Dulce Garcia

January 21, 2011 10:10 PM

Anyone need a Tutor? by Dulce Garcia

Dulce entered the hall for the fourth time in her life. Each year she enters, she is excited to get through another year. Not because she really gave two hoots for the school, but because it meant it was another year gone and another year closer to leaving it forever. It was a negative look to have for a place that most people found to be a second home, but Dulce never had that feeling. She was an outsider here in every sense of the word. And because of that, she never felt the love for this school the way others did.

She knew that was partly her fault. She never branched out. She never tried. She could have sat at any table and chatted to anyone if she wanted. That’s what teenagers did on a daily basis. That’s what her sister did. But Dulce just couldn’t do it. She just… couldn’t. She didn’t have the tools necessarily to make connections with her peers. They were all on different levels. They all had very different paths chosen for them. Some only focused on marriage. Others on their schooling. For Dulce, it was her music.

This past summer had been the same as always except that Dulce had decided to learn how to play the guitar. She had mastered the piano, violin, and the drums, so her mind was craving for something knew. She never expected to want to learn the guitar, but she had grown bored of playing the same instruments and wanted something new. Guitar was the best option for the time being. Maybe next summer she’ll try a wood instrument or a brass instrument… Well, it’s food for thought anyway.

On the first day of her return, Dulce entered the hall for the fourth time in her life. Each year she enters, she is excited to get through another year. Not because she really gave two hoots for the school, but because it meant it was another year gone and another year closer to leaving it forever. It was a negative look to have for a place that most people found to be a second home, but Dulce never had that feeling. She was an outsider here in every sense of the word. And because of that, she never felt the love for this school the way others did.

She knew that was partly her fault. She never branched out. She never tried. She could have sat at any table and chatted to anyone if she wanted. That’s what teenagers did on a daily basis. That’s what her sister did. But Dulce just couldn’t do it. She just… couldn’t. She didn’t have the tools necessarily to make connections with her peers. They were all on different levels. They all had very different paths chosen for them. Some only focused on marriage. Others on their schooling. For Dulce, it was her music.

This past summer had been the same as always except that Dulce had decided to learn how to play the guitar. She had mastered the piano, violin, and the drums, so her mind was craving for something knew. She never expected to want to learn the guitar, but she had grown bored of playing the same instruments and wanted something new. Guitar was the best option for the time being. Maybe next summer she’ll try a wood instrument or a brass instrument… Well, it’s food for thought anyway.

But Dulce had come up with a plan that may help her meet new people and not be so awkward around them and also help keep herself from becoming bored with school. She was doing extremely well in all her of lessons. She may not have been placed in Aladren, but Dulce was pretty sure she had a running for top student. Not that anyone noticed. They never did. But, she wanted to put her brains to work. So, stepping out of her box, Dulce had set up a poster outside of Cascade Hall reading Need a Tutor? and the hours in which she could be found in the library for anyone who needed help with their studies.

It has been a couple of days since school had started and she wasn’t likely to have anyone yet (if she ever got anyone to tutor at all), but she sat at the table she had indicated at the time she had specified. Maybe someone will just come along anyway.
6 Dulce Garcia Anyone need a Tutor? 153 Dulce Garcia 1 5

Sophie Jamison

January 22, 2011 9:38 PM

*raises hand* by Sophie Jamison

Sometimes facts were undeniable. One of those undeniable facts was that Sophie was not good Merlin-awful at Transfiguration. Sure, her grades were fair in other classes, not often below an A, in anything else, but Transfig was just… not her thing. Now that her second year was coming, she just had to suck it up and face this fact.

She had to seek help for this dilemma.

However much confidence the Pecari displayed, she was not entirely comfortable around all of her professors, which included Professor Crosby. Therefore, she did not feel secure at all to ask her for assistance. It was nothing personal towards the professor; the blonde simply did not feel as relaxed around her as she did some other adults. Professor McKindy she was fine with--he was her favorite professor, and her Head of House!--but he taught Charms, not Transfiguration.

