It helped that her dad was the professor for her first year, but mostly, Aire just liked the skies. The heavens had a way of making the whole world feel vast, like it did back on the ship. That and it was essential for navigation at sea. More than a few nights on the Solus Aire would drag Harmony up to the crow’s nest and spend the whole night pointing out constellations and making up stories about the stars. Bonus points if it was real. Extra bonus points if it wasn’t but the other person was totally tricked. Come exam time, Aire just kinda waltzed in and treated the exam like any other discussion and managed to scrape enough together for an A.
Charms ~ E
Aire was decent at charms, and particularly liked the ones that tickled people or made them dance. They were great for pranks, and practically harmless. She found ways to weave charms in seemlessly to her everyday life, and knew enough about spell theory and had enough practice to guess if not know.
Defense Against the Dark Arts ~ D
Aire was vaguely familiar with dark creatures that haunted the cursebreaking finds at sea. But all her life, she knew that if they encountered one, her job was to make sure the adults were warned and she and Harmony were safe below deck. While she wasn’t afraid of most things and could do all the spells in class adequately, she wasn’t as comfortable with defending against them as she was just leaving them alone. Unfortunately, how to avoid dark creatures in the first place was not on the exam and in addition to some mix ups on the written section, she completely froze up in the face of the boggart.
Herbology ~ A
Aire grew up on a ship that specialized in magizoology research, and her ami, Annie, specialized in underwater environments, including the plant life there. Her experiences aboard the Solus gave her a solid grasp of not only underwater plants, but how they interacted with aquatic life, and how everything from sunlight to salinity to merfolk presence affected different aquatic habitats. This didn’t translate perfectly to shore herbology, but it certainly helped and she was able to muddle her way through most of Herbology with a bit of effort.
History of Magic ~ D
Aire spent most of class doodling scenery from the history textbook. She didn’t know who any of the people were and didn’t really care that much, unless she had met them. She could draw you the architectural fashions of every century, both muggle and wizard, but asking who might have been around then to see it went over her head.
Potions ~ P
Aire legitimately tried in potions, particularly because she knew from the ship’s healer how useful potions were in healing. She thought it was the best class for playing little pranks, and years of knowing what actually affected a potion and what was just funny gave her good insight into making potions. Unfortunately that didn’t translate to writing out and answering theory questions. While her exam practical was perfectly potable if a little slow in making, her written portion was riddled with careless mistakes.
Transfiguration ~ E
Aire wasn’t the most reliable on all the theory behind transfiguration, but she understood the math, and early on, she felt most comfortable with transfiguration over other kinds of magic--something wandlore later explained by kelpie core being particularly adept at transfiguration. Liking this quality of magic boosted her interest in transfiguration as a subject. She enjoyed practicing transfiguration more, and all the practice meant that while she just managed for the written portion, she all but aced the practical.
ELECTIVES Alchemy ~ D
Turning things to other things sounded like a transfiguration. Aire was good at Transfiguration. She also liked puzzles. Alchemy was great fun usually, but she had no time with all her other activities and classes and couldn’t quite coast by.
Arithmancy ~ A
Aire took Arithmancy because it was a cursebreaking elective and she thought she ought to at least know enough to be passable but found she had a genuine interest in knowing about numbers. It helped that her predictions with Arithmancy were always better than those in divination. Austen’s influence meant she at least did (most of) her homework in the class and she enjoyed comparing arithmetic predictions and interpretations with him in their note-passing. While usually an E student, Aire was particularly tired and succinct in her interpretations, leading to a few mis-steps on the exam.
Art ~ A
Aire discovered she quite liked sketching like her mamom Alys. Aire had a particular fascination with structures, maps, and environments, and art as an elective helped her hone her skills and learn to appreciate others’ art. Art history was the only kind of history she knew anything about and she was an ace at art theory. However, Aire chose an unfortunate subject for her practical: an empty version of the art classroom, and it barely seemed to animate when she cast the spell to animate it.
Care of Magical Creatures~ A
Aire grew up on a ship that did magizoology research. She helped out with creatures, saw plenty of them in the wild, and had a very good grasp of how different creatures interacted with others and their habitats. She took the Care of Magical Creatures because she always thought she would be staying aboard and thought it was necessary. Most of her experience however, was with aquatic creatures, and while she knew the basics about other creatures, on the exam she was mostly left guessing for half the written section about the specifics. Her practical carried her grade, as even if she couldn’t list exactly what she was doing, she had enough of an idea to interact with the creature.
