Selina Skies
April 23, 2022 8:54 PM
Intermediates - The Swapsie Game by Selina Skies
“Good morning,” Selina greeted the intermediate class. “Today, we’re going to be carrying on with switching spells—but with a bit of a twist.” She hoped that was enough to catch their attention, even as they returned to the perennial subject of switching spells. It was something that they studied throughout the intermediate block, and really was one of those subjects where it just needed repetition—with bigger objects, across bigger distances and so on. It was very much the spell equivalent of lifting weights—you just had to keep going to build up those muscles.“Today, you will be working with a partner and using switching spells on unseen objects. Switching spells are useful in daily life for storage solutions, such as rotating seasonal items through your closet, or retrieving things from a teetering pile without sending the whole thing flying,” she said, trying to hit practical, every day examples which would cover a wide range of bases.
“We will be experimenting with some differing conditions. You will have a wooden block in front of you. Your task will be to swap it with the middle object in a row of three behind a screen. Your partner will tell you either the real object, a different object that is also behind the screen, or an object that isn’t there. They should not tell you which condition you are working under, and you should try at least five switches, covering all conditions at least once. After that, swap positions and swap objects from this tray at the front. You should take notes on how many tries it takes you to switch the object accurately. Regardless of whether you find this subject easy or hard, you will get a variety of information that lets you compare you to yourself, which will be the most meaningful way of interpreting the data.
“You should by now know the switching spell. Though how we handle the ‘object’ part today is an interesting dilemma. Any thoughts?” she asked. The spell was always ’suppuno,’ and generally had the name of the object they wanted tacked onto the end. Given that they wouldn’t know whether or not their partner was being truthful, that made it tricky. They also ought to know by now that when classes were more experimental, they only wanted to change one condition at a time—in this case, their partner’s directions—so they needed to come up with something that would work consistently. She took answers, posing questions and gently prodding until they’d found a logical answer.
“There is a worksheet to fill out afterwards, with some prompt questions and reflections, which will look at what this tells us about switching spells. For now, find a partner and begin.”
OOC: As usual, points are awarded based on length, realism, relevance, and creativity. I tried to set this up in a way that gives lots of chances for pair work and socialising, so hope that's appealing.
Subthreads: I am familiar with this game. by Henry Spellman
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Selina Skies
Intermediates - The Swapsie Game
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Henry Spellman
May 03, 2022 4:06 PM
I am familiar with this game. by Henry Spellman
Henry tried not to roll his eyes when the professor talked about 'daily life' including having enough clothes to swap out for various seasons. Summer clothes were just the bottom layer of his winter wardrobe, even when Phoenix hit more unusually cold days. Perhaps he'd feel differently if he lived-in Alaska but he doubted many magical people really had big needs for seasonal wardrobes when they could just weather control whole school buildings and stuff. Maybe it was just for fashion.That was something that was always hard for him to adjust to when they returned to Sonora after a break; these people were not his people. Even though he was one of them and probably would always have to be now, and even though his brother was here, and even though their home in Arizona was a whole lot better than it had once been, these were not his people. There were probably a few exceptions but so far, none had stood out enough for him to really dive in and trust them. Not that he generally trusted people much. He was the rule follower and that meant doing things the right way, but friendships couldn't really be done the right way. Oz was the one who had friends and Henry was the one who had books. Some days, that just hit a little harder than others.
Today, they were working in pairs though and that meant finding Oz or making nice with someone who was not really his friend for the duration of class. He always looked around for Oz, an automatic movement at this point, but he also knew that Xavier was in this class and so were Billy and Gus and whoever else Oz might feel like hanging out with so he didn't really try that hard to find him. He really didn't try hard to find anybody honestly. He just moved slow enough that someone would come find him.
He had been quiet in the discussion but was fairly sure suppuno object would be sufficiently vague and accurate. He just hoped he didn't manage to mix up his switching with someone else's around the room. How would one even know? He took the block he'd be working with and grabbed a pencil to gently mark an H into the side. It was light enough to be wiped off or erased later but it would help him know if he'd done the thing properly. Probably.
Finally, as the class paired up, someone approached him.
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Henry Spellman
I am familiar with this game.
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