Quote:

Originally Posted by xXxPandora

Beezus raised her hand, "So, sir....we aren't going to measure twenty feet and stand on that spot to measure our visual acuity one eye at a time? From what I know, that is how to use that muggle eye chart." ....All up to him. He was the man in this class.

She was just merely wondering.

Oh...was that how these things were used? He honestly had no clue seeing as he had never been to a muggle doctor before. He did have one hanging up in his flat though that he looked at and tested himself with while he prepared dinner. 20 feet. Good to know.

"You may test your eyes at various distances and not just 20 feet," he responded with a slight chuckle. "After all, those stars and constellations out there are much much muuuuuuuuuuuch fuuuuuuuuuurther than 20 feet." So really, if the spell only helped you see 20 feet then it wouldn't do you much good. It was a starting point, however.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cheeseStrings

Lens Focalis. Oculo Focalis. One for lenses and the other for eyes. Natalie suppose that 'Oculo' means 'eye', so she quickly jot the stuff down before she forget. But she realised that she could be wrong, so she raised her hand up to ask. "Professor, since 'Lens Focalis' is a spell for lens, and 'Oculo Focalis' is a spell for eyes, does 'Oculo' mean 'eye'?" Besides, Nat never actually took up Latin when she was enrolled to the Muggle school in her hometown, and it's better to ask than to walk blindly towards a pool of lava.

"It does indeedy," he replied to the curious Hufflepuff. "Oculo is Latin for eyes." And if she had not noticed already, there was lots of Latin when it came to incantations.

Quote:

Originally Posted by CassiopeiaAKTF

John Flamsteed... Daichi frowned deeply as he tried to think back about what he had read over and over for his studies. "I think so..." he answered slowly and then it hit him. With a loud GASP! the Slytherin looked at the professor with twinkling eyes and even pointed to him almost hyperly. "You're his great-great-great-great?" how many greats were there? "Grandson?!"

"Something like that," he chuckled at the Slytherin prefect before ruffling the boy's hair. Airey wasn't one to have too much of an ego, which was really sort of a lie because once his ego was inflated it pretty much risked going supernova, but the fact that Mr. Katharos had figured out his family name put a MASSIVE grin on his face.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tegz

"Professor, what happens if you have reading glasses? Should you still use the charm? If I use the charm and mess about with my vision, will I have to change my glasses to compensate? And also, should you test your vision with or without glasses..?" Look, they were just important questionsssss okay?

"Ah, all very good questions, Mr. Odessa," he nodded as he made his way over to the bright young man. "You should not need to change your glasses as use of this charm should only be short term. Long term use of this charm, as in never stopping its effects with Finite, could cause serious damage. Some witches and wizards prefer to use this charm in place of reading glasses, but it is not recommended by Healers." Which was why he had warned them to use it sparingly. He was really left with no other choice this lesson though ... seeing how ALL his telescopes were gone. "You can use Lens Focalis on your glasses only if you wish for them to potentially break or fog up." Long extended pause. "So I recommend you test your eyesight without your glasses."

Looking around the room at everyone - and glancing at his sundial again to check the time - he figured that it was time to offer the next set of instructions to those who were ready to move on.

"You can continue to practice the charm if you wish, but those of you who are feeling confident can move on to the REAL activity," he said, his voice booming through the Astronomy classroom. Hopefully that got everyone's attention. "I want you all to think of this as practice for your homework assignment which is going to be a sort of stargazing camp out on the grounds." Now did he have their attention?

Turning his back to the class, Airey flicked his wand at the board and created a list of constellations, stars, and planets.