Cursebreaking ~ E
Aire’s mamon was a cursebreaker, but Aire’s particular fascination for cursebreaking was entirely her own: Aire liked cursebreaking for breaking into places, getting around wards, and sneaking around. She thought cursebreaking puzzles were like deconstructing and repurposing pranks, and while some of her solutions were wild and strange, they usually worked. She loved the new spells they learned, and always looked for ways to use them creatively. Perhaps the only class she consistently did the homework for, cursebreaking was definitely one of Aire’s favorite and best subjects.
Divination ~ P
Aire’s paternal stepmother worked in the Hall of Prophecy and often turned to divination for everyday things. Their summers together helped Aire breeze through her first year of divination, but by fourth year Aire quickly discovered she had no answer when reading for herself and frequently preferred to just daydream or make something up or speculate. She didn’t rely on divination on the ship, and the less time she spent with Julius and Edaline, the less Aire thought about divination. It didn’t help that she spent most of class thinking of how to crafting a new prank. She learned some topics in great detail and read Austen’s notes on the subject attentively, but mostly had no idea what she was doing for the practical. She did naively think she would at least pass the exam though :/
Ghoul and Ghost Studies ~ D
Aire thought talking to ghosts was great, and thought she could use her work to find leviathan ghosts at sea. This was not the case. She also spent most of class studying other subjects. Aire was much better at the practical than the written portion, but tended to forget what spells were most effective anyways.
Healing ~ D
Aire had seen more than enough accidents happen aboard to know how useful Healing. She didn’t expect herself to be a healer, but Aire wanted to be sure that she knew what to do if someone got sick or had a gash. The OWL was much harder than she had anticipated though, what with her hardly ever finishing the homework. She fell asleep during the written portion and panicked on the practical, forgetting everything but Woundus Healiom.
Muggle Studies ~ T
Aire thought the content of Muggle Studies was generally pretty basic and usually spent class just drawing pictures of cool buildings, planning her next master prank, or catching up on sleep. Thus was the case for the exam: between cramming for other exams and napping before her next exam, she completely missed the exam until there wasn’t enough time to rush over.
Music ~ T
Aire thought she would learn to play the flute better. She thought music theory was fascinating, but usually she was just tired, and she really just wanted to listen to different kinds of music across the world. With the stress of her other exams, she slept through this one and didn’t realize it until the end of the week when she realized she hadn’t touched her flute in a while. She decided if she wanted to listen to music she really ought to just go to music club.
Mythology ~ E
Aire loved mythology class. She loved the storytelling, the reenactments, and even enjoyed hearing people’s analysis of the topics. Even her doodles were on topic. However, she was usually pretty quiet in class, and struggled to express her own thoughts or even accurately regurgitate others’ analyses. Learning to express these was much worked on in fifth year with Austen, and she somehow managed to do better on the subject than expected.
Study of Ancient Runes~ P
Study of Ancient Runes was seen often enough in her mamon’s cursebreaking work that Aire knew it would be useful. She really liked this class, and Austen’s influence made sure she always not only did the homework, but often completed it and turned it in. She did tend to second-guess her translations though; In class, Aire alleviated this by comparing her assignments with Austen’s and friends.. But with no one to compare with her on the exam, she second-guessed half her answers and didn’t finish most of the exam. Ironically, the part that she turned in was actually great.
Wandless Magic ~ T
You can’t always reach your wand when doing things, and Aire took to Wandless magic with particular practice. She wasn’t a duelist, but could do most charms and even a few defensive spells wandlessly in a pinch. After a rough first year, she was generally fantastic in wandless. Unfortunately you can’t be fantastic if you also forget to show up to the exam, so that kinda sucked.
Wandlore~ A
Aire wasn’t so much a craftsman as a designer, but she had sat in on a few classes and gotten interested in the material aspect of wandlore studies. She wasn’t so much interested in making wands as furniture or imagining how the materials could be used for buildings and did decently well at the subject. She considered retaking the OWL in an attempt to continue to the NEWT but found out the NEWT was specifically wand-based and decided her current knowledge would suffice.
Wizard Law ~ D
Aire took the class thinking it was always good to know what loopholes she could exploit. She paid a lot of attention during any units on maritime law and architectural and building restrictions. She actually remembered to attend the exam, but took one look, filled in what she knew and left the rest of it blank and went to nap before her next exam. Law always was a fantastic class to nap in.
---------------------------------------- In summation: 0O / 4E / 6A= 10 passed 3P / 6D / 3T = 12 failed
Aire is a generally mediocre student who doesn't do half her homework and is oftentime distracted thinking of pranks or napping or just doodling in class (mostly she just starts and never completes her assignment because she gets distracted).
Aire will retake her 5th year with an amended workload. Some of these exams she will keep this years scores, and others she will retake to get a better score.
