Potions Beginners ((1st - 3rd years))

[Professor Severus Snape]

If there was one thing that annoyed Snape more than having to teach a class of arrogant students, it was having to teach a class of young arrogant students. When would they ever learn their place; that they didn't know everything, and that they would be best off if they just sat there and listened. It was expected though, by Snape, that the students would likely grate on his nerves. Still, he had to do the lesson. No matter how irritated he was, he couldn't simply avoid his obligations.

Today, the beginner Potions students would be working on a Shrinking Solution. It was simple enough, one that Snape hoped that they didn't mess up too much. However, there was always the student who would add too much rat spleen or too much leech juice. It was somewhat amusing though, watching as they tried to figure out why their potion was a vivid orange colour, whilst the rest of their peers had potions of an acid green hue. Carelessly, Snape flicked his wrist and the instructions appeared on the board.

Shrinking Solution

Ingredients

• chopped daisy roots
  
• skinned shrivelfig
  
• sliced caterpillar
  
• one rat spleen
  
• dash of leech juice
  

Directions

• Chop the daisy roots into a pile of evenly cut slices.
  
• Mix half of the daisy roots with the caterpillar and the dash of leech juice.
  
• Allow the mixture to heat until simmering.
  
• While the mixture is heating, crush the rest of the daisy roots, the rat spleen, and skinned shrivelfig to make a paste that has a dark green colour.
  
• One the first mixture is simmering, SLOWLY add the paste until the overall mixture has turned a bright shade of green.
  
• Once the desired colour is reached, take the potion off the heat and stir for about two minutes until it has reached a mud-like consistency.
  

Once all the students had arrived, Snape spoke over their irritating chatter. "Today you will be attempting to brew the Shrinking Solution. Allow me to warn the fool who thinks it will be funny to drink theirs when they have finished that if you desire to make a joke of this class that it is best for you to leave now." He eyed a particularly disrespecting student in the front row before turning his attention to the board. "Here is a detailed list of everything you will need. Well, go on now, get to work!" He turned and walked hastily back to his desk. "Imbeciles," he muttered under his breath before tackling a stack of NEWT essays that needed to be graded.

[phantomlynx]

Skyler followed some of his fellow first year Ravenclaws down to the dungeons. He was a few steps behind them. He wanted it to appear to an outsider that he had everything under control, that he in fact did know where he was going. But that was very untrue. He had no idea where he was and where he was going thus he was trying to discreetly follow his classmates. This made Skyler disappointed in himself. He had never had this much trouble getting around before. But that was back in the, oh what did his mother call it? "muggle" world. This was in the magical world. He had excelled in the muggle world, but he seemed to be just plain in this world.

Upon entering the dungeon, Skyler stole a nervous glance at the professor. Skyler had heard of Professor Snape from Aurora and Cougar and neither one of them seemed to look with favor upon him. But Skyler was determined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Still, it did look like Professor Snape had a permanent sneer on his face. Skyler took a seat in the middle of the classroom hoping that if Professor Snape called on a student it would be someone up front or in the back.

Skyler listened to the professor as he told them that they were to make a Shrinking Solution. As Professor Snape sat at his desk Skyler looked at the board for the instructions. At first the words looked like scribble. Luckily Skyler had had a teacher earlier in his childhood who preferred scribble to neat print so he was fairly good at deciphering it. Caterpillars? Skyler thought, thank goodness they're already sliced.

Skyler mixed half of his evenly chopped roots to the caterpillars along with leech juice. He wasn't exactly sure how much a "dash" was but he took his best guess. While that was heating he mixed the other half of the roots with the rat spleen and the skinned, what was that word? Shrivelfig? At least that is what Skyler hoped it said, and he hoped that what he was holding was a shrivelfig. At this point his solution was shimmering so he started to add the paste. However, he got nervous and accidentally put the paste in the solution all at once. I hope it doesn't affect the solution too much... The resulting color was... well... a color. Skyler then took the heat off and stirred till he could no longer. He then waited to see what would happen next.

[severusmagic]

Ash hurried along to Potions. She didn't want to be late and she hoped to gain some points for her house, Slytherin, who was lagging along behind the other houses.The last thing she wanted was to lose points.

She walked into class fairly casually but not with her old swagger. She also noticed a Ravenclaw boy looking slightly lost. She snickered at him and smirked.

Oh, god. Ash noticed Deeba, her sister. Earlier this would have made her even more determined to do well but recent events had changed that. Ash came from a typical Slytherin pureblood family who happened to come from India, not that that changed anything. Ash'd recently been found out about being friends with a Gryffindor and her family life had come crashing down. She'd been able to move on at Hogwarts since she hadn't been home yet where she knew she'd be treated like a house elf. She'd stayed out of her sisters' way and everything had been fine, but now that they had a class together......... Well, Ash didn't want to think about it. But something nearly made her crack. Her adoptive sister, Medeia, was sitting next to Deeba. She hadn't been raised to love her sisters and this held true for Deeba but Ash really cared for Medeia and to see her sitting there was almost more than Ash could bear.

Best ignore the whole thing and get on with her potion though. What was it? Shrinking Soloution. Medeia and Deeba.
Chop the daisy roots into a pile of evenly cut slices.
She could do that, she took out her daisy roots and her littl knife/dagger thing. Actually it looked more like dagger to her, symbolising the blood spilt in her family. Her pile was looking good when she finished with them all and even too. Even like her family sort of, except with her family there was her piece of daisy root missing.
Mix half of the daisy roots with the caterpillar and the dash of leech juice.
That was easy too, a lot easier than trying to put her family back together.
Ah! She couldn't stand this!

