Andrew was slightly taken aback by the professor's use of his given name, as he wasn't used to the professors actually even knowing it! However, it did not take him nearly as much time to get over that as it was taking him to get over the professor's new look.

The way she spoke when she started the lesson made him force himself to focus on her words, but there was still a figurative elephant in the room that he just barely managed to ignore. The professor's question seemed simple enough, but he was a little afraid to answer just in case he'd misunderstood. Still, he took a breath and raised his hand.

"If I've understood the question correctly, Professor, you're referring to the three classifications of magical creatures: Spirits, Beasts and... Beings I think was the third one?" He spoke slowly and calmly, making every attempt to obscure how uncertain he was about his answer.

All the answers she could give we're already being said by others, so Lux didn't really see the point in raising her hand. Instead she took out her notebook and began writing down what was being said.

Looking towards her boyfriend, she saw that he was asleep. Poor Bay. He was working so very hard this term; she was so proud. About to wake him before the Professor noticed, she was pleased when he did so on his own. Hopefully he would stay awake. At least until class was over.

Benny heard Angel's comment to the professor and knowing what had happened in the dorm yesterday, he was well aware of who she was refering to. Said person answering herself as AJ spoke up and added her two cents into the conversation. And the possible growing situation between the sisters. When Angel spoke again, he turned to look at his girlfriend feeling the need to say something to her...anything to keep it from escalating...as Adi seemed to be trying to handle AJ.

"Angel, this is not the time..." he answered quietly as he looked back up at the front of the class.

Zander raised his hand to answer, but then promptly lowered it when someone else went to mention the X's. That someone else who was talking about how X's meant kisses and how kisses meant cooties? Did all boy's have cooties? 'Cause..... He kissed, ahem, someone on the train and.... He didn't give her cooties did he? That would be bad. Did she know? Did she know that some boys have cooties, but then she kissed him anyways!?

O________O

No. Cooties weren't actually a thing. They couldn't be.... Could they? UH, Professor??

But also, how come they were talking about magical creatures in history? Shouldn't that stuff be saved for, well, Care of Magical Creatures? Just wonderin' is all. Ahem.

"OH yeah, yeah just like they said Professor. ME PERSONALLY, I like the beasts. They can talk and junk, but also eat your face with gravy. I mean, that's something." It really was. "Like TROLLS and WEREWOLVES. Man. So cool. Werewolves got a whole department thing in the Ministry." Yep.

Yes! Yes! Everyone was getting snaps! How adorable was all their entrances and look how sweet they were saying hello to her. First she gave a hello to Adi, and then to Eden. "It's just a happy day!" Yes, that it was. She nodded at her, "Wouldn't miss it." Beaming she watched the other students enter. Her best friends class was just so fabulous and her look, she couldn't wait to see what that was about.

Smiling at Ethan she wondered if he knew his Yeti picture was hanging in her office, but she'd tell him later. Class was going to start and she couldn't be a bad Professor and talk. She waved at Kace as well and nodded to his question. Yes she was joining or she wouldn't be sitting here right now.

Oooh and it was time to get started, gosh she loved Nessa's hair! It was so long, maybe she should charm her own to be that long for the fun of it. She wondered if someone might like it long or even shorter. Hmm shorter might be fun. Her mind drifted to these things until students started answering a question. Whoops, what was the question? The Divination Professor listened trying to catch up.

Dot kept her head down on her desk and hoped desperately that The Boy wasn't looking at her. It was really hard for her to focus on the professor and her question, even with the woman being green, when she was busy being embarrassed. Like... like what was she asking about?

Beasties, yeah? And ghosts. And spiders. No.... no one said anything about spiders. Dot propped up on one elbow and then on two as she considered the question. "What about magic ones and... not magic ones?"

Puck grinned at Professor Glendower, “nice hair Professor” she quietly complimented and then returned her attention to the class at hand still in her fairy gear. Her face as straight and prim as ever she just felt the laughter bubbling through her mind and body as she tried not to laugh. “The creatures that are no problem to competent wizards are given an X-X-X rating.” She piped up and glanced around daring ANYONE to comment.

All the answers were probably said already right? Ruby hadn't really been paying attention. She was lost in her own world, chewing on her quill, zoning out. Basically quiet Ruby was quiet.

How odd.

