And the rest is silence. on Charms

Professor Perrault

May 20, 2016 11:56 AM

Nonverbal Spells [VI & VII years] by Professor Perrault

Now well into his late thirties, Edward Perrault had a lot of experience under his belt to compliment his impressive qualifications. Yet despite this, he was surprised to find that he actually felt rather nervous for his first Advanced lesson at Sonora. Edward supposed staying in one place for so many years had allowed him to fall into his comfort zone, the only real change ever being a fresh bunch of first years each term but they’d always been unlikely to incite nerves.

Although in contradiction of this was the notion that Edward had never truly been able to feel comfortable at l’Institut Québecois. That was for personal reasons, not because he had never been welcomed or involved - arguably never in his life would he find true comfort or satisfaction given his unfortunate situation. The Charms professor was aware that he had disappointed a good many people by leaving the Québecois school, both in the form of students and fellow faculty members, and he would certainly miss them but he’d made his choices now and was not about to turn back.

Second only to teaching was Edward’s love for acting and he was very good at it. He was therefore a natural at concealing his emotions - he had always had to be - and didn’t let his nerves show now. He felt a little warm under his robes but knew this was down to the fact that he hadn’t fully acclimatised yet. The climate here was very contrasting from that of Canada, even if there did seem to be a weather system in place to prevent the school being as unbearable as the surrounding desert.

Edward was fully prepared for his lesson but he sat organising his desk further as he waited for his class to arrive. He smiled and greeted the students as they entered in dribs and drabs, as expected some more prompt than others, his bright blue eyes friendly and keen. Once he was fairly certain everyone either was present or should be present given the time, Edward stood in front of his desk to greet them as a whole.

“Good morning sixth and seventh years,” he beamed at them, his voice projecting around the room in a confident manner. “I am Professor Perrault, your new Charms professor. Before we commence with today’s lesson I would just like to make you all aware that I am always available to answer any questions that you may wish to ask in class, or outside of class hours, so do not hesitate to come to me for help.” Edward liked to make sure students knew he was a dedicated teacher who could be relied upon for help at all times. He wanted to make sure they reached the highest level of their ability, particularly as half the class would be facing RATS examinations at the end of the year, and if it meant given up his own free time to go through certain things with students, he was more than happy to do so.

He knew that there had already been a number of Charms classes taken by a substitute professor before he had arrived at Sonora and had been informed what they had covered so far. It was odd how Sonora combined several of the year groups for classes, different to L’Institut Québecois where they kept the years separate, but Edward supposed it made sense for such a small school.

He perched on the front of his desk, reaching back to grab the roll call sheet and then returning to face the class. “I’ll quickly take roll call to try and learn all of your names, but I apologise if I don’t pick them up straight away.” He read through the names, ticking them off accordingly as the students responded.

“Thank you,” he said when finished, returning the sheet back to the desk as he got up and walked back behind it. “Now, we shall progress with the lesson,” he said, taking out his wand and revealing the lesson’s incantation and wand movement on the blackboard as he spoke.

“Today we will be learning and practising nonverbal spells, which I understand you have been studying recently,” Edward told the class. “What can you tell me about nonverbal spells from what you have learnt so far?” He picked on a few students so they could share their findings, either from their own reading and research or class lectures (depending on how keen they were). “Good, thank you,” he smiled when he was satisfied with the responses.

“Now, sixth years, I know that this will be a new skill for you so I am not expecting instant results. Performing nonverbal spells is very difficult and it will take time, and perseverance, to perfect. Today you, sixth years, will only focus on the Levitation Charm, a basic charm I know you are all very familiar with.” The Levitation Charm was one of the first spells the students would have learnt and Edward thought it best to keep things simple for their first time trying to perform nonverbally.

“However, for seventh years this is your chance to show me what levels you are all at so I would like you to cover a few more nonverbal spells. You may work your way through as many of the charms on the board that you feel comfortable with.”