SPOILER!!: the blackboard

Astronomy stargazing scavenger hunt

constellations
Ursa Major
Ursa Minor
Draco
Cassiopeia
Cepheus

Andromeda
Aries
Auriga
Camelopardalis
Capricorn
Cetus
Cepheus
Corona Borealis
Cygnus
Equuleus
Eridanus
Fornax
Hercules
Lyra
Pegasus
Perseus
Pisces
Taurus

planets
Pluto
Neptune
Saturn
Jupiter
Mars

stars
Polaris
Vega
Deneb
Altair
Pollux

Squinting at things before giving a nod of approval, the astronomer turned his attention back to the class. "The celestial bodies I have bolded are ones that you MUST be able to identify." Especially Polaris since it had been the focus of the lesson. "The first item from this list I want you to identify is Polaris. Once you have done that you may be able to find the others. Furthermore, by identifying Polaris in tonight's sky will essentially guarentee that you have found all of the bolded items." They all remembered how to find it, yes? "You may use your textbooks for reference if you wish."

He was just about to step aside and let them get to work when something crossed his mind. Something that he really should have mentioned earlier and his conversation with Mr. Odessa had reminded him. Oops. At least they hadn't been practicing the spell for all THAT long. "OOOOOOOOOONE more thing about the spell you all are using on your eyes. Don't forget to cast Finite when you are done. If you do not know how to cast it then ask someone to do it for you. The spell will continue to effect your eyesight otherwise."

Anymore questions? Had he completely frightened them? Hopefully the answer was no - although he would always take questions if there were any. "So, if you are ready then you may begin!" he said as he dramatically pointed outside to the beautiful December sky.

SPOILER!!: what the sky looks like December 4th, 2080 @ 8:30pm from the Astronomy Tower

OOC: In order to be eligible full participation marks you must complete 5 posts for this activity. You DO NOT need to RP finding everything on Professor Flamsteeds 'astronomy scavenger hunt.' It probably would make more sense IC not to, but it is entirely up to you and what you feel your character is capable of. You will not be graded on how many you find, so don't worry if all five of your posts are your character struggling just to find Polaris for example

If you have not completed your three posts for the first activity you may still do so for credit. You can also choose to skip the practice and just move on to the next activity if you wish, but keep in mind that you will not be able to receive full credit for the lesson by doing so. The choice is yours.

Any questions you have may be asked IC to Professor Flamsteed or OOC to me via VM/PM.

You have approximately 48 hours from this post to complete this activity.

Now it was time for the spell. Oculo Focalis. It was a good thing Sarah had done it before so she would not have to spend time on introducing her tongue to the incantation. So instead she closed her eyes and said "Oculo Focalis” then she tapped her eyelids and opened her eyes.

WHOA! Hold em cowboys - freaky. Sarah moved back a few paces and began to test her eyesight.m It was as if she was wearing eye glasses with a major prescription. She could even read read line eight! This was so awesome, this would solve the problem when Sarah misplaced her glasses and was unable to look for them due to the fact that she had lost them.

She read out each row even though the top E was freaky large.

She could not wait to move onto the stars

Minerva kept walking backwards until the line was blurry. Now she looked around just making sure she was going to do the movements right. She has been so mopey at first and now felt so okay with everything, happy even that she was kind of afraid she missed something.

No she didn't, sighing with relief she turned back to her poster. Now she was suppose to do this spell to help her eyes. Why was this spell not used more, it was really an epic spell. Closing her eyes and doing the wand movement, Min tapped her eye Oculo Focalis

Blink...blink...blink.. did it work?

Looking at the poster she smiled.. It did she could see the last line.. Bouncing in excitement she was thrilled, planets, stars she stunk at, but spells she had this...

Okay, time for some stargazing! This was the best part! GRIN. Ella nodded in understanding as Professor Airey gave them their directions and then copied down the list of things they'd be looking for, bolding the ones they'd be responsible for knowing.

Scribble. Scribble. Scribble.



Putting her quill down, the blonde's eyes went upwards, scanning the sky. It was pretty awesome how much she could see right now and how clearly she could see it. Impressive spell was really impressive and it worked wonders too!