[Kody Leuchten G3]

Kody had been in Potions class once before with Professor Snape, and had been nearly scared out of his wits from the way the professor addressed his students. He wasn't sure what to think of him sometimes. But now that he knew at least a bit of what to expect from the teacher, Kody was better equipped to listen intently and get the first solution done correctly, and maybe even win some points for Gryffindor.

He looked at Professor Snape, and then looked at the board to see what he would need to be doing. Doesn't seem too hard to figure out, Kody thought to himself. He picked up the daisy roots and chopped them up into even slices, or as even as he could get them. He took hold of the pot he had, and threw exactly half of the daisy roots into it, along with the caterpillar, and squeezed out a bit of leech juice into the delicate concoction. Too much of this stuff could ruin the whole batch! he thought in his mind.

He quickly heated it, and made haste to mash the daisy roots, spleen, and the disgusting skinned shrivelfig into a ugly looking dark paste. Looks okay so far, Kody thought to himself. Just gotta get the right color now. He took the pot off the heat, and, ever so slowly, mixed the two mixtures as Snape had directed. He had began to walk around the room, critiquing concoctions and colors, so Kody needed to get this one right to gain some positive points for his House.

As he poured the two mixtures together, he noticed a faint green color beginning to emerge from the middle of the muck. He kept adding more mixture, and soon enough, the whole mixture was added, and it had turned a bright, yet muddy shade of green. Snape had said the mixture should be a mud-like substance, so Kody put the pot down, and patiently waited for the professor to come over and inspect. He couldn't help but crack a smile to a few of his fellow Gryffindors, because he was quite positive he had done the solution correctly. Although, Snape had particular ways of doing things, so he could still be way off.

He hoped not.

As he patiently waited, Kody glanced over at a few of the other students, to see how they were doing with the solution. Over to one side, he took notice of Ash Gandhi, a third year like he was, but she was in Slytherin, or at least he thought.

[severusmagic]

Okay, Ash, ignore your brat of a sister and get on with your potion.

Allow the mixture to heat until simmering.

That was easy, she was doing it already.

While the mixture is heating, crush the rest of the daisy roots, the rat spleen, and skinned shrivelfig to make a paste that has a dark green colour.

Ash sat there mashing for a while until she had a dark green paste like Snape's illegible handwriting said.

One the first mixture is simmering, SLOWLY add the paste until the overall mixture has turned a bright shade of green.

Her hands shaking a little, Ash carefully added the murky coloured paste. She looked at her concoction. It was the right colour hopefully.

Once the desired colour is reached, take the potion off the heat and stir for about two minutes until it has reached a mud-like consistency.

Ash took the potion off the heat like asked and stirred it for a while before deciding it was mud-like.

She looked triumphantly at Deeba, who's potion was royal blue and smoking. Then Ash looked at Medeia who was smirking at Dee's steaming soloution, her own a bright shade of green with the muddiest consistency anywhere.

Ash now looked around at who else was in the class. There was a ravenclaw first year, hardly worth considering and a Gryffindor third year among others. The third year looked like a boy named "Kody", Ash had seen in the student lounge. He was actually not bad looking but Pyro, the sixth year Ash had a majorcrush on, was far more hot.

The only thing standing in the way of Ash being with Pyro was the fact he was engaged to Alexandra Ricci, another sixth year Ash hated with a fiery passion.

[Professor Severus Snape]

Snape's view shifted from a dreadfully boring essay he had been reading and he watched as the younger students worked on their solutions. By this time, a few of them had seemingly finished and so he stood from his desk and walked to the first student.

Skyler

Eying the potion that was sitting in front of Skyler, Snape turned his nose up and made a disgusted face. "Perhaps if you would have been more cautious and controlled yourself you wouldn't have turned the wretched orange colour. Five points for merely avoiding blowing yourself up, but far from what one might consider acceptable."

Ashakiran

The next student was a Slytherin, and one that Snape knew had somewhat of a reckless reputation. He took a look at her potion, which seemed to have been brewed in an acceptable manner. "Ten points for Slytherin," he stated rather shortly. When it came to students of his own house, Snape tried to be brief. He was less likely to point out their flaws, but at the same time didn't want to praise them as he didn't prefer praising any students really.

Kody

Moving on, Snape couldn't help but notice a proud grin spread across the next student's face. "Wipe off that silly grin," he snarled, hoping that he might find something wrong with Kody's potion. Disappointed that it seemed to be done to standard, he remarked in a barely audible tone, "Ten points to Gryffindor."

Snape walked back to the front of the room having went around and critiquing everyone's potion. With another flick of his wand, the directions for the in class assignment had disappeared, and to replace them, he put up instructions for their homework assignment. It was a bit extensive, but that didn't mean Snape would be sympathetic. Sneering, he bode the class farewell. "Your homework is due in one week. Please do hurry out as I have quite little patience for those who lag behind."

Homework
Write an essay on the common misuses of the Shrinking Solution and include relevant potions that are used to counteract the negative effects that the solution can have when used inappropriately. The essay should be two feet in length and free of spelling or grammatical errors. Anything not up to standard will be discarded and awarded no points.[/font]

((OOC: You can PM Snape the essay if you wish to do it for more housepoints. They are due one week from today (that would mean that they are due Monday, Oct. 29) at midnight Eastern American time. Even if your student didn't post here, you can pretend that they were in class to get the assignment and still PM it to me. You will actually receive housepoints if you do the assignment, and they will be based on creativity and realistic thinking.))

[Williard Thoth R4]

Even though Snape terrified Williard completely (and Williard heeded Snapes warning and packed up as quick as he could), he thought Potions was rather enjoyable. In fact, if it wasn't for Snape, Potions would be his favorite subject. He loved following steps and doing things that required great detail. Becoming slightly frightened at the amount of students that were exiting the dungeon, he gathered up the rest of his things, and stood there for a minute to read the board and memorize the homework assignment as best he could before running out after his classmates.