With a casual flick of his wand a list of spells appeared on the blackboard behind him:
Levitation Charm
Summoning Charm
Engorgement Charm
Shrinking Charm
Freezing Spell
Fire-Making Spell
Water-Making Spell

“May I make it clear that you do not have to get through all of the charms listed,” Edward expressed firmly. “Some are harder than others so work through it in the order on the board and make sure you spend a good amount of time practising each. I might add, if you are going to be using the Engorgement or Shrinking Charms, I ask that you return your object to its original size afterwards.” He gave a brief smile before continuing. “If you have not covered any of these spells yet verbally, do not attempt them today but inform me about this.”

“You may use any of the objects I have provided on your desks. For the Levitation Charm you may wish to begin with a lighter object, but that is entirely your choice. Please help each other and ask me for assistance too,” Edward smiled, keen for the lesson to get underway. Before the students had entered he had arranged a good variation of objects on the desks, including quills, books (of varying weights and sizes), candles, a broomstick, a few small cauldrons and more. “Therefore you may talk amongst yourselves quietly so long as you are concentrated on the task. You will not succeed if you do not focus. However, I do not want to hear any incantations spoken aloud. I will deduct points from anyone who dares utter an incantation in this lesson.”

“I would also encourage everyone to make notes of your own observations to backup your research notes on nonverbal spells. Sixth years, when you have successfully completed your task, please grab my attention. You may get started now.”

Edward had already done more talking than he would have liked for a practical lesson but he wanted the individual years to be clear of what they were doing. He was still getting used to the idea of having multiple year groups in one class and since he did not know the abilities of the students yet, he neither wanted to underestimate or overestimate them.

With that he began making rounds of the classroom, observing the students’ progress and ready to offer any assistance if required and giving little pointers and tips here and there where he saw fit.

OOC: General class rules apply (you all know the drill). 200 words minimum and the more creative the more points earned. Tag Professor Perrault if you need direct assistance but you are fine to say that he offered advice where relevant. You are also free to say that you were one of the students called upon to give an answer to his question. You do not have to use the objects mentioned as this is just a guide for the type of thing Edward has provided.

Subthreads:

And the rest is silence. by Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

Talking it out. by Lionel Layne, Pecari

8 Professor Perrault Nonverbal Spells [VI & VII years] 0 Professor Perrault 1 5

Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

June 09, 2016 3:34 PM

And the rest is silence. by Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

A new professor was seldom something Isaac thought anyone truly welcomed unless they’d hated the old one beyond reason, which Isaac didn’t think many people had done in this case, but a new professor in Advanced classes was close to a problem. Isaac had not been all that attached to Professor Olivers – for one thing, knowing she had been an actress at one point, it had been hard not to assume she was always lying, or at least that he’d never know the difference if she switched back and forth – but he had been a little horrified when he heard she was gone. Her absence meant a new teacher who’d probably spent half the year just trying to figure out what the students already knew, and while that was fine for the sixth years, Isaac didn’t have time for all that. He had a calendar marking off days to the RATS on his wall in his room, and it was amazing how short months could look when the RATS were on the other end of them.

He responded when his name came up in the roll call and raised his hand when the class was asked about nonverbal spells. “They’re spells cast without a spoken incantation,” he said, nearly reciting from the textbook, “either to give an advantage in a fight or just to preserve a quiet environment.” Or to show off, though he decided not to mention that to the teacher. That wasn’t a good way to make a good first impression.

It was one reason why Isaac wanted to achieve greater mastery of nonverbal spellcasting, though. It was the kind of relatively subtle show of power that he knew his father would approve of, and he’d be able to do things without it being immediately apparent what he was trying to do, which came with all sorts of advantages even for someone who expected all of his fights in life to involve a lot of paperwork and percentages and laywers instead of wands. Still, appearances were everything. Perrault, if he had a brain, knew it was show-offy, and knew they knew it, but if anyone said it, it wasn’t going to be Isaac.

The list on the board was mostly lower-level spells except for the last one, but there were a lot of them and Isaac could see how some would be more difficult than others. Levitation made sense as a place to start, though- half of that was nonverbal anyway, as most of the steering and maintenance of even the verbal version occurred without repeating any more words once the item was up in the air. It was a smaller step than some of the others.

