Jake raised his hand, more uncertainly this time. "Do you find the corresponding numbers to the letters in your first name, according to the..." here he struggled and glanced down at the book, rifling through the pages. "P... puh-pyythagooreyuhn number system... and then add them up or something?" he shrugged, no longer very certain at all. Stupid words.

Erm....

Raising her hand unsure of herself, Livvy answered, "Well the transits are individual letters and influences, so how we find each and every Physical transit, would be by looking at each letter of your first name." Was that right? She looked down at her textbook momentarily. It seemed right.

Kiri raised her hand. "Well, there are certain attributes and characteristics and... and, er, well, possible future events for each letter in your name. So depending on what letters you have in your name, you'd be able to figure out what your, your Physical Transit is." She stared at the last sentence of the introduction to the Transit Cycles.

Each letter of the name lasts for as long as the value of that letter. Whatever did that mean?

Destiny kinda knew this answer. She just had trouble explaining it.
'Each letter of our first name stands for a certain characteristic.'

"Well,Proffesor each letter in our first name stands for a certain characteristic."

Flicking through his textbook, Blake almost tore a page, meep he needs to slow down. Oh poo! this is confuzzling, Blakey doesn't understanddd sowiee. Think.think.

Lucille bit her lip. She didn't really know this, but she thought she'd make a guess. "Is it each letter of the name, lasting for as long as the value of that letter?" she asked hesitantly.

Ginny raised her hand again...she wasn't sure ''um i think we find every Physical transit,by looking at each letter of our first name professor''she said''maybe it's right she thought

Warren had a long hard think.

'' Do you.. find out the numbers that relate to the letters to your name? they are each characteristic. '' he said giving a faint smile. '' And then either add them up or mulitiply?''

Jack raised his hand and replied, 'Well, I think each letter in your first name means something, but I don't know how you figure out when or for how long.'

Herminny raised her hand and said, "I believe you take each of the The Transits that are found among the individual letters of your name, in this case first, and are used in conjunction with the Essence Chart to provide additional information about your future.
Your name can be viewed as a piece of music that vibrates in time. Your life, therefore, can be visualized as a musical score, with the individual letters making specific contributions at given points, just as notes in a musical piece are played at specific moments to give a piece of music its rhythm, character, and nuance. Each note or letter has a specific duration and influence over your life during a specific period of time.".

Tiberius looked over the textbook as he considered the professor's presentation so far. He understood how to find the letters, but not much else. Scrunching up his face, he raised his hand.

"Professor," he asked, "maybe you'll be getting to this later, but I'm wondering where it says that it lasts for as long as the value of the letter, but would, say, the T length start at the beginning of the year? Or does it just happen whenever? I guess, I'm not clear from the text how to figure that out .." Tibi frowned and looked at the professor expectantly.

Oh, Ella knew this one. Confidently, her hand rose and she answered, "Each letter of your name corresponds with a characteristic, I think?"

Evelyn thought she had the answer, but before raising her hand, some other students started to speak. Their words were adding to her own response and after a few seconds, all her thoughts were becoming confusing and she wasn't sure anymore. 'Huh...' she leaned forward on the table, placing her elbows on top and resting her head on her hands, listening to everyone.

Professor Shackleton-Clark confirmed James' answer to Tavelon's question, "Even if a person changes their name, unless it has been officially changed on their birth certificate, you always use the original name. Whatever name is on the birth certificate is the one you use in most calculations in Arithmancy, including the Transits."

Professor Shackleton sighed and replied, "It is quite off topic, but yes, I do sometimes have you work in pairs. Though I often dictate the terms by which pairs are decided to prevent unfocused students from spending my class time discussing their social lives."

"This is the most accurate description I've heard thus far. A point to Ravenclaw."

"The first name contains multiple Physical transits because the name contains multiple letters. There are no calculations to determine the meaning of each Physical Transit, though there may be some math when determining which Transit Cycle is current or applies to a specific age. Each letter has a meaning for a certain length of time in a person's life. How do we determine the length of each Transit Cycle?"