Polaris was the first thing she needed to locate and actually, finding that would help her find some of the other things on her list, yeah? Yeah! And had she mentioned how much she loved this class yet? Because she did. LOTS. Star gazing was one of her favorite activities and getting to do it for school reasons was pretty cool.

Now if she could just find Ursa Minor, she'd be on her way to locating the North Star....scannnnnnnnn.

Taking a couple steps away from the poster, Jo decided that it was time to test her eyesight. She could read the first seven lines quite easily but they eighth proved to be more of a challenge because it was blurry. The ninth was a greater challenge for the She-Snake because she could barely make out any of the words.. What was that letter?...a T, D, or P? she thought. Honestly, she couldn't tell. Perhaps the girl needed glasses after all.

Jo took a deep breath and prepared herself for whatever this charm would do. Who knew? Maybe it would make her eyesight better in the long run of this lesson? Picking up her wand, she swished her wand in front of her and then proceeded to gently tap her right eye first. At the same time, she said the incantation, "Oculo Focalis!" After doing so, she repeated those movements on her left eye. After casting the charm on both of her eyes, Jo noticed that her eyesight wasn't changing. She was about to raise her hand when she got a sudden urge to start blinking.

After blinking for a couple of times, Jo noticed her eyesight was beginning to change. Everything a few feet away was becoming sharper. She could actually see a couple of strands of her classmates' hair in detail. Turning back to face the poster, she began to read it again.

It wasn't immediately apparent that the spell had worked, but then Mo wasn't trying to see anything that he couldn't see with normal vision. He wondered briefly if he could somehow see the individual eyes on a fly or something equally superhero-y... and then decided it was doubtful.

Turning to the poster Essex had hung once again, Mo eyed those bottom two lines again. Previously, those lines had been blurry, even with copious squinting, but they now sprung up clear as block letters on a sunny day. He gave a little yelp of pleasure at being suddenly able to see before turning his attention once again to the professor and the next phase of their lesson.

After looking up for a few minutes and scanning the sky, Ella decided she was going about this the wrong way. She needed a proper plan first and so she turned her attention back to her text book. Airey had said that was alright, yeah? Yeah.

Flipping open to the part about Polaris, Ella used her finger to scan the page. Ohhh! So she could find the North Star by using the Big Dipper! And the Big Dipper is part of the Ursa Major. Okay...that was good information. It was also a bit confusing because the Big Dipper was an asterism and only part of the constellation, making it harder to spot. She'd figure it out, though. She'd just focus on finding that cup and then, as the book said, use the pointer stars on the edge of the cup to locate Polaris! Seemed like as good a place to star as any.

Looking up again, the blonde scanned for the Big Dipper asterism.

Hmmm....

Her eyes focused on a large cluster of stars and she tilted her head, biting her lip. Could that be the Ursa Major? It...sort of did look like a bear, she guessed. Tilting her head the other way, she observed it some more before consulting her book.

As Kace was scribbling the constellations and what to look for in his notebook, he heard he was going to use the charm for stargazing. SWEETNESS. He was SO excited. He was quite good at locating stars since he did so much before he came to hogwarts. He was going to be a pro thanks to his mother.

He heard the Professor say that the charm should wear off when you say Finite. Well good that is doesn't wear off on its own. He still had the spell working and he was going to where Ella was. She was gazing at the stars too!

He checked his notebook again to see what he had to look for in this scavenger hunt. He only copied the ones in bold and the rest he would find later.

SPOILER!!: Notebook!

constellations
Ursa Major
Ursa Minor
Draco
Cassiopeia
Cepheus

Stars
Polaris

The best starting point was to find Polaris, the north star, then it would be easy to find anything else. He began to scan using the spell. The spell was working fabulously for him. He could see SO clearly it was unbelievable. He didn't need to squint but he was scanning the clouds to look for it that is for sure.

So apparently the lens-adjusting spell could break glasses – that was a good thing to know. ”That does not sound good, breaking or fogging glasses” she muttered as she stood there and then glanced up at the stars above them.

