First Years, Lesson Two

After reading carefully through the introductory quiz he gave his students on the first day, Professor Landon Carter was feeling very confident that he would have a good year this year. Many of the students seemed eager to learn which lifted Landon's spirits up. The man was at the front of his classroom lining up each and every tool that they would be using throughout their time in the course on the table at the front of the room. He knew that going through each and every tool individually would be boring and time consuming and so he wanted to make it fun. To do this, Landon had set up a game for the students to play. A great section of the Greenhouse had been cleared of plant rows in favour of wooden pallets that were filled with many different kind of dirt and sand. There were six in all, each measuring two by two meters. If the children did not find this fun, he would not know what else to do.

When everyone started filing in group by group, Landon greeted them all with a smile. "Please stand next to a pallet each." he told them as they made their way inside. Once he was sure that everyone was there, he began his lesson. "Today we are going to be learning about each and every tool in Herbology. With me here I have a spade, a mattock, a spading fork, a draw hoe, a rake, pruning shears and a few little wheelbarrows." Landon pointed to each one as he said them, making sure that the students knew which ones were which. "In each pallet in front of you there are different kinds of dirt. Every different kind of soil has nutrients and densities perfect for the plants that grow native in them. Sandy soil is better for shrivelfigs, heavy and clay-like for Mandrakes, light and dry for bouncing bulbs and so on. We're going to get to know the soil and the tools we use for Herbology by going on a little treasure hunt." Looking around the room, the man could see some of the student's faces light up, and he just smiled at them all, glad that they were already liking the sound of the day's lesson.

There were no rules as such, but there were some interesting prizes and results. Buried beneath the pallets were a mixture of knuts and sickles, the latter being further down in the piles and harder to reach. Also in the soil, however, were twelve raw eggs spread between the six pallets. Professor Carter instructed the students to attempt to retrieve as many knuts and sickles as they pleased using the tools. Successfully rescuing an egg from the dirt and returning it to him would grant the lucky student/s one galleon. There was a catch; each witch and wizard could only touch the dirt with the tools. By experimenting with each set with each soil and finding out which worked best, everyone had a chance of winning the knuts, sickles and perhaps a galleon or two. Landon encouraged the students to rotate around the pallets to work with different tools and soils. By the end of the lesson there were many grubby, sweaty and happy students.

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Assignment: Roleplay the lesson, and have fun! The first five people who take the time to have their character find an egg will receive extra points in lieu of actual money.
 
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His first herbology lesson was pretty boring to sit through, so he didn't think that the second one was going to be much better. Already he was hesitant when he saw the pallets of dirt, even more so when the Professor told them to stand next to one. He already had a sense of where this particular lesson was going even before the activity was explained to them. Well, he supposed that digging around in the dirt was at least more interesting than just sitting around and listening to a lecture he couldn't really say he cared much about. Thankfully, Miles had no issues with getting his hands dirty, more than happy to just waste time trying to dig the biggest hole he possibly could in the middle of the pallet. Luckily, he also managed to find one of the eggs once he had dug his hole wide enough, managing to reach the bottom of the pallet of dirt. By the end of the lesson, he was quite proud of his hole, handing the egg he found into the Professor before he left the greenhouse.
 
Finley wasn’t late to Herbology like he normally was most of his classes because he’d actually already been awake. He was trying to start getting ahead of things, but he would have to see how it all worked out to know if it would make any sense at all. He stepped up to the pallet in front of them as the professor stopped talking, gripping his fork thing tightly - unsure what he was going to be able to find. A treasure hunt, he thought, sounded like it would be a really cool idea and such an exciting way to spend time in class, since he liked being outside, and it was a good way to test different tools in the soil. He struggled with the heavier clay, not sure which tool was best to use for it, but was able to work it much easier after switching to a mattock. He kept digging for a while until he unearthed a dirt covered egg, and carefully moving it without breaking it, he rushed over to Professor Cater, holding it up to him with pride.​
 
Christa couldn’t believe she was back in the greenhouse so soon, it felt like almost no time had passed at all, the classes were coming quickly and she didn’t feel at all prepared for the end of the year when she would move into the next year, how was she supposed to learn anything with the year moving so quickly? She liked the idea of a treasure hun tthough, which seemed like it would be way more exciting than having to listen to a lecture, which was fine of course, but to be honest she prefered the more hands on stuff. When the lesson came to an end, Christa had found several knuts and a slightly cracked egg that she carried over to Professor Carter to show him, she was really very excited.​
 
Lincoln had higher hopes for herbology when he walked into the greenhouse and saw a bunch of pallets laid out on the work stations. Professor Carter explained their purpose and what was inside them, they had to use the different type of tools on offer to dig through the soil and find the coins and eggs that had been buried. Lincoln got start, choosing the spade first and going from there, experimenting with the different tools and seeing what worked best. Once he figured out which tools worked best with what soil he was off to the races. He collected a handful of knuts and sickles but he was still in search of the illusive unbroken egg, which he did eventually manage to find and carefully extract. He carried it over to Professor Carter and presented it to him. By the end of the lesson Lincoln was covered in dirt but he didn’t mind, the lesson had proven to be more fun than he expected because it had been hands on.
 
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