There was always Ryan. She was pretty sure he was doing well in Professor Crosby’s class, and it would have been fair of her to ask his help. After all, she had helped him with Potions last year and would gladly do it every year. However, Sophie liked being the helper, the smart one. As much as she trusted him--which had been enough to show him her deepest secrets--she wanted to seem impressive. Because of that, she hadn’t told him of her Transfiguration troubles.

When her blue eyes had accidentally made contact with a peer tutoring flier in the Hall, she knew this was her change. Sophie picked a time from the flier and decided to head to the Library at the indicated time. Coming up to the specified table at which a girl was sitting--This must be the Dulce girl--the twelve year old adapted a friendly grin. “Hi. I’m Sophie Jamison,” she said. “And I suck at Transfiguration. Think you can help me?”
12 Sophie Jamison *raises hand* 34 Sophie Jamison 0 5


Dulce

January 23, 2011 8:39 PM

*Points to raised hand* by Dulce

Dulce hadn’t been really expecting anyone to take her up on her offer for tutoring services. It was probably silly of her not to expect anyone because she knew of quite a few students that actually really did need the help, but considering Dulce was a shadow in this school, she didn’t think her sign would have gone noticed or if it had been noticed, no one cared to believe in her. She was fine with either one. People chose to believe in whatever they wanted. It did not make that belief factual.

Her light eyes glanced up when someone approached her table. She recognized the girl from some of the classes that the third years had with the lower years, but she didn’t know her name. Well, if she was younger than Dulce, Dulce definitely knew the curriculum that she was currently going to be heading into. Made tutoring much much easier, but Dulce had everything up until fifth year down pat. She liked to go through Lita’s textbooks from her school year and perform the tasks herself. Sometimes her mother and father would help her, but most of the time Dulce did it on her own. It’s probably why she did so well in her classes.

Dulce offered the girl a smile. It was a rather difficult feat to do considering Dulce rarely smiled, but her mother had always told her that if she wanted to make a good impression, than she needed to smile more. And, if Dulce wanted to actually make this whole tutoring thing work, she needed to come off as friendly. Nobody would want to spend time with someone who was always sour. So, on came the smile. “Hi Sophie.” Dulce greeted. “I’m Dulce and I should be able to help you with transfiguration.” She added, picking up her quill and dipping it into ink. She indicated the chair across from her for the girl to take and get comfortable in.

“But first, I need to know what year you are in.” Dulce advised. If she knew the year the girl was currently in, she would know the skill level she ought to be at. And, knowing where she should be, would help get her to that point and then beyond it. “And I need to know what specifically you are in need of help of. Like the practical part, the essay part… the wand movement, etc.”
0 Dulce *Points to raised hand* 0 Dulce 0 5

Sophie

January 28, 2011 5:02 PM

Hooray, I've been picked! by Sophie

The second year smiled when Dulce said she could help her with her Transfiguration problems. Coming to be tutored by someone who couldn’t have helped her would have been useless, so it was good that the older girl was going to be able to help her. Sophie took the chair Dulce had indicated to her to sit in, her small body having tons of room to stretch out in.

“But first, I need to know what year you are in. And I need to know what specifically you are in need of help of. Like the practical part, the essay part… the wand movement, etc.” The blonde nodded, seeing how that information could and would come in handy. After all, how would Dulce know how to help her if she didn’t tell her what needed helped?

“I’m a second year. Pecari, if you’re interested.” She knew that information would not alter the tutoring process but just felt it was something she might as well share. Sophie wanted to get to know Dulce, and she wanted Dulce to get to know her, because she didn’t think the tutoring would work all that well if they were strangers. As Serapes had often pointed out, for her to effectively learn, the blue-eyed twelve year old needed to know that the person teaching her was actually cared about her. Sophie needed love, or concern at the least.

