Tonks stared at the class. They stared back at her. Had there been a clock in the room, she was sure its ticking would have drowned out all other noise. Except there wasn't any other noise. That was good. Wasn't it? Noise was usually a bad thing.
But, sometimes, with 5th years. And not just any 5th years.
These were Hufflepuff 5th years. In a Defense Against the Dark Arts class.
Hufflepuffs and Defense Against the Darks Arts just didn't mix.
Oh, the Hufflepuffs pretended to be all safe!They pretended to be all good and wonderful and honest and hardworking and all that other crap that so enchantingly represented the House of Hufflepuff, but it was all lies! Because when it came right down to it, Hufflepuff 5th years were hormone-plagued teenagers.
And hormone-plagued teenagers always were plotting!
Tonks cleared her throat and shuffled her piece of parchment. Her lesson plan, written just this morning after remembering that McGonagall was going to want to see an official and professional lesson plan. Curse these lesson plans! Curse them! They took all the fun out of teaching!
But, supposedly, the lesson plan kept you on track! If you fell off your lesson, you turned to your plan and everything was all wonderful and hunky-dory once more.
But the students were still staring at her. Snape was at his desk, trying not to fall asleep, and McGonagall was at a table in the back, glasses lowered, quill ready, frown in place.
Observations were so horrible! Would McGonagall critique as much as Snape did?
Tonks cleared her throat. Again. The non-existent clock was still ticking.
Maybe she had best get the lesson started.
"Today, class, we are going to learn some basic spells to keep away unicorns." Oh, no! Had that been her voice? Had that squeaky little inaudible rush of words been her voice?
She never whispered! She had always been the loud one!
And why was everyone laughing? They weren't laughing at her voice, were they?
And Snape was even laughing! Even McGongall was smiling.
Tonks fought the urge to run from the room. Had her voice been that bad?
"Unicorns," that irritating Brian Stauffer kid said from the front row.
She stared down at her lesson plan. It didn't say unicorns, it said erumpents. Her face grew warm.
Classroom management, classroom management, how did that work here?
The students were still laughing uncontrollably.
"I made a mistake, sorry," she began. But no one was listening.
Classroom management. She took a deep breath. "Oh, be quiet!"
And, amazingly enough, they all did.
She took another deep breath. This wasn't so hard. Now... she was going for "discovery" approach here. "Take out your wands, and imagine yourself facing an erumpent."
"In Africa?" someone asked.
Was that were erumpents lived? "Sure! Africa sounds good!"
McGonagall frowned and scrawled something on her notes.
Tonks grimaced. That couldn't be good. "What I mean is..." She screamed as a blast from wand rocketed past her.
The entire room was filled with it. Spells firing each and every way. Snape was wide awake, already holding two boys by their collars.
"Put your wands down!" Tonks screamed.
No one really seemed to grasp that concept of erumpents that day.
The students filed out as the hour ended, and Tonks slunk down into a chair next to McGonagall.
"Do you know what you did wrong?" McGonagall asked matter-of-factly.
Tonks nodded and buried her face in her arms. "The Discovery approach sucks."
She expected a tactless torrent of words from McGonagall, but instead there was silence.
And then, finally, a hand on her arm. "I know. Trust me, I know. It takes years of practice."