Ash was a big fan of word searches and other games. They made a lesson interesting, and NOT in a 'oooh we're all gonna die' way. Ash liked being interested. She did not like dying, or feeling on the verge or tears, or something. So Professor Holden was doing a good job.

"Hey." Since she was in a particularly good mood, she offered him a rare smile as she took a seat in the front and started doing the word search. "I like puzzle type things." This lesson was going well so far, in her opinion. She could FEEL the good vibes.

Maybe because nobody else was there yet to bother her. Or maybe not.

Ash hoped that today would be a good day.

Again, Maya felt like everything learned in this class could easily be gained from reading the textbook. However at least the professor kept things interesting. The Slytherin straightened her uniform and adjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder as she turned the corner to ensure she was presentable for classes. [b”Hello, Professor Holden,”[/b] Maya greeted politely and giving a slight nod of her head as she entered the classroom.

She looked over at the chalkboard which featured incredibly straightforward instructions. Maya slid into a seat next to Ash and smiled. ”Hey Ash.” Maya’s eyes glanced over the easels, curious as to what the whispers would be before looking down at the puzzle on her desk.

Oh! A word search! Maya did enjoy those, even if they weren’t all too difficult. She immediately went to work on it. Would they be learning about other magical institutions this lesson? If so, she hoped he would describe a bit about what university and the application process was like. Just in case she wanted to get a head start.

Milo had a way of entering a room as though he'd turned up entirely by accident, and it was curious, that this almost always seemed to be the case for his timetabled lessons. He drifted silently in - still no shoes in sight, those belonged to the Giant Squid now - and claimed the first desk directly by the door.

Milo didn't sit so much as perch, like a five foot two gargoyle, made of teeth and bone and flesh and blue eyes. But, with his socked feet slipping and sliding and offering him no purchase on the wooden chair, he shifted from squatting on the seat to kneeling, feet poking out behind him as he sat back on his own legs.

With a pen he fished from his pocket, Milo focused on completing the word search, neatly filling each and every square with an immaculate block of black ink and ensuring none of the letters were visible, until he had just one big black square on the parchment. As for the words down the side, he filled in every loop and closed in space of every letter, and called it a success.

Better. History, interesting as it could be, tended to play on Milo's mind a lot more than he'd have liked at the least convenient times. What he liked better was to shore up his defences, obscure and neutralise potential threats, and anchor himself, before History dug in its talons and flew away with him.

Having performed well on his OWL and genuinely having an interest in the subject, drawing parallels from the past to the present and hopefully being wiser for it, Cooper had kept History of Magic in his schedule and thus entered the classroom with a pleasant smile to his strong features. A smile that only brightened seeing papers on the desk. A pop quiz, perhaps? Cooper had done a bit of reading ahead and revision last night while TRYING in vain to get Theo interested in the topic of the 14th Century Wizarding Economic Bubble by throwing in a bit of Gobbledegook here and there (Cooper knew only a handful of words in the language which he had picked up as a kid to try and impress the goblins at Gringott's while on errand with his parents - the end results had not been favorable)...but his dormmate transcended the textbook and comforts of the bed they were sitting upon and didn't even notice Cooper not speaking English at times. Which, to be fair, they were known to do on a whim with interlacing a language or two and filling in the gaps by context clues...so he really should have known to approach the situation differently.

Oh well.

"Hello, ladies," he smiled at Ashley and Maya (aka Evan's sister) as he took a desk near the pair, the seventh year slipped his bag off his shoulder to lean beside his seat and got his things out for class. Professor Holden seemed...preoccupied with what was very obviously a gallery of portraits who had things to day...so Cooper left the man to that and instead turned his attention to the parchment before him. He remembered dad getting him a whole book of these once. How long had it been since he had sat down to just do a wordsearch? He wasn't sure, but he was soon dipping his quill into the inkwell and drawing perfectly straight lines through each word he found. He needed Mercer and his collection of colored inks, honestly. The black on black was hard to see at times. Especially when he accidentally dropped a bit on the parchment and blotted out some of the letters a bit - ironically making it so that finding 'Ravenclaw' was more difficult than it needed to have been. Grinning as he finished, Cooper flipped his paper over and set his quill down and gave the room a look over. Did anyone need help? He imagined the professor had the papers enchanted so the letters shuffled into different positions for each of them, but maybe he could still offer hints to someone who wanted a bit of assistance.