Nessa took a deep breath before addressing the entire class. It seemed some were very confused given some of the answers she had gotten even after specifically asking that they not give her those. “Alright, class, as you can see from the board,” she began, gesturing to the information written there. “There are three official classifications given to magical creatures – Beings, Beasts, and Spirits. And we are talking magical creatures in the most general of terms. That includes people too. We are not talking about the rating system that the Ministry gives to what we consider to be animals as this is not Care of Magical Creatures class.” She supposed it needed repeating so hopefully everyone was paying attention this time and perhaps the visual aid of the board would otherwise help them to grasp the concept.

Quote:

Originally Posted by blackboard!!!

Beings – intelligence, cognizant comprehension, input in shaping magical laws

• Wizards/Witches
• Veela
• House-Elves

Beasts – some have speech but most don’t, can be vicious or savage, no input in magical laws

• Dragons
• Trolls
• Werewolves (during transformation)
• Merpeople

Spirits

• Ghosts
• Poltergeists

Grogan Stump - Minister for Magic credited with instating current classification system and definitions

Nessa pointed to the board as she continued. “Now here is a list of what we have come up with so far. This is very incomplete and I’m sure that we can come up with a little more to fill this in.. so what other creatures would fit under these headings? What are the traits of each of the classifications or how are they determined? What defines beast, being, or spirit? And start to think of why these classifications are in place.. What reasons would we need this organization of creatures?”



OOC – Please provide an answer to one or more of the questions Professor Glendower has posed to the class (specifically the last paragraph) about Being, Beast, or Spirit classification. Please remember that it is not about the X rating system the Ministry assigns to Magical Creatures.

Maddie kind of WANTED someone to talk about Xs again, just to see what Glendower would do. The thirteen year old had been hoping for more of a reaction when student after student repeatedly gave an answer the woman had said not to give and was left underwhelmed. Couldn't they have a Professor who was a bit on the crazy side? Not counting Flamsteed, of course. A good professor meltdown would certainly liven up her day.

"Acromantulas are beasts, Professor." Maddie hadn't taken Care of Magical Creatures YET but she was an avid reader so she DID have some knowledge about creatures, magical AND mundane. Also, she DISLIKED spiders very much. Her skin had goosebumps just THINKING about giant ones who ATE people but she was used to keeping it together. Better to get this out of the way herself. "They can speak but they also will EAT you which makes them rather disagreeable. Imagine sitting down with one of THOSE to make a law?" You'd likely find yourself in their belly after a short time, she guessed.

Professor Morgan was the best. Eden LOVED her. And she was enjoying sitting next to her because she was being so NICE and COOL. Hehe. And having the happy, bubbly person next to her was helping her feel positive, too. She kept smiling up at her, too. HAI PROFESSOR MORGAN.

So Eden was right in thinking the 'X' classifications were NOT the ones Professor Glendower wanted. But oh--now that she thought about it, yeah, she DID know about the spirits and whatnot classifications. Oops. Regardless, she was taking notes like a madwoman. Because..this was interesting. Yes. Very interesting. HMPH.

She glanced up at the board. Right. Makes sense. And now for more discussions. Eden was enjoying this class thus far...especially with all of the CREATURES stuff, yes! Hehe.

The Ravenclaw timidly raised her hand. "I think Centaurs would definitely be in the 'Being' classification, Professor." She said softly. They were the first creatures she had thought of when she saw the word 'beings.' Well, besides humans, of course. As for the other questions..hmm.."Well..I think we'd need the classifications because you can't deal with 'beings' problems the way you can deal with, say, a 'spirits' problem. The two are much too different..." she said with a nod. "Need to be able to handle everyone efficiently." It wasn't...a perfect answer. but Eden had SUCH a hard time putting her thoughts into words most times.

Adi smiled back at Glendower. It was nice to see she was still the same despite the few changes in appearance. Besides, he was only doing what was right here. He knew he was one of the few persons that could calm AJ down.

He released her arm so he could begin taking his notes. While Adi did this, he considered the questions. "A Banshee is considered a Spirit, Professor. I think we need these classifications since they vary from other classifications because of their traits and will need to be dealt with based on the respective groups they are put into.'' Did that make sense to the Professor? Because in his head, it did.

Kace understood what the professor was trying to get at. He was a bit off topic at first. He thought about what creatures could fit into the list. He thought of beasts at first but then came up with something else. "Professor I know Goblins would go under beings since they are intelligent. But I have a question, would boggarts go under the spirits or beasts since they show us our worst fear?" He was just being a curious puff is all. He hoped he answered the question right the second time around.