Please PM or poke addaellis if these require additional edits. Proposed score code listed for convenience:
Astronomy ~ [color=green]A[/color] Charms ~ [color=green]E[/color] Defense Against the Dark Arts ~ [color=red]D[/color] Herbology ~ [color=green]A[/color] History of Magic ~ [color=red]D[/color] Potions ~ [color=red]P[/color] Transfiguration ~ [color=green]E[/color]
Alchemy ~ [color=red]D[/color] Arithmancy ~ [color=green]A[/color] Art ~ [color=green]A[/color] Care of Magical Creatures ~ [color=green]A[/color] Cursebreaking ~ [color=green]E[/color] Divination ~ [color=red]P[/color] Ghoul and Ghost Studies ~ [color=red]D[/color] Healing ~ [color=red]D[/color] Muggle Studies ~ [color=red]T[/color] Music ~ [color=red]T[/color] Mythology ~ [color=green]E[/color] Study of Ancient Runes ~ [color=red]P[/color] Wandless Magic ~ [color=red]T[/color] Wandlore ~ [color=green]A[/color] Wizard Law ~ [color=red]D[/color]
Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2021 9:11 pm
Astronomy ~ A Charms ~ E Defense Against the Dark Arts ~ D Herbology ~ A History of Magic ~ D Potions ~ P Transfiguration ~ E
Alchemy ~ D Arithmancy ~ A Art ~ A Care of Magical Creatures ~ A Cursebreaking ~ E Divination ~ P Ghoul and Ghost Studies ~ D Healing ~ D Muggle Studies ~ T Music ~ T Mythology ~ E Study of Ancient Runes ~ P Wandless Magic ~ T Wandlore ~ A Wizard Law ~ D
Aire took her A from last year instead of retaking the exam.
Charms ~ O
Aire retook the Charms OWL class mostly because she thought she could do better, even though her E last year was sufficient. With minimal effort, the extra practice and year of theory understanding, she easily aced the exam.
Defence Against the Dark Arts - A
Given she had failed DADA last year with D (hey, D was for Defence right?) Aire took her DADA retake seriously and studied up on the dark creatures. She did acceptably on the written portion, having devoted herself to cramming all information in her head, but the practical was where her biggest change was. Where last year she only cared about running, this time Aire put her mind and spellwork to confronting the creatures and performed well. Her hesitation in the practical just cost her the E, but it was well enough to continue (Plus A was the other part of Dark Arts, soooo that made sense?)
Herbology ~ A
Aire took her A from last year instead of retaking the exam.
History of Magic ~ P
Even after another year, Aire struggled to stay focused on the material for History. Even when she tried not to doodle in class she would fall asleep or end up doodling again. She got much better at drawing the different architectural and interior design structures of wizarding and muggle yesteryears, and could point out how some parts were influenced by events of the time. She also learned a lot about Quidditch History-- honestly, If the entire exam was History of Quidditch or History of Architecture or Art History, Aire would have aced it.
Potions ~ E
Aire took her Potions retake very seriously because she had decided she wanted to continue Potions at the NEWT. After just missing a passing mark last year, she focused on understanding how theory explained the steps of making potions and found herself learning more than she’d expected about not only potions but how the herbs worked together. The extra year of practice only made her potion-making technique more fluid and practiced as well, which helped at the practical.
Transfiguration ~ E
Aire took the E from last year instead of retaking the exam.
ELECTIVES Arithmancy ~ A
Aire took the A from last year instead of retaking, although she did keep up with the practice problems. With another year, she was starting to develop a greater appreciation of Arithmancy.
Art ~ A
Aire took the A from last year instead of retaking. She did redo all her assignments though, and it helped her development as an artist greatly.
Cursebreaking ~ E
Aire took the E from last year instead of retaking. She also sat in on the NEWT level cursebreaking class mostly so she wouldn't fall too far behind.
Healing ~ E
Aire was just glad that failing so many classes meant she had a chance to redeem her abysmal Healing score. This time, she did all the homework and better familiarized herself with the spells available. She also got a great deal out of having a study group. This time when she approached the OWL she was much calmer and prepared.
Muggle Studies ~ E
Taken because she was in frequent contact with the muggle world while at port, Aire generally thought of Muggle Studies as very basic. Her life revolved around more magic than she gave credit for, but with her newfound focus on architecture, she found ways to pin her learning onto muggle architecture and did well. Having actually showed up to the exam though, she passed this time around.
Mythology~ E
Aire took the E from last year instead of retaking. She also snuck into the NEWT mythology course, mostly to watch even more stories and spend time with Austen.
Study of Ancient Runes ~ O
Aire retook the Ancient Runes exam out of determination that she could do better. The year had been pretty lax, but she redid most of the assignments anyways as part of building her confidence in her own translations. Come exam time again, Aire not only finished, but finished early and turned her answers in with aplomb. She also snuck into the NEWT level Ancient Runes class, mostly because she liked swapping translation opinions with the others in her original year.
