Jackie raiises her hand. "Yeah, you can be someone who makes phrophecies for the Hall of Prophecies in the department of mysteries. Or work in the Hall of Prophecies," she says.

Matheu listened and took notes as the proffessor went on. One field of personal interest, Arithmancy, came directly to mind when the proffessor mentioned fields of Divination.
"Arithmancy, sir," Matheu said. "Using numbers to understand people, events, et cetra, while also predicting possible outcomes using those numbers by grouping them with varies events and people, finding compadability and what not. It isn't directly associated with the Ministry, but it is used globally. Even in the Muggle world, professor." Seeing as how Matheu was Muggle-Born. Also in Ancient Runes, interrepting stones from the Mihans, Barbarians, et cetra."

Chris grinned escitedly at the enthusiasm Professor Reynolds had showed at his answer. "Thank you Professor." he said, his cheek bones turning slightly pink.

Other Divination-Ministry feilds? Hmmm... he was having a bit of trouble thinking of those until Gold mentioned the one that he could have hit himself for not knowing. Go Awesome!Gold, Gryffindor Prefect Team for the win! *giggles* He turned around in his chair and gave her a thumbs up.

He then reaised his hand to say one that could possibly be right, for he didn't just want to repeat what Gold had said, "Professor perhaps Seers could be used to help out in the Department for Internation Cooperation?" Kind of a strech he knew, but he had to give an answer. "They could be used to try and predict future disturbances and perhaps to pick ideal locations for world event such as the Quidditch World Cup, that are not planned to host Muggle activity in the future." The Head Boy crossed his fingers under the desk.

Nolan grinned. Those had been some of the answers he was looking for. "Yes, all good answers, all of you! There are many divisions in the Ministry that deal with aspects of Divination, most of them residing in Mysteries," he explained, standing up and pacing in front of the class again. He tapped the chalkboard and a list of all the careers they had listed popped up.

"And, as many others suggested, you don't HAVE to go into the Ministry or become a fortune teller to have a career revolving around this subject. You can become a Divination researcher and write books on the subject, you could make the items needed to perform rituals, or even teach it, as I chose after I left the Ministry," he added.

After casting a quick glance at Cela, who was staring at her desk, he looked back to the class. "Now, many of you brought up reading tarot cards or tea leaves and making a living off of doing readings. Many Seers do chose this path, and some even open their services to Muggle to make more of a profit. Today we're going to be focusing on a type of Divination that make Muggles think of immediately when the subject of psychics comes up. Can anyone explain to me what scrying is?" he asked the class.

Selena raised her hand before answering, "Well, scrying is usually done with the use of a crystal ball or mirror, it basically allows you to see the future to some extent and helps you reflect, kind of, on what you already know to form some sort of image," she said. She was pretty sure the first part was right. Not so sure about the second part.

Carin looked up at the next question. Scrying? She'd read about that in some of the Muggle fantasy literature she had been trying out that summer. Of course, she knew that there was nothing fantastic about it in the Wizarding World.

"Isn't that when you look into a reflective surface and you see in it a person or place as it is in the same moment that you're in? So, if you want to see how your brother's doing while he's on a trip in, I don't know, Sweden, you can scry him and see where he is and what he's doing at that exact moment."

She paused as another thought entered her mind.

"Professor, doesn't scrying only apply to people or places that you already know or have seen? So taking the example of my brother, if I scry him in Sweden but I've never been there myself, I will only see him, not his surroundings... right?"

Gold raised a hand. "It's a technique where people try to See through a physical medium, isn't it?" She offered. "It can be used to interpret the future, but it can be used to make sense of the past and present, too. Or for guidance, or the sake of spirituality."

There was obviously more that could be said on the topic, but Gold chose to stay on the surface. Lots of other people willing to answer questions. They could all contribute to the discussion.

Lysandra knew what scrying was, well, at least what she thought it was and she raised her hand. Scrying is a magic that lets people see things physically, such as pictures of people or objects in mediums such as crystals, mirrors, or water.

Pshaw.

All those jobs mentioned seemed BORING to Destiny. Who in their right mind would want to work with crystal balls all their life? Unless you could smash those balls, she wanted nothing to do with them. She needed something to keep her awake, and was glad for the question asked. "Scrying is a form of Divination.." Obviously, "..where one stares into something shiny until visions appear."

As she lowered her raised hand, she decided to staaaare at the rather shiny forehead of the Professor. She was scrying.

Maeve smiled wide. Had he might have put this in the lesson because of her love of the art? She raised her hand and looked around. Wow, a few people knew the gist of it. "Scrying is a method of Divination to help look into the future." But that was quite a given. "It varies on different types of use when using different mediums to scry with."

"The most common items are Mirrors, Fire, Smoke, Water, preferably in a basin." She opened up her notebook to a page where she had written everything down the last time she had done a traditional Scrying. "But other people might fine Photo Scrying, Shells, Rocks, & Wind to be better for them." She looked up for a moment and then back at her notes. "One must focus all their attention and mind onto the fixed surface, to stare receiving visions from the other realm." She looked up and smiled. Her only thought, besides loving this subject, was how people were going to perceive her. What? She just loved Divination.

Huh. Abby knew this one. She raised her hand before replying. "Scrying's when you divine answers to the future using an object. It's usually smooth and able to reflect stuff," she said. Hm, vague. What else did she know about scrying? "People who scry focus on the object until they get a vision. The vision could be in the form of a whole bunch of different kinds of things, like changing color or cloudiness or a glow. It's up to the person's mind's eye to interpret the vision."