She just beamed when she heard that the assignment was stargazing – even if stargazing in the middle of the winter seemed like a really, very cold predicament. So she sat there was a growing smile on her face. Such a big smile really.

”Oculo Focalis” and a taaaap against her closed eyelids to make it so she could see the stars a little better – which was needed. Much needed. Sure the first thing she had looked for was Polaris – but there was something else she wanted to find first. Her eyes were busy scanning the sky for a certain constellation. Tired, her eyes felt so darn tired.

Looking up and up she was struggling to see straight, frowning slightly she glanced at the board again and blinked a few times to see it more clearly. Then back at the stars. Oh! Look! There was Andromeda! Wasn’t she a greek something-or-other. She checked that one off her list.

Now that her eyes were adjusting to the spell, they longer stung as much. Which was good, because the stinging had been making her eyes water which in turn, made it harder for her to see. Not so great when you had to try to find stuff. And what was that Professor Airey had said? Camping themed homework? Hmm.. interesting....

Sky focused on the chart again, testing her eye sight with the spell. Merlin, she could even read the 'made by' label! Jeez, this was a powerful spell.

Jo just wanted to close her eyes and take a small nap now. Her eyes felt puffy and sore as if she had pulled an all-nighter the previous night before. Rubbing her eyes a little, she refocused on the poster a coupe feet away and began to test her eyes.

The first six lines of the poster had been magnified immensely. The "E" in the first row looked as large as her Care of Magical Creatures textbook. Jo continued to test her eyes and found that she indeed could read the last line. Yippee! She had perfect magnified vision now but there was only one problem now- her eyes felt sort of swollen.

The Professor began to speak again so Jo turned around and scribbled down a couple notes.

Marigold took her wand and tried the charm after much practice.

"Oculo Focalis!" she said, swishing her wand and tapping her eyelid. "Woah." She could see everything, all of the bottom letters on the chart. Hmm.. maybe she could stay like this a while longer.

And moving on. Sky moved away from the chart, closer to the outside. She figured that, even though she had the spell, she would still be able to find the constellations better here. Checking the board for the list and map, she had a moment of confusion. There were A LOT of stars and A LOT of lines and A LOT of different labels. How the heck was that map supposed to help them?! She couldn't even find Polaris in that mess! Aggghhhhhhh! Were they being graded on how many they found.......?

Jory scribbled down some more notes, placing a small X next to the constellations they were supposed to be finding. This was all so exciting! He loved scavenger hunts. But he was not necessarily good at them but he decided he would try to find as much as possible.

So, they had to locate Polaris first. That should be no biggie, right? It was one of the brightest stars. Now, if the Puffer could just locate the Ursa Minor maybe he would have it easier to find Polaris. There were so many stars all about! Everywhere stars, stars and more stars! "Keep focused, Jory,'' he muttered, is telescopic eyes on the lookout for the Ursa Minor.

After finishing taking notes, Jo made hearsay towards the window. Alright, now she had to find Polaris, Ursa Minor, Ursa Major, Draco, Cassiopeia, and Cepheus. But no Camelopardalis? She pouted slightly. Maybe if Jo finished the assignment early then she would have a little time to find Camelopardalis too?

Nah, that was too much work.

.......But it would help her!

Jo knew that Camelopardalis looked like a giraffe and that it was next to Ursa Minor and Cepheus. If she found it, then she would be able to hopefully find Polaris, Ursa Minor, and Cepheus. After finding those, she could then locate the other stars.

She gazed up and began looking for a set of stars that looked like a giraffe..

Hmmmmm....

Auriga, yup. Alice nodded seriously and beamed at the professor, duly noting the other constellations named after she'd answered. Eyesight charts next, though? She didn't know what those were, but it wasn't too hard to figure out just by looking. Grabbing one, she stuck it to the wall and stepped a bit back, leaving a good amount of distance in between herself and the chart. And what, just look now? Simple enough.