Ian listened to the professor as she reiterated the answers provided as well as discussed the differences in classifications and ratings of creatures. Ian thought about the last thing she asked. Why would the ministry need these classifications? What purpose would it serve?

Ian thought about how muggles were classified by their own governments and what purposes were served in that capacity. He raised his hand and gave the following response.

Muggle governments classify people by their status in society. This helps the governments understand how best to meet needs and control different portions of the population. Ian didn't want to get overly political in his response, but it just happened. I would think the ministry would have the same purpose in mind. How does one control something unless it is provided a label and understood how best to 'deal' with that particular group? Ian had added the air quotes when he said the word deal to indicate a sarcastic use of the word. Perhaps not the most politic way to say it, but it's kind of how he viewed the whole classification thing. Governments had been doing it for thousands of years, the most basic classification being 'us' and 'not us'.

Toby couldn't help but smile at the look on Glendower's face after he gave his answer, and ended up grinning right back at her. Couldn't help it, see; whenever someone smiled it automatically made him smile right back. The Hufflepuff nodded and started to write down everything that was being added to the board, and aaaaaaaaall the words that the professor was saying too.

At the next question he raised his hand super high, suddenly quite enthusiastic because there was something he KNEW ABOUT THIS. It was all rather exciting, because Toby was awful at remembering History facts, but he supposed his studying was helping.

"Eden said about centaurs, Professor. And they're considered Beings and all that, but they refused it, for the same reason that the merpeople did, because they didn't like sharing with certain other Beings, and said the prefer to be called Beasts. Sooooo... I guess sometimes it doesn't actually matter what the requirements of a category is, if they prefer to be in another one." Toby lowered his hand and began to fidget with his quill, twirling it between his fingers. "And the classifications get re-... re-thingied all the time. Re-decided, I mean. Beings used to be classified as things that can walk on two legs, but there was a bit of a disaster when they tried to have a meeting to discuss laws and stuff. So yeah... it changes all the time. I guess they decide the classifications based on what has or hasn't already worked."

But... why? Why WERE the classifications needed? Toby had no answer for that, and gradually a thoughtful frown appeared on his face. He... had nothing there.

Spiders were beasties. Ghosts were... spirit things. And people were beings. Human... beings. So that one was easy. But there were some that were complicated, and Dot was drawing little lines between the beasts and being categories and then scratching her head with her quill.

There was ink in her hair. Oops.

"What about house elves? Those are like... thinking things and sometimes real bossy, but do they have their own will? And what's the point, then? If you say something is a being, are they allowed to buy stuff? Live in a house? Use a wand? I don't get the point."

After writing up what her fellow students had to say about Beings, Beasts, and Spirits, Lux saw that Professor Glendower had written on the board so that information was recorded in her notes as well. Hopefully they were going to get to an activity soon, because Glendower always had fun activities and she wanted to act out a role again.

A lot of questions were coming at them, and Lux raised her hand to answer one of them. "Basilisks are beasts."

Zahra was eying the board, shaking her head in that WISTFUL way. "Man, Professor.... it'd be so cool if dragons COULD talk."

Like really man. Imagine riding a fire breathing lizard to work then telling it to go pick you up a burrito for lunch? Yeah. Amazing.

"But like... okay get this. If government has set categories then like why are these creatures CHOOSING where they want to go? If the shoe fits - wear it, you know? Centaurs and merpeople need to suck it up. SUCK IT UP LIKE VAMPIRES, who are beings I think. THAT or I'm gonna move that we as wizards and witches go and be spirits 'cause they just do WHATEVS like all day everyday." See Peeves for example!

Ruby wasn't paying any attention to the board, as usual, but she did think the discussion was interesting so she was all for it. Her hand went up after a moment or two.

"I think maybe it was good intentions to start with, like probably it was about a ton of different things, wizard safety and creature rights both, you know? But I also think its maybe because people feel the need to categorize things all the time, and maybe it was a little bit about trying to neatly fit things so they were definable. I mean maybe they only had three rooms at the ministry that they could use for the divisions, or they couldn't decide which person out of three to give a promotion to, you know? It could've been something like that behind the original decision to make up the different categories." Who knew really?