Quite frankly Tavelon wasn't sure how stable the science of arithmancy was, so 'calculate' was probably not the right term. But like most magic it was very new to him, so Tavelon decided to try to figure it out.

Tentatively raising his hand, he answered "Each individual letter has a vibration-energy?" Of course he wasn't really asking a question, but all 11 year olds sound like they are.
"Thank you, Professor" Tavelon said. "But why do we use the birth certificate? Is there something particularly magical about it? I would think that you'd get a better reading off of who you really are rather than what someone named you." Hopefully his question wasn't too outlandish, but Tavelon was quite curious about the matter.

Kyle Thought..
And Thought about this question..
But then He scanned through
his book...
It was obvious...
And he said,"It depends on the vibration energy."

As LouAnn read through chapter twenty-eight, she came across the answer, however, there was some P-word she had not the slightest clue how to pronounce. She flipped back and forth between chapters twenty-eight and two, then finally raised her hand. "You use the Pythagorean Number System," she said, saying that P-word slowly just in case she was slaughtering its pronunciation. "You can add together the numerical value of each of the letters in your name, then you can find out...well, it says here...find out something like how many years your name will last. Or something like that...then it starts over again with the value of the first letter of your first name." Whoa. That was confusing. LouAnn glanced up at the professor and blinked, unsure of what she'd even said.

James was happy that he got the other boys question right all though he could'nt hid his disapiontment that he got the other question wrong and also achived no points for answering the other boys question

Herminny raised her hand yet again said, "Your name can be viewed as a piece of music that vibrates in time. Your life, therefore, can be visualized as a musical score, with the individual letters making specific contributions at given points, just as notes in a musical piece are played at specific moments to give a piece of music its rhythm, character, and nuance. Each note or letter has a specific duration and influence over your life during a specific period of time.".

Ella smiled a little; head down. She hoped the teacher didn't resent her. She hadn't been what you'd call the best student. She wrote a note to herself reminding her to bring some Honeyduke's chocolate for her sometime.

Ella just couldn't figure out the answer to some questions, like this one. She looked hopefully toward Herminny, who looked pretty smart for a Gryffindor.

Ella flipped the pages, she still couldn't find it. Uggh.

Jake raised his hand, looking thoroughly confused. A confusion caused by reading.

"Professor..." he said, furrowing his brow. "Does this have something to do with it? Each letter of the name lasts for as long as the value of that letter. I mean... the book said it and I can't see anything else according to length of time," Jake added, shrugging.

Scanning her notes she'd made in the margins Sloane raised her hand again, "Each letter lasts the length of the value, each letter/value is different."

Each letter of the name lasts for as long as the value of that letter, james said, decied to see if this would be a good enough answer, he could go into more detail, if not

"This is a very insightful and important question. I'd prefer to address it at the conclusion of class if that is okay with you, as it can often create a rather lengthy discussion and debate. But I will say that it is believed that your name at birth does have a magical quality about it. With that said, there are numbers in Arithmancy that deal with changes made to a name. For example, for people who change their name when they marry, there is a Married Name Number to determine what energies are added to a person in marriage. Changes often add something to a person, but they do not negate the original essence of a being, which is revealed by the birth name."

"Very very good, Ms. Purple. You've earned a point for Gryffindor."

"This is a very beautiful description of the Transits; however, it does not answer my question."

"Yes, that does have something to do with it. A point to Hufflepuff."

"Sloane and James, points to each of your houses as well for correct answers."

She addressed the class, "In order to determine the length of a particular Transit Cycle, you assign the letter its corresponding number based on the Pythagorean Number system, which is listed in chapter two of your textbook. That number is equivalent to the number of years that that particular Transit lasts.

"We read the Transit Cycles just as we read a name, from left to right. We start with the first letter representing the Transit from birth, or age zero, to whatever its numerical equivalent is. The next letter picks up where the first left off and lasts the number of years that the letter represents. And so on and so forth.

"I realize this concept is difficult to understand in words, so an example might be best. We'll use my first name to demonstrate the Physical Transits."