All of the first seven lines weren't difficult at all for her to make out with her right eye covered, but the bottom two, eight and nine, were where she started having issues. Were they supposed to be blurry? Why couldn't she see them? Did that mean her vision was off? Alice thought it was FINE, thank you. She tried again, only this time covering her left eye instead of her right, and gathering the same results.

Spell, then?

Jory continued to keep a look out for the Ursa Minor. He really liked this spell. It was so fun and really useful. He continued on, trying not to get distracted by the fact that he had suddenly thought of ice cream. He wished he could have some right now.

"Focus, focus...'' Yes! Must not get distracted. Jory's eyes caught a cluster of stars. Was that it? The Ursa Minor? He glanced back at his text. It certainly was in the shape. "That has to be it!'' he decided. Great! Now he could located Polaris, which shouldn't be too hard as it was rater bright and not really far from the Ursa Minor.

Jory kept looking in the vicinity of the Minor. So far no luck. But wait! Wasn't that Polaris? Just ahead of the Minor? And it was shining bright! Yup! He had found Polaris!

Yup. That was Ursa Major. Ella tilted her head and the book just to be sure but the shapes were the same. GRIN! That meant she'd found one of the things they needed to, yeah? Yeah! It also meant that she was one step closer to locating Polaris. Now she'd just need to pick out the Big Dipper in this thing.

The sixteen year old looked up and blinked, trying to focus on the constellation. She used her finger to trace along the lines, trying to find the cup shape. Now where was that handle, anyway? Hm.

Oh! Oh there it was! Well...at least Ella thought that must be it. It looked a lot like a handle as the blonde followed it down, she spotted the cup part of the Big Dipper too! BEAM.

According to the book, now she'd have to use the pointer stars on the front edge of the cup and follow the line until she spotted Polaris, which was a part of the Little Dipper.

Jo wasn't having any luck finding the giraffe shaped constellation. The stars were a little bit too blurry or too far away for her to see clearly. Time to use the charm again? She swished her wand, tapped her right eye, and then said the incantation again. She repeated this and tapped her left eye.

Returning her gaze, she look back up at the sky to search for the giraffe shaped constellation. Jo glanced over at the board quickly to check the list as well as the chart. Northeast. Centre thought Jo as she gazed up at the sky.

A few minutes later, she found a long line of stars all next to each other. Could that possibly be a neck? she thought as she blinked again, looking around the line of stars. Her eyes widened and a smile broke out on her lips.

Jo had found Camelopardalis! Yes! One small victory!

Okay, Polaris was slightly west of Camelopardalis, wasn't it? The Slytherin turned her gaze west and found a bright star. She paused and bit her lip. Was that Polaris? she wondered as she looked around the star. It may well be Polaris. Next to the bright star was a group of stars that sort of looked like a little stove-pot. Like the Little Dipper? Like Ursa Minor?

Yes it was Ursa Minor.... So that bright star must have been Polaris. Now she had to find the other three......

The spell was working perfectly, Mo decided as he turned his head to the night sky. It had been harder to tell when looking at things that were up close, but here... he had more than perfect vision as he stared upwards. He actually wasted several minutes initially as he enjoyed taking in all the stars above the tower without being impeded by the limitations of the telescope viewfinder.

Finally, he went looking for Polaris. To be honest, it wasn't a major hardship for him, considering he'd already found Cepheus during this class period. Buuuuut just to do things the correct way, Mo went looking for the Big Dipper. Straight line out from the end of the scoop... and there was Polaris. Bingo.