Wandless ~ E
With all her years of weaving wandless magic into her everyday, Aire was generally great at Wandless magic. This time she remembered to show up to all her exams, and performed much better.
---------------------------------------- Aire is retaking her 5th year after dropping 6 electives. She was also a generally better student this year: in addition to keeping up with her study notebook with Austen, she studies with Harmony and her friends, and actually made a point to do and turn in her homework--most of it anyways.
She is only taking 8 actual exams (the other 8 scores were passing grades from last year). For classes she chose not to retake the exam for, Aire still attended the 5th year level class. Where mentioned and permitted, she sat in on 6th year level classes. Finally, she had two passing scores from last year that she chose not to continue with.
As always, please poke or PM addaellis if something needs to be edited or you've any questions!
Proposed final OWL scores with updated passing grades, listed for convenience/ reference:
Astronomy ~ A Charms ~ O Defense Against the Dark Arts ~ A Herbology ~ A History of Magic ~ P Potions ~ E Transfiguration ~ E
Alchemy ~ D Arithmancy ~ A Art ~ A Care of Magical Creatures ~ A Cursebreaking ~ E Divination ~ P Ghoul and Ghost Studies ~ D Healing ~ E Muggle Studies ~ E Music ~ T Mythology ~ E Study of Ancient Runes ~ O Wandless Magic ~ E Wandlore ~ A Wizard Law ~ D
Posted: Fri Jan 14, 2022 2:41 pm
Astronomy - A Charms - O Defence Against the Dark Arts - A Herbology - A History of Magic - P Potions - EE Transfiguration - EE
Arithmancy - A Art - A Cursebreaking - EE Healing - EE Muggle Studies - EE Mythology - EE Study of Ancient Runes - O Wandless Magic Practice Class - EE
Aire continued with Astronomy because she remembered quite liking the subject. Astronomy was useful for navigation and there was something horrifying yet familiar about the study of space. Plus the NEWT was more practical! Her written exam might have made only some sense, but she did well enough on the practical to secure a passing grade (and only made up a few constellations).
Charms ~ O
Aire approached the Charms NEWT with confidence, given her high scores the last few years. She understood Charms theory well enough, and her practical casting ability was well honed from years of using it in subtle ways to help move around or prank.
Defence Against the Dark Arts - A
Aire applied her newfound approach to confronting rather than avoiding the dark creatures discussed in DADA to her NEWT studies, but there was only so much theory of boogey-henchmen she could stuff into her head. With greater time to prepare and think through her spells like a cursebreaking puzzle, Aire might have excelled, but as it was, she barely did well enough at the practical to secure a passing grade.
Herbology ~ A
Aire maintained a general sense of how plants worked together and how to care for them still, but had to study much harder to keep up at the NEWT level.
Potions ~ D
Aire mostly cared for potions as a matter of healing. Her retake of 5th year had gone a long way to helping her understand the theory behind Potions, and for the most part, she managed to keep up at the NEWT level– By seventh year, Aire figured she could get an A as long as she got a nap and girding potion before the exam. The thing was, taking the potion also gave her the perfect idea for a farewell prank–spiking every drink she could find with hair-raising potion. Needless to say, preparing the prank completely took over that night, and it wasn’t until she got her grades back that Aire realized she hadn't attended her actual potion's practical.
Transfiguration ~ A
Aire had taken her previous grade for Transfiguration and found jumping back into Transfiguration harder than expected. While she never attempted the animagus transformation, she kept up her practice with fun pranks. Unfortunately this wasn’t quite enough. Aire found advanced transfiguration theory—with all the exceptions and edge cases—a little too confusing to reprise her O.
ELECTIVES Arithmancy ~ E
After taking the A from her first OWLs year instead of retaking, Aire chose to sit in on the sixth year class to better understand Arithmancy. It greatly helped come NEWTs time and she started writing notes and predictions in the column of book margins, analyzing poetry with numerology, and applying arithmancy to potions or architectural art. Her creative applications actually helped, and she managed a solid E without extensive studying.
Art~ O
Aire took her A from her first OWLs simply to reduce the load on her schedule, but as with other classes, still attended class to soak in lectures and Art club to keep her practice up. Her NEWT classes went very well thanks to keeping up with the art theory and history, and her sketching skills were better and paired with a precision honed in Arithmancy. She chose a much better subject for the practical, drafting a cross-section of a studio apartment and animating it with how different wall and floor panels could open up to serve as multipurpose furniture.
Cursebreaking ~ E
Perhaps the only class she consistently did