It was in his looking around that he spotted Mercer's little friend - the one with the socks and no shoes - and offered the little Claw a wave. He hadn't caught the kid's name yet, but hopefully he could start calling him something more than Mercer other friend who wasn't Mitsuki soon.

He'd debated not showing today. He'd missed a few other of his classes, choosing instead to stay in his own room and study by himself. But it occurred to him the skipping was going to catch up with him at some point, even if he wasn't technically 'slacking'. So he was here, entering the classroom quietly, forgoing any greetings, and sliding into an open seat towards the back. He wasn't feeling up to conversation, so instead of verbal greetings he simply gave nods of his head towards his peers.

Though truthfully, he tried to not make eye contact with his sister in case there was questions there.

Sitting at his desk and pulling out a highlighter, Evan stared at the crossword puzzle before him. He usually liked word puzzles, enjoyed doing them. But he was having a hard time focusing and finding the words, to the point where he found the Hogwarts house names and proceeded to give up. He'd just have to hope this was for fun and not graded.

History with Holden- reckon they should have renamed it last term but then again he'd only thought it up this term, and it wasn't like anyone on staff could see the future- well, professor euna, but he digressed. Tie slightly askew, Ruari entered the classroom with a looping gait. He was trying to emulate Seth Elliot and doing a surprisingly fine job. Yes, Ruari looked confident, cool and even a little bored as he took the seat beside Milo Evans- Ravenclaw First Year who didn't like socks- but he wasn't bored. He was positively stoked.

This was a class he could never get enough of, especially when that history had anything to do with Harry Potter and the Second Wizards War. Ruari often revisited the legends surrounding the Boy Who Lived and his friends, sometimes he even imagined what it would have been like to live in that era- to know the Golden Trio and face off against ~evil~.

"How's it hanging, professor?" Ruari greeted, dropping his bag down and peering at the parchment with bright eyed excitement.

a crossword huh? easy peasy. He could do this with his eyes closed. Humming cheerily, Ruari began his work. The Hogwarts houses were easy enough- they were all very long- and then the founders names- Helena and Rowena equally giving him a hard time, he was unsurprised for some reason- and then there was the others. He paused when he reached them trying to recall whatever he could about Wampus and Pukwudgies before finding them amidst all the black ink letters.

One subject Cailyn rarely thought about skiving off from was History of Magic, even as she knew Margaret, at least, thought she was strange because of it. She just liked histoty, that was it. She liked learning about historical figures, hence her latest novel being read being somewhat related to Merlin and the Muggle interpretation of him and the figures around him. It was taking longer to finish said novel, but that was more due to OWL studying having already begun rather than anything else.

Therefore, it was a rather animated Hufflepuff fifth year who had entered the classroom, hardly thrown by the veiled arguments coming from what obviously had to be portraits. Just as a form of amusement to herself, she tried to see if she could recognize any of the muffled voices as she settled into her seat with a smile toward the obviously distracted professor. “Hi Professor Holden,” she added, even as she applied her attention to the parchment on her desk as she hardly expected a return greeting. What with his distraction and all.

Hm, a word search. The sleuthing comment on the chalkboard made more sense now, although it didn’t take her much time to complete the puzzle in front of herself, color coding each word just for an added level of difficulty. Although it had been a bit harder to decide on colors for the non-Hogwarts related terms. Either way, her parchment had ended up rather colorful in the end, as she resorted to flicking through her textbook just for more ideas.