SPOILER!!: notes

Astronomy stargazing scavenger hunt

constellations
Ursa Major
Ursa Minor
Draco
Cassiopeia
Cepheus

Andromeda
Aries
Auriga
Camelopardalis
Capricorn
Cetus
Cepheus
Corona Borealis
Cygnus
Equuleus
Eridanus
Fornax
Hercules
Lyra
Pegasus
Perseus
Pisces
Taurus

planets
Pluto
Neptune
Saturn
Jupiter
Mars

stars
Polaris
Vega
Deneb
Altair
Pollux

Now that she had tried to find one of the major things she HAD to find on the list – and failed, she was going to try and find something else. This time she scanned her eyes up, down, and around the sky section they were looking at. And today, wasn’t all that fun was it. Sore eyes. She blinked again, causing her to loose her place in the sky and find something else instead!

“Draco” That meant that Ursa Minor was close by! Which was geat because she really really wanted to find it and be done with this yeah?

OH HAI, POLARIS!

Ella BEAMED when she spotted it, double checking her book just in case. Oh and this meant she'd found Ursa Minor too, yeah? Mhmmm. It totally did.

The blonde tilted her head back and took in the view, tracing the Little Dipper with her finger. She stopped again on Polaris and bit her lip. So this was meant to be the star she'd use if she ever got lost in the forbidden forest at night without a wand? She felt weird for thinking it'd be bigger or brighter than it was. Not that she hadn't seen it before because she had. Her Dad had shown her and her brother when they went camping years back. Things just always seem bigger and brighter when you're little, though.

Shrugging her shoulders, she decided to move on to another constellation.

Now that Jory had located the Ursa Minor and Polaris, he drew a light line through them. Now to find another. He quickly decided on Cepheus randomly and focused his cool telescopic eyes back on to the sky.

Jory kept glancing back at his text book to remind himself what the constellation was shaped like. About ten minutes later, Jory had still not managed to locate Cepheus. "Where on earth, I mean where in the sky is that constellation?'' he wondered, taking a break from searching. It had to be there. Grrr. Jory set looked back into the sky. Must find Cepheus.

Alright! Time to put this telescope eye thing to actual use!!!!

Lex hopped her way closer so she could get a good look at the sky, heh, like that mattered anymore, however she was still very much listening to the Professor and his caution about removing the charm the moment they were done. Okay. She'd have to remember that. Wouldn't want some freak accident happening. Those never ended well, no matter how epic they started.

She should know. But anyway! The sky!

She cast her gaze up at the star-littered sky and quickly realized something; she didn't know what any of those things were. Like maybe if she was standing on her hands and looking at the sky from a different angle then maybe the pictures would become clearer but at the moment she was lost. Alexa actually contemplated a handstand but figured she'd just use her text like the Professor said.

She skip!hopped back to her seat, only running into like four persons, pffft, this was an improvement, yo! Textbook gotten, she went to try finding ANYTHING up there.

As Kace was still looking for Polaris, he was still have a tough time. He noticed all the other student's could find it while he was still struggling. He always had a hard time just finding the stars, usually his mom had the eye for it. As he was scanning it, then he was looking back at the sketch he sketched in his notebook of the constellations. He even redid the spell to be sure.

Kace said "Finite!" and then his eye sight came back to normal. Then he said "Oculo Focalis!" and with a swish and a tap on his eyelids, he saw saw clearer. MUCH clearer than before! He was happy and impressed.

So he had to look and scan enough soon enough he found it! He found Polaris! WOOT and even the Ursa Minor! They seemed connected on the chart. So he crossed those off on his list.

SPOILER!!: Notebook

Astronomy stargazing scavenger hunt

constellations
Ursa Major
Ursa Minor
Draco
Cassiopeia
Cepheus

Andromeda
Aries
Auriga
Camelopardalis
Capricorn
Cetus
Cepheus
Corona Borealis
Cygnus
Equuleus
Eridanus
Fornax
Hercules
Lyra
Pegasus
Perseus
Pisces
Taurus

planets
Pluto
Neptune
Saturn
Jupiter
Mars

stars
Polaris
Vega
Deneb
Altair
Pollux

He liked this activity a lot. Then he saw the rest of the constellations he had to find. He could DO this. He liked scavenger hunts like this. Plus he loved the night-time atmosphere.