?" he asked as all but Ronald Weasley and Mandy Brocklehurst said they did.
"Ok for today only Ronald and Mandy are to stay here with me and the rest of you are permitted to go. This will not happen again just for today. Ronald and Mandy please wait for me in my office. See you all tomorrow. Now ok then Mandy who does your wand belong to?" he asked her as she shook with nerves. "It belongs to my grandmother who left it to me when she passed away. My mother said I should be honoured to use it so I was scared to tell her it does not work well for me. I loved my granny very much and I wanted to honour her sir!" she said as a tear fell from her eyes. "Well sir my family cannot afford to get new wands so my wand is my older brother charlies first wand he had at school here" said Ron. Neville didn't much like Ron over everything he'd done but would have serious no accidents in his class because of a faulty wand. He called for Ollivander through his floo asking him to bring materials to make a wand with him. He asked how much it would cost and then found out it would cost ten galleons.
Bending into the floo again he floo called Charlie in Romania.
"Hello there I am looking to speak to Mr Charles Weasley can you please tell me where I might find him?"
"I am Charles Weasley how may I be of assistance to you sir?"
"Good day Charles. I am Professor Longbottom your brothers DADA teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and we have an emergency here that he needs help with. Do you think you could aid us?"
"What has Ronald done now? I swear he's never out of trouble."
"We were practicing spells in class but his wand was causing more injury to himself and others then it was protecting him. Quite frankly you must know how dangerous it is to have a wand which is not just for you. I have arranged for Mr Ollivander to come through to my office and make him a new wand as it will be much safer for all should he have one of his own. I will not have serious incidences in my classroom because he is ill equipped. I need you to send through ten galleons for his new wand as his parents are not in any position to be paying for one as you well know!" he said as Charlie looked shocked.
"Yes of course sir you know with everything that happened with mum and dad I hadn't thought of that. Ginny will need her own wand next year as well. Thank you for telling me this and I'll send it through just now. He can pay me back at a later time when he gets money from somewhere. Have a good day and give Ronald my regards and tell him I'll see him at Christmas" he said cheerily.
He stepped back as a sack of money came through the fireplace to Ronald's shock. "Your brother Charles will pay you for a new wand and you will pay him back at a later time when you have money. Now select your wand woods and cores. The same goes for you Miss Brocklehurst as your mother too has sent through money for Mr Ollivander here. Do not worry about things as your mother says she is disappointed you couldn't tell her there was a problem but said she loves you none the less. Mr Charles Weasley will see you at Christmas Ronald!" he said happily. They both selected ingredients and so on and eventually had their brand new wands. "Tell me Ronald who else in your family does not have their own wand?" he asked as Ron went red faced. "Well Professor Fred and George don't and that's all. Percy has a brand new wand mum bought him for becoming prefect" he said happily glad to be getting away form the embarrassment of his family for now.
He was asked to leave and then Neville turned to Ollivander handing him twenty galleons. He had always liked those twins and now would be treating them to their own wands. He had instructed Ollivander that he didn't know where the money had come from but someone had paid for them to get new wands. Ollivander never suspected that he himself was paying for them nor did he care as money was money at the end of the day. They were summoned and came up to his office in shock. What had they done wrong?
"Fred and George Weasley enter please. Now both of you sit down. As you know DADA is a dangerous subject field and what is most important in this room is as you know safety. A wand which does not belong to the wizard who uses it is a disaster and will not be tolerated in my class. You are lucky as someone who I don't know as they rudely left without giving their name has paid for you to have two of your very own newly made wands. No more dangerous hand me downs for you two!" he said as they both squealed in excitement. A half hour later they had brand new wands and could feel their cores at their strongest and fullest it had ever been. Neville was happy things would be safe from now on in his classes as although he seriously disliked Ron everyone's safety mattered more. As the first year group headed upstairs to Harry's room for Cultural Studies no one knew what to expect.