One subject that Rosa enjoyed attending was History of Magic. To learn about old historical events and people was interesting so the blond entered the classroom in a cherry mood. She bypassed the veiled portraits that were giving their professor an earfull it seemed. "Hello Professor Holden!" Rosa greeted cheerfully, but doubted that their professor heard what she said or anyone else since he appeared distracted.

Going over to where Cailyn was sitting Rosa took a seat at the adjacent desk to her friend and fellow badgerette."Hi Cailyn," she mumbled as she took out her supplies for the lesson. It didn't take long before she got started on the word search with a pink marker. The parchment looked nice and bubble pink when Rosa some minutes later had found all the words in the search puzzle.

Summer was super excited, she knew a lot about the history, but there was always loads of new stuff that you could learn, like seriously, she wanted to know more about Gryffindor, since her mother had been in this house and then one of her aunts had been in Ravenclaw, she was still trying to figure out why one triplet would be put in Ravenclaw but the other two in Gryffindor.

As she got closer to the classroom, she stopped thinking about it, now she was fully prepared for whatever they were learning today. "Good Day Professor!" Summer smiled, before she went over to her desk.

Sitting down, she noticed a piece of parchment on the desk, she looked at it and sighed, seriously puzzles, she wasn't any good at them, in fact when she did them before she came to Hogwarts, she always got her mother to help, she wondered if the Professor would allow her to phone a friend.

Aria always thought that Professor Holden had such an eye candy of a face. If you’re wondering about her crushing on the man, then yes. Yes, Ms. McLeod had a small crush on him which had developed towards the end of last term. Oddly enough, he was her first Hogwarts crush. Or first crush at all. But it was needless to say that Aria told not a soul this. You would remember she loved keeping most of her private life on the down low.

Sharp eyes cut to the board the moment she stepped into the room. Sleuthing? Did it involve fashion? Otherwise… BORING. Not to mention… what was with the paintings? Aria eyed the loud one up and down before pressing a finger to her own lips in a shushing manner. Take your own advice, painting.

“Hello there, Professor Holden,” Aria said, finally giving the man a smile. With grace and elegance of a budding model, Ms. McLeod took up a seat beside Rosa. “Knight.” The Puff got a smile. Ah. A crossword puzzle. Nice. Aria took a pencil from her stash to begin. These clues definitely hinted at today's lesson topic.

Keighley didn't really mind History of Magic. Maybe that was because she was only a second year and there was so much yet for her to learn about. True it could be boring at times and it wasn't always easy remembering all of the information but that was the same with anything in life. If she worked hard and studied harder she would come out on top.

As she entered the room her bright smile didn't fade at all, not even when she didn't spot her brother or sister or any of her cousins. That was alright, she would just settle down in an empty seat until one of them arrived. "Hello Professor," Keighley waved politely before finding herself a seat and sitting down.

The instructions on the board made her glance around for a moment before her attention took a better look at the parchment on her desk. Oh! These were always fun! Pulling a bright pink quill from her bag, the twelve year began to search for the words in the puzzle.

Moose came into History of Magic a bit more cautious than usual. The start of term feast how ever far back it was from now, left a bad encounter with Professor Holden and that feeling still lingered through many of the lessons after that. Just push through the lessons and don't bother with class participation as much. It did not help that History of Magic was by far his worst subject that did not in itself involve using actual magic.

His usual tactic to take a seat directly by the door had been hindered by the Lazy Sloth Kid. So naturally Moose grabbed the next closest open seat which was directly behind them. There was no Hello directed toward Holden, as the Professor seemed preoccupied with talking to what looked to be covered portraits.

He set himself up at his desk and looked down at the Word Search Puzzle. Grabbing his pen, then looking up to see two stinking socks poking out from Sloth Kid's seat looking directly at him. It was almost insulting. It felt like there were eyes on the back of his feat staring into his soul. This aggravated Moose some. Not much...not unless those socks reeked beyond belief, and there was some distance spaced between them both so if there was a stench of stinking feet it might not reach his nose.

Moose just silently, and slightly peeved went to work on the puzzle. Scratching at his hair in frustration as he was one of those few who found these difficult to complete.