Scrying? Like crying with an 's'? Ellie glanced around the room.

"Might it have anything to do with crystal balls?" she asked, almost sarcastically. Almost. But not evident. She still wasn't sure how much of a sense of humor this guy had...

Hand raised. Hand raised!

"Professor, scrying is also called crystal gazing...but not always involves a crystal, one can also try and see any vision through water...in which case the visions may come from the movement of this medium, and the scryer has to interpret them" right? That's what the scryer did, correct? Treyen rested his hand after this, and waited for the Professor to speak.

Meeeeh. They weren't going to be staring into the crystal balls today were they? She was hoping they'd be doing something a bit more...hands on so she was able to stay away. But staring at a clear glass ball was...

Well, Rae better keep her awake the whole time. Or Destiny. Or...JOSH! *squee!* Sitting up straight in her seat when she saw the Gryffinor, she closed her eyes for a moment and sighed before slumping back down. What in the world was she doing?

Yea, she didn't know. So, scrying. Crystal ball gazing. Fun stuff.

You use your inner eye to see images in mirrors, crystal balls, water, anything that will reflect something.

Niko put up his hand "You basically look in anything that you can... well see into. Crystal balls, mirrors, glass, water. Could you if you really wanted to you could use firewiskey even, but then most people think it's just the firewiskey talking if you actually saw something."

Zane just stared ahead of him, not knowing the answer, but getting his quill ready to take the notes down.

Two things happened just then. The first was Cela shrunk into her seat a bit, the second was her sitting bolt upright and giving the professor an interested look. Scrying was one of the most interesting categories to her,and so she put up her hand, this time willing to give a thorough answer.

"Actually many kinds of divination actually fall under the scrying category, its just that some of them have very specific names. Scrying comes from the word 'descry' and that means 'to make out dimly' or to 'reveal', it doesn't actually indicate what medium is used, but the most commonly known methods are with a crystal ball, a mirror, glass, water, generally reflective surfaces." Cela explained, hesitating at first, then warming to the topic.

"My favourite one is using a cauldron of water, with the inside of the cauldron painted black, and dropping a sickle in there. With that one you use the refelection of moonlight on the sickle to scry with. Likewise with mirror scrying, a popular way is to use a black mirror, which is one without a reflection. You paint the mirror black and look at it on an angle to see if you can see anything. The Centaurs use smoke scrying, and sometimes flame scrying, the ancient Egyptians used to scry oil and dreams.

Some of the specific types of scrying include capnomancy, catoptromancy, crystallomancy, hydromancy and lecanomancy, just to name a few. Scrying isn't limited to reflective surfaces, all it requires is some sort of medium to look through, and just as many Divination styles come under the heading of scrying, so too does scrying itself because its fundamentally Radiethesia."

Well.

She liked to read.

Alex knew precisely what scrying was, "Scrying is a type of divination done mostly by using a crystal ball, It allows you to see into the future for a brief moment." She stated after raising her hand, after taking notes on the previous question and the answers.

"Scrying in a way by which Diviners can stare into a physical object, like a crystal ball, mirror or water, and see things that were, things that are, and something that have not yet come to pass!"
Patroclus wondered if muggle TV's were just scrying boxes? He would ask, but it sounds to him, a very silly question.

"Not necessarily," Nolan said. "Just like other forms of Divination, such as tea leaf reading, you may see things or gain insight on events that you were not previously aware of. That's why many people use crystal balls to gaze into the future," he explained with a grin. It was steriotypical, yes, but the truth nonetheless.

"I guess you could say that," Nolan said with a smile to the Slytherin when he noticed that...she was looking at his head. Whaa....had Lucky Torelli told her he had a big head?! EEEP! She was spreading rumors about him now. Not cool!

He self consciously rubbed his forehead before turning back to the class.

"Yes, good answers to all of you," Nolan said, nodding at each student as they spoke. "As Miss Toussiant said, there are many different types of scrying and today we'll be focusing on crystallomancy which is, of course, scrying through the use of crystal balls."

He walked over to his desk and tapped the crystal ball on his desk with his wand, smiling when he saw that the Inpenetrable charm he had placed around it was still working fabulously. "Now, you can't just go around grabbing any round piece of crystal and calling it a crystal ball...you CAN perform scrying on any reflective surface, but you'll have much better results if you use a crystal ball specifically designed for crystallomancy. Can anyone describe to me what that might look like? What are some of the standards we use for crystal balls that are used in readings?"

Alex glanced around after writting down the previous answers in her notes, She had no idea to be honest, this was her least favorite class after all.

"Well I imagine you would want to use a lighter ball, compared to like a black one. Like, opaque...ish. Or translucent. Is there like a certain size that works best? I imagine larger better..." Niko rambled out his thoughts as they came.

Ooh. Easy!

"Round." Ellie said, laughing inside her head, "And white-ish.. And smokey inside.. And.." What else had she seen, "Semi- transparent?"

Yup. Exactly like that.

"Looks as big as a small toddler's head." she said, staring at the one on the Professor's table before raising her hand. "Professor? Do they have any spells on them? Or are they all just, natural?" Evelyn asked and dropped her arm to her side, too lazy to slowly put it down.

Meep. Just as her suspicions were correct too. They were going to be staring into a crystal ball. Yea, that wasn't going to happen. Mostly because her eyes won't be open for much longer.