"But I also think that the ones that said they don't want to be beings because they object to being beings with ones that are beings that they don't like, they sort of are still beings no matter what? Like they are still influencing laws and stuff just by objecting to them, and I don't think that it makes sense to just 'let' them be classed as something that they aren't, especially when it proves they're what they object to being called." It was dumb, basically. Ruby fell quiet, not used to saying so much in class. She went back to... not taking notes.

Andrew furrowed his brow at the professor's barrage of questions, staying silent for a moment as he tried to make up his mind about which one he'd go for.

He'd almost gotten over the professor's green-ness. Almost.

A silent moment's careful deliberation with him self later, he'd decided to take a gander at the last one. Why would we need to organize critters this way? Raising his hand, he presented his answer to the professor. "Surely when deciding who gets to vote on magical laws and such, a classification system like this would be invaluable." He began, shrugging his shoulders slightly.
"We can't exactly have grindylows- He paused, pondering the correct pluralization of the word 'grindylow'. Grindylowe? Grindylli? - Anyway: "We can't exactly have grindylows and Cornish pixies voting for health-care reform, can we?" He smiled and sat back, rather pleased with his answer.

Then again, it wasn't himself he had to impress.

Grayson wasn't usually sure how to feel about enthusiastic people. It raised the question of WHY they were so enthusiastic in the first place when the world was worse than dragon dung. But he appreciated Glendower's enthusiasm, welcomed it even, especially when it came to her enthusiasm for his answer. Dead happy, he was.

They were gonna discuss disputes soon? BRING IT. He was ALL up for discussing exactly why there had been arguments in the first place. Let them dish out the dirt because let's face it: THOSE were the most interesting things to learn about. Facts were alright and all but really, there were only so many times he could listen to those without getting bored.

Oh jeez, those were a lot of questions. They weren't expected to answer ALL of them, were they? He freaking well hoped not.

Grayson, unsurprisingly, had another answer that was linked to conflict and opinions. Kinda. So, his hand went up in the air. "The reason I think we have these classifications is so that there's an order. Some organised way of looking at creatures, I guess. There's one for mundane creatures so why shouldn't there be one for magical ones as well?" Shrug. "Besides, we kinda need it in place. It's much easier to remember these categories and to know what they roughly stand for than the ones saying how dangerous a creature is. You say the word 'Beast' and people are more likely to think of a monstrous creature they should stay away from, even if they don't know ho dangerous they are."

"It also creates a sense of hierarchy. Beings are more likely to be higher up the hierarchy and therefore have more power." Just saying.

And Ruby had said a lot, you know? Intelligent words. Her opinion. And he hadn't heard her giving that much of an answer before as far as he could remember so, he smiled encouragingly in her direction.

Lots to think about here. David was trying to think of a creature he could suggest to add to the board, but then Zahra's answer kind of distracted him and now he was thinking about that. Why DID they let merpeople and centaurs choose? Hmmmmmmm.

He raised his hand as he considered it. "Maybe letting them choose is like...a sign of respect or something? Centaurs and merpeople are probably pretty helpful for some things, but they might not ever help us with anything if we didn't respect them enough to not classify them with vampires and hags and all those things they don't like. So that could be why. Or part of the reason anyway." Because there could be more to it than just that. He didn't know.

Norah slid down in her seat, feeling her cheeks start to turn pink. So people thought cooties were funny? Sigh. Nobody understands a twelve year old. Heaving a long breath, she sat back up again and grudgingly began to take notes. So she hadn't even been answering the right question? Boooring. Talking about danger would be much more fun.

She sat listening to the other answers, contemplating whether she should raise her hand and humiliate herself even further. "Chimeras are beasts 'cause they're definitely vicious AND savage." There. That was right, wasn't it? And not funny or stupid? Suddenly confused, Norah's hand shot back into the air. "But why would a being WANT to be a beast? Doesn't it make more sense for them to want to be beings so they can make the rules?" Why would anybody ever give up an opportunity to be the boss?

Marigold followed along, taking notes, before thoughtfully considering the question. "Flobberworms are beasts." She knew that one. Which was weird, not that she knew that the fact that flobberworms which were soo boring, were under a title along with dragons and chimeras? Anyway, Marigold listened attentively to Ruby's point, then raised her hand. "I think they can choose because, ultimately, wizards 'n witches aren't going to... y'know... force them one way or another. We prefer being in charge anyway. But allowing them the choice... I mean, it's probably one less thing for the ministry workers to worry about, right?"