"Enter and find your seat. I wand two Gryffindor's and two Slytherin's at every work section. Please note the place you pick now will be your place permanently with your name on it which will only appear there when you yourself sit there. Should someone else sit there their own name will appear so don't worry. Now the desks have many functions. Right now they are set to their normal functions but can become a kitchen area and even an area for making things with wood as well as an art area. Now as today is Monday and no one likes those really we will be doing art today. You will find we art on every Monday. Now in front of you, you will see a wheel and attached to it is a pedal. I want you all to push the pedal with your foot and see what happens. Now as you will notice when you push the pedal depending on how fast you push it the wheel spins on it's own. Now today we will be working on clay. I find that molding shapes with clay is very relaxing. For those of you who don't know what clay is you will find that most vases and household wares are made from it. Those of you who are wearing family rings will want to take them off you now and place them in your table sides drawers. Now I am passing out a sack of clay and some water to everyone including a mixing bowl" he said doing just that. When he was sure everyone had some he told them what to do with it.
"Ok so pour all the clay powder into your bowl and add the water you have been given. Everyone is to put their hands into clay powder and water and begin to mix it up like I am doing here. When it gets to the same consistency as mine you are to stop and wait for everyone to catch up. Now as I do in all of my art lesson there will be muggle music on in the background so ignore it if it's not your thing. Are we all ready. Ok so now do as I do and place it on top of the wheel in front of you and gently push on the pedal. Make sure it is gentle as if it is not your mixture will end up all over you and your section. Placing your hands on the mixture while spinning the wheel gently mold it into the shape you want it to take. It can be a plate, jug, bowl, vase or anything you want it to be really. Now you have an hour to complete this task. Off you go!" he said smiling. It was his idea to get the purebloods in particular filthy dirty in class as it was something they would have to learn to cope with. He would clean them all off before they left the room however he wasn't telling them that. They needed to sweat for a while for assuming bad things of muggles always.
"Potter this is pointless! No one wants to do this dirty servants work!" snapped Malfoy angrily. "That is Professor to you Mr Malfoy. Now however you'll need to learn better manners and so Mr Malfoy you can think about how to better phrase your complaints in detention with me tonight at six. You will soon learn that muggles who are not rich do not have servants and do everything for themselves. And shock of all shocks they manage to do it all without complaining about it. Isn't that so weird?" he asked in a condescending tone. "My father will hear about this!" he snapped. Clearly he'd not been told about his daddy yet. Possibly his mother didn't wish to worry him yet. "I have no doubt he will. Now get on with it!" he snapped not liking Malfoy's tone. He put on some more Michael Jackson to see how people would react to it. He could see that Malfoy was very shocked by the tone of the music. He really liked it. He assumed it was some wizarding music he'd not heard of before however when he found it was a muggle artist he said it didn't mean he was suddenly a muggle lover. As people in the class worked away he had an idea. He was looking around at all of the blank walls in his room and an idea struck him. Everyone made plates, vases and the like singing them at the bottom with quill nibs and leaving them to harden in the cupboards under their desks where they would remain until the next week.
"Ok so your things will be ready next Monday for you to paint and design in any way you see fit. Now everyone stand still as I'll be cleaning you all up. Now for Wednesday I want a one ft parchment or page on how this experience made you feel and what you learned. Now I am passing around two boxes one with books in it and another one with pens in it. You are to take one out of each box and pass it on to the next person. The books here are full of blank pages of paper which is used in replacement for parchment in the muggle world. The pages are to be used in my class by being torn out of the books like so and handed up to me here with your names on them. If you run out of paper tell me and I'll give you some more. Now the pens are what muggles use to write instead of quills. They are the same as self inking quills however they need to be thrown out when they are gone. There is a special type of pen called a cartridge pen which is very fancy and uses capsules of ink in it to give it the ink for writing with. Once these are gone you need to put a new cartridge or container of ink inside the pen. These pens don't need to be thrown out. If people would prefer I can show you how those types of pens work later on. Now everyone is to test these out writing out your name and age on the pages like so and then show them to me. Off you go" he instructed them.