“I don’t really know how to describe my, er, problem areas,” Sophie admitted, her English accent slightly stronger than it had been towards the end of the previous school year as she had spent her summer back home in England. “I can say the incantations. I can swish my wand around.” She pulled her wand from her pocket and sliced through the air with it to prove her point before sliding it away. “My problem is… my spells just don’t work. I try, and they never turn out right.”

“And when I get to an essay or whatever,” she added, “I guess I just forget everything. I barely managed to pass last year, and Merlin was Ileum annoyed--that’s my godfather. He’s big on academics.” She smiled slightly, remembering the horrified look on his face when she had told him about her near-failure in the field. “Can you fix me? Is there a spell out there that fixes the ineptitude of little blonde witches?”

OOC: Sorry the reply took longer than intended. My computer has a virus, so posting became a non-option
12 Sophie Hooray, I've been picked! 34 Sophie 0 5


Dulce

January 31, 2011 7:16 PM

Glad you're excited about it by Dulce

As Sophie sat down and began to explain her details and what it was about Transfiguration she was having difficulty with, Dulce wrote it all down on her parchment. It was likely that Sophie would be her only ‘client’ so to speak, so Dulce was going to do her best to know whatever she could about the girl’s troubles in order to find the best way of finding a solution. Considering the girl was only a second year, Dulce felt pretty confident that she’d be able to help the girl. If the girl had been older, Dulce might have had some difficulty, although that wasn’t likely considering how much she had studied. Either way, the girl would probably be more trusting of Dulce’s ability being older than she would have if Dulce was younger.

When the girl started to explain her issues with Transfiguration, Dulce nodded along. Transfiguration was a very difficult subject. If she remembered correctly, Transfiguration was the most difficult of lessons for anyone to learn and even adult wizards and witches continue to have difficulties with maintaining transfiguration for long periods of time. Transfiguration itself wasn’t difficult for Dulce, but she had yet to really try herself at keeping something transfigured for longer than a class period. Hm… maybe she ought to start trying that? Food for thought.

“It’s okay if you cannot give me a conclusive answer to that.” Dulce stated, trying not to sound monotone and not knowing if she pulled it off. “Transfiguration is typically the hardest subject for people to …master.” It took Dulce an extra second to think of a word to end her sentence. Master seemed appropriate though. “Spells will always work even if you don’t think that they did. It’s all on concentration and your skill level.” Dulce explained, pulling out her transfiguration book and her wand. Dulce waved her wand and mutter a spell on her book, changing it completely from a book on transfiguration to a Raggedy Ann doll and then waved her wand again to return it back to it’s original form.

“That, to me, was extremely easy.” Dulce explained, “But my skill level is very high when it comes to inanimate to inanimate object transfigurations. Currently, my skill level is learning animate to animate, which is the most difficult. Eventually, we’ll learn animagus transfigurations and how to maintain a transfiguration for long periods of time.” Dulce wasn’t exactly sure why she was explaining it, but for some reason she felt that it would help to explain just how difficult and continuous and even important Transfiguration could and would be.

“Normally, beginner levels start by doing inanimate to inanimate transfigurations. But, er, I heard that with Professor Crosby likes to kind of throw you all into the hardest transfigurations for your level rather than let you all start out small to get accustomed to the spell work and the type of concentration you need to perform them.” Dulce wasn’t going to speak ill of the professor because everyone had their own way of doing things and really, her lessons weren’t what bothered the fourteen year about the woman, it was how she spoke to her students that really grated on Dulce’s nerves. But, that was neither here nor there.

“Since you have issues with the spells entirely, we’ll start at the very beginning with inanimate to inanimate object transfigurations. Once you have that mastered, we can move forward onto more complicated transfigurations. This actually will probably help with what you are currently learning because once you have the basics, you can have a better chance at everything else.” Dulce explained to her. “And, if you do have current work that you can’t quite figure out or homework, I can help you with that as well. Does that sound good with you?”

OOC: No worries. Life happens.
0 Dulce Glad you're excited about it 0 Dulce 0 5