Well, everything had to start somewhere. Isaac didn’t see how Perrault planned to see if they dared mutter a quick incantation if he was going to allow them to speak, but he didn’t want to cheat today, so he just picked up a quill, put it in front of him, and concentrated as hard as he could, going through a familiar wand movement and chanting wingardium leviosa, wingardium leviosa, wingardium leviosa! silently in his head as he did.

The feather shuddered, jerked a few inches into the air, and then fell. He smiled, even though he could still feel just how hard he’d been squinting at the feather in the skin between his eyebrows. He was really going to have to work on doing this without looking as though he were on the brink of blindness if he ever planned to impress anyone with it. First, though, just to get it more than an inch off the table….

Two tries later, he succeeded in that. It rose two inches instead. Isaac smiled at the feather again, but this time, it was not in a very friendly way. Why did learning skills have to go so slowly?

16 Isaac Douglas, Crotalus And the rest is silence. 273 Isaac Douglas, Crotalus 0 5

Lionel Layne, Pecari

June 09, 2016 4:40 PM

Talking it out. by Lionel Layne, Pecari

New class, new professor. Everything was new except Lionel and his classmates. He thought they were pretty much all the same, just maybe more or less stressed than they had been at the end of last year.

He had tried not to let the stress get to him too much, to just take it easy and not obsess over the CATS, but it hadn’t entirely worked. He had done pretty well for most of the year, busy learning how to prefect and participating in the team challenges and everything, but then, right at the end, the CATS had gotten to him a little. He had spent a couple of weeks staring anxiously at his CATS prep books and papers every night, usually just staring at them but a few times flipping through the beginning chapters of review material and then almost panicking afterward. The weird thing was that it had actually worked – there had been a short-response writing question in the Transfiguration test he had only been able to answer because of one of those skimming sessions. It was enough to make Lionel wonder if his cousin Kate was right and at least some members of their family really did have almost preternatural luck. That would explain a lot of things Lionel didn’t honestly know of any other explanation for. The worse a situation tended to look for a member of his family, the more it actually worked to that person’s advantage long-term, the major exception seemingly being his poor granddad.

Professor Perrault seemed like a pleasant enough guy at first glance, though Lionel did a small double take when the professor said they had been studying nonverbal spells lately, because Lionel most certainly had not. Then, of course, he remembered that as small as this class was, it did still have two years in it. The seventh years must have known beans from potatoes about it all, if possibly not much more than that from Isaac’s description and failure to actually look all that pleased about what they were doing as his cousin answered the professor’s question. Of course, Isaac didn’t really emote much as a rule, or even really pretend to do so. Isaac looking stoic was really no more or less indicative of anything to worry about than Isaac’s sister Alicia’s smiles were, and Alicia had seemed downright jolly in public about the time in Lionel’s first year when everyone had realized that no, they really couldn’t get in touch with the outside world and no, it didn’t seem like it was having any better luck getting in touch with them, either. That side of the family was…well, he guessed it was a good thing in some ways, but it was still kind of messed up.

Lionel was familiar with the Levitation Charm, at least, but winced when he saw the length of the list the seventh years were working with. He was glad he wasn’t one of them right now. He just had the one thing…a comforting thought that took about three seconds to turn on him and show a lot more teeth than it had seemed to have at first. Only having one task while first starting a new kind of magic while the other half of the class had many tasks made him assume that while it might be easy to gather momentum once one got started with nonverbal spell casting, getting started was going to be hard. He nervously weighed a quill and a thimble between his hands before deciding that the latter was the lighter object somehow and that he should start with it.

He put it in front of him and bit his lip. So he just…waved his wand and thought about it being in the air? Was it sort of like visualization in Transfiguration? He tried that, going through the steps in his head that he had in Transfiguration for getting a really clear image of the thimble in the sky, but nothing happened. He tried again, concentrating so hard his eyes screwed up this time, but it still didn’t budge so much as a millimeter. Okay, then. Was the problem just that this was really hard, or was the problem that Lionel was doing it wrong?

“Hey,” he said to his neighbor. “Do you mind if I ask how you’re approaching this one? What you’re thinking at it?”

16 Lionel Layne, Pecari Talking it out. 283 Lionel Layne, Pecari 0 5