They all did so a lot of tearing was heard everywhere "Sir mine ripped and isn't working anymore!" said Ron seriously. "What you all need to do is lean lightly with the pens on the paper like so. These are not parchments where you need to push the quill firmly to get it to write properly. If you push too hard like that here the pages will break. Tear them out and leave them on your desk and start again. It doesn't matter that you got it wrong. What matters now is that you learn from this and move on. We need to always learn from our mistakes and not dwell on them as that can cause problems for us all. Let me see how you're all doing now then. Ok very well. You know I told you to do one ft of paper but what I really mean is write on the front of the paper and then turn it over and write on the opposite side of it and that will be one ft ok. Now considering that we still have some time in our class left we are going to be doing something muggles do all the time. Ok so watch me while I explain what I am doing as I will need you to see it for you will be doing it next" he said as they all watched in fascination. He conjured a platform in the centre of the room so they could all watch what he was doing.
"Ok so I must tell you that everything runs in the muggle world on electricity like everything runs here on magic. Without it a load of things don't work. Now as we cannot use electricity here we will be using a gas stove. Now watch me please. Here I have what is known as a kettle. Inside this we put some cold water and set it over the fire. Once the water is ready to be used the kettle lets out a loud whistling noise to let us know it is done and needs to be removed from the fire. Without this noise it would be dangerous. Once the water is done it will be boiling hot. Ok so do you all hear this noise? Yes? It means it's done so I will now take it off. I need no towel or anything as the handle here s not hot so I can hold it easily in my hand. Now grabbing the mug here I will put in the teabag as so and add in enough water for myself. Now this is the point where you need to decide if you like your tea very strong or weak. If you like weak tea you can remove the bag now or if you like it to be strong you may squeeze it with the spoon against the side of the cup to get a stronger tasting tea. After this you will be placing the tea bag in the bag here provided and you will not need to look at it again" here he paused to make sure they could all see him which they could.
"Now tea can be enjoyed three ways. You can have it black just like this, or you can have it with some milk in it. The final way you can have it is with some milk and sugar in it. Now Mr Crabbe please come up here and make yourself a cup of tea. We'll all be doing this so take your time. The water is already done for you now so you just need to make the cup of tea for yourself. Yes just like that very good. Well done Mr Crabbe and five points to Slytherin for making your first cup of tea for yourself without any assistance" he said happily. As everyone got a chance soon everyone had a cup of tea. He handed out some muggle biscuits to them. "the muggles call this their elevenses or morning tea time. They usually have tea with a biscuit or two at this hour and then they don't eat again until lunch at two o'clock. I hope you enjoy your tea and twenty five points to both houses for inter-house unity and using muggle equipment for yourself. The benefit of this Mr Malfoy is that you made it so you now get the pleasure of enjoying it all for yourself. You should be very proud indeed" he was so impressed at the kids excitement of getting to consume what they themselves had made.
The Slytherins all felt amazingly proud of all they had achieved and couldn't wait to learn about more things. This idea of getting to make your own things and then enjoy them yourself sounded very fun and rewarding to all. They knew that they had house elves who might not understand but Harry had explained to them that they should get help from them as it is to do with school stuff and the house elves would only be too happy to do it. "Now then the best thing about this next part is that I want those of you who have personal house elves to call them here now and give them the second cup of tea you made just made now. Tell them you are learning these things and ask for their opinion on it as they will love how involved it makes them feel!" he said proudly. Twenty house elves came all in shock but delighted to receive the tea. "House elves thank you for joining in this lesson with us. Your input is invaluable and the kids are very happy to know they are doing something right. Sometimes I will assign them homework to at home during the summer make three of four different dishes and I would very much like you to supervise them and then tell them how they did. You are to let them do it all on their own first and then show them where they went wrong. It will be a learning experience for all of you. Now everyone let's give a round of applause for the amazing house elves who took time out of their busy day to come and see us today. Thank you all very much now class dismissed!" he said as everyone clapped and house elves had never felt more delighted and proud of their masters. At least this way. They could learn things together. It was two happy professors that retired to their offices for lunch that day. What a lesson.