Sitting on the bus on the way to school, Hermione's mind was going a mile a minute. She had never thought about asking to meet with the school vice principal in charge of finance before. But why shouldn't she, all she wanted to know was where she had gone wrong in her calculation of how much money the fundraising had made. She decided that when the other children went outside to play for their break that she would ask Ms. Rose for a pass to the office.
Selena Rose was Hermione's favorite teacher ever. She wasn't like other teachers that she had known. Ms. Rose never fussed at her for finishing her work early, and she always had plenty more for whenever Hermione wanted it. She was pretty sure that no other P7 student was reading the Canterbury Tales, nor were any of them taking a stab at geometry and basic trigonometric principles. But, Ms. Rose had said that this was to be a secret just between the two. This made Hermione think that this was something she shouldn't go talking about with all of the other students. This wouldn't be hard, especially since she hardly ever talked to any of them anyway.
This was the first year that Ms. Rose had not had any complaints about her teaching style. In fact, this was the first year that the principal had not had to withdraw a single student from the class. It would seem to any outsider that Ms. Rose had made a complete turn around in her teaching style. This was true, but the real turn around was that she wasn't teaching at all. It was almost as if she was completely enchanted by Hermione. Hermione was the only student that Selena ever spoke to and on most days Hermione and Ms. Rose were in the library together or outside under a tree discussing things that were usually reserved for students much older.
Hermione loved school, she loved everything about it, but most of all she loved numbers. Numbers, in her opinion, were one of the few things that are concrete, they can be manipulated to make different numbers but they themselves do not change with out reason. Hermione looked up to see that they were pulling into the schoolyard. She hastily shoved her journal and her special fountain pen that Ms. Rose had given her back into her bag.
Once inside the classroom, Hermione took out her journal again and continued to write, she still had at least twenty minutes before anyone else would be in the room.
September 9th
Today I was able to make my lunch box come to me by only thinking about it in my hand. Ms. Rose was right, there is something special about me. I only wish that mother wouldn't worry about me so. She still is keeping notes on every little thing that I do. That notebook that she has is getting way too full for just one binder. It is hard to believe that she has been watching me so closely all these years. But then again, I suppose she is concerned. I love my mother, but sometimes I worry that whatever it is that is wrong with me will haunt her forever. Maybe I will ask her if I can see the notebook, maybe the answer is in there somewhere and she has simply looked at it so many times that it doesn't make sense to her anymore. Maybe I will ask Ms. Rose, she seems to know what I am thinking sometimes before I do. When I grow up I want to be a teacher just like her.
Oh I almost forgot, well of course I did not really forget, there are only ten days left until I am ten years old. I am beginning to feel so grown up. Mummy says I can have a party at the play date for the PWA children. At least there will be cake and ice cream.
Hermione shut her journal and pulled out the book of higher-level math problems that Ms. Rose had given her the day before. She couldn't explain it but numbers made perfect sense to her. Granted there had been some things about numbers and math that she did not understand at first. And many things that she had to work at to grasp, but if she ever decided that she wanted to do something she was able to, eventually. Books, however were a completely different subject. Hermione had never once read a book that she did not learn something from. At age five she was given a dictionary. Every time she looked up a word she marked it, and never once had she looked up the same word twice.
Ms. Rose came in looking extremely cheerful. Ms. Rose's attitude was a book-worthy story in and of itself. Until this year she had been notorious for being the absolute meanest teacher in the entire district. She typically gave extreme amounts of homework and was not sympathetic towards her students at all. If Hermione had had friends outside of the PWA play dates she probably would have been told to be worried about having her, but since she didn't, she was not worried in the least. This year Ms. Rose had split her class into groups that were taught by the aides. This way they were less of a bother to her and that left time for Selena to work one on one with Hermione. No one, including the other students, objected to this; in their opinion the less involved Ms. Rose was, the better.
Hermione went to the teacher's desk and shared her plan for interrogating... err... questioning the Vice Principal in charge of financial issues about the fundraising funds during lunchbreak. Hermione was ecstatic when Ms. Rose said that there was no reason to wait for recess time, why not go during the morning break. This was amazing; once again Ms. Rose had been able to tell that this was something that was important to Hermione and she had decided to help her out. And Ms. Rose was actually going to go with her. Not that she would have minded having to speak with the secretary by her herself, but with another adult there maybe she would be taken seriously.
Hermione beamed and went back to her desk to analyze the financial document she had updated twice a week the whole of last year. She had so many questions that she wanted to ask, she could hardly sit still. She was so involved with rechecking the results of the third grade candy sale that she did not even hear the announcement about the next major project that the class would be working on. Normally the idea of an independent project would have made Hermione ecstatic, but today she was all too worried about making sure that she had her facts straight for the meeting. If there was one thing that Hermione loathed more than anything else, it was not being taken seriously by adults.
Hermione looked up when one of the aides snapped a ruler on the desk of Alyssa Dawne. This was when she saw that there was a bright green slip of paper sitting on the corner of her desk. She could hardly control her excitement when she read it:
Second Major Project for P7 Students
All P7 students must demonstrate a basic understanding of genealogy. Genealogy is the study of a person's background, more commonly known as a family tree. Students will be required to go at least two generations back, extra credit will be awarded to those who take the initiative to investigate further. Special circumstances such as adoptions and divorces will be taken into consideration. If one of these, or something else, will possibly hinder you from this project feel free to discuss it with your teacher.
Projects will require students to know the name and at least one fact about each member of their family for the past two generations. This includes parents, their siblings (your aunts and uncles), their siblings children (your cousins), your parent's parents (your grandparents), and their siblings (your great-aunts and great-uncles).
No specific format is required, therefore this information may be presented in a tree format, an outline, or more simply in a formal essay. All projects will be required to be turned in on the second Monday in January. As is obvious by the amount of time given for it, it should be assumed that this is to be a well thought out project.
Could she have read that right, she had finally been given an assignment that she was not only happy to be doing, but it was something that she was enthusiastic about. She would finally have an excuse to rummage through her mother's old picture books. This was going to be so much fun.