If you asked Emmerson how concerned she was about her History of Magic OWL, you may get a different answer every time you asked. Some days, she felt like she was SO SURE she knew what started the goblin rebellions...and other days she got back grades that assured her she certainly did not. No real winning with this subject, the Gryffindor just had to get it over with and pray for the best.

It was safe to say she had taken her mother's threat to pull her from all dance activity if she didn't get good OWL scores very seriously.

When one was a rising star like she was, any threat to fame had to be taken seriously and handled. Later, Emm would get herself a tutor and everything. For now, she was still trying to remember that classes were not optional, no matter how close to nailing a new move she was.

Hair still tied into a tight bun from the earlier practice she had managed to slip in, Emmerson made her way into the classroom. "Hey Professor," She greeted as she finished tying her tie back into place. "Are we watching wizarding reality shows from the past?" Because she'd love to sit and do nothing while she got her heart rate back where it was supposed to be.

Here she was, History of Magic .. okay history of anything sounded kind of boring right?? Though if she wanted to make history maybe she could learn what not to repeat and such. Anyway!!!! Moving and and smiling at the Professor. "Hello Professor ... umm... Professor yeah just Professor" Well if that wasn't embarrassing at all, she still didn't know all their names, there were so many professors to remember, and now she had just made a fool out of herself.

Taking her seat and wanted to die a little, she looked around the room, trying to avoid eye contact with anyone that may have seen her brain fart and began working on the puzzle provided.

Her hair was getting seriously long lately, and Remy was living for it meaning she wore it down most days, including today. Her wavy curls also had a way of covering her face whenever life became embarrassing and she had to hide behind it… she did this alllllll the time. (She also had moments of embarrassment far too often, which she needed to address.)

The Gryffindor took a seat, not near anyone in particular, not waiting for anyone either. She had every intention to concentrate on todays lesson, because it was easy to lose your track of thought in classes like History of Magic.

Remy couldn’t help but roll her eyes at the goody-goody students who always had to greet professors in such sickly ways. Professor Holden was busy talking to the paintings, clearly, so she kept herself to herself and started working on the puzzle that was provided, looking up at the other kids every now and then to make sure they weren’t finishing before her.

“Easy.” Remy mumbled to herself and the empty chair beside her when she was finished, and set her quill down on the desk.

All the classrooms looked unique and different to Delilah. She hadn't quite figured out what they normally looked like, because they changed every time she walked in. For a firstie, this was super exciting, although she imagined by the time she was a third or fourth year, that excitement will have worn off. Maybe. Maybe not. "Hello, Professor," she said, as she passed him by. She didn't really expect a reply, though. He looked super busy with whatever all that was.

She eyed the holes in the wall, wondering what had caused them, and then turned her attention to the parchment on a random desk. She took a seat and then read the instructions on the board. Sleuthing? Awesome! ... Sleuth what, though? Again, her attention turned to all that super secretive noisy stuff going on at the front of the room. Had she not been so distracted, she would have noticed the word search in front of her. Oh. OHHHH. Ahem. She was totally aware that had been there all along.

She took out a quill and some ink and started searching the page.

Daniel walked right past the Professor, not bothering to greet him because the man seemed to be preoccupied with his work anyway. He walked to one of the desks in the centre of the room and sat down, placing his bag beside him on the ground.

He looked down at the piece of parchment on his desk and for a split second, he thought that they were about to have a pop quiz. But when he turned the sheet of parchment around and saw the puzzle, he instantly felt better.

These types of puzzles were always enjoyable to him. He'd solve them sometimes in his spare time in the Hufflepuff Common Room. When he noticed the writing on the chalkboard, he thought he could work on the puzzle while the rest of the class entered. He took out his pen from his bag and began to solve.

Jordyn was kind of excited for class. Why, she was not exactly sure. She was in a good mood and had a good feeling about how the day might play out. She arrived at the History of Magic classroom and eagerly went inside. “Hello Professor, she said with a little too much enthusiasm.

Finding an empty desk, the Hufflepuff sat down and gathered everything she would need for class. It was then that she noticed the parchment on her desk. It was a word search puzzle and that put a smile on her face. Jordyn liked doing puzzles of any kind and couldn’t wait to get started on this one. In the back of her mind, she wondered what this would have to do with the lesson for today.

As V entered the room, there were two options of where to sit. She didn’t immediately notice the professor only because her eyes were traveling from looking over at Remy and Daniel. Who to sit by? The two weren’t situated all that far from each other, and so V took her chances to sit by Remy, but she DID give a wave to Daniel, their last few encounters still being recounted in her head. It was interesting, wasn’t it? To not hate someone you did for so long.

She may have looked at Daniel a bit too long as she took her place next to Remy. “Hey,” she said simply, looking down at the word search and scoffing. “I hate word searches,” she muttered. “Wait you FINISHED already??”

Ivy was immediately intrigued about the topic of today's lesson upon seeing the covered...paintings? Portraits, perhaps, considering Professor Holden was talking to them. Wonder whose portraits those were.

Clearly they'd find out soon, so she opted not to ask or otherwise distract him. Instead she decided to slip into the seat next to Evan, who was already getting to work on the word search. Oh, these were fun! She offered a quiet "Hey Evan," and a smile before turning to hers as well. "Rowena" was the first one she circled. Nice!

"Good day, Professor!" Celyn greeted the man warmly with a cheerful smile as she walked in. It looked like the room was getting full already which was not much of a surprise to the seventh year. She sometimes got distracted on her way to class that she was almost never one of the first ones to arrive. But at least she wasn't late today.

She took her usual seat next to Cooper and softened her smile. "Hi... oh, what's this?" Her eye caught sight of the parchment on her desk. A word search? Oh those were fun. She glanced up at the directions on the board then back at the puzzle. She found one, then another. But when she got stuck on the next one, her eyes began to wander. Her attention was soon diverted by the vines coming through the walls. That was even more interesting. She could not quite tell which vitis species it might be from where she was sitting, but she let her mind wander as she pondered it, fingers absently twisting the ends of blonde hair.

As Alfie walked into the classroom, he gave a small nod to the professor before taking up the seat next to Daniel, dropping his bag at his feet. "Hey.", he said with a smile, before turning his attention to the parchment in front of him. A word search. Those were fun.

Whizzing through the search in a matter of minutes, Alfie's attention turned to the portraits, the one lecturing the others in particular. Magic portraits had intrigued him ever since he was a child. How exactly portraits gained sentience, that had always confused him. He should probably ask Holden that. Or was that more of a Charms question?

She was convinced she was late, she was absolutely SO convinced she was late for class, she didn't know WHY but she just KNEW alright?! Christianna was basically sprinting to make to the History of Magic classroom in the hopes she'd make it by some miracle before Professor Holden began the lesson. Fifth year had just started and she was already oversleeping for classes!

Finishing the second braid of her pink locks when she saw the classroom in sight! Practically throwing herself into the room out of breath before saying, "Good morning, I am SOOO sorry I'm la-" She stopped mid-sentence when she realized that....to her complete surprise...she was NOT late in fact, as a matter of fact, she was ON TIME. Letting out such a relieved sigh before smiling brightly, "I meannnn, Hello Professor Holden! Have a nice summer?!" With that she made her way into the classroom to claim a seat, taking note of one particular Moose, but she did not sit near him, she chose to sit elsewhere claiming a different seat. And OH look, a word puzzle!

Remy was startled when V sat beside her, mostly because she was in the middle of a daydream. She followed V’s gaze over to Daniel and was confused for a short time, because she was sure they hated each other. Remy was so out of the loop with everyone in her year, she was too busy fussing over fourth years. Hehehe.

“Hey,” Remy smiled and sat up a little straighter. “Yeah, I’m finished… it’s only a crossword puzzle.” She thought about covering her answers but after thinking on it, she didn’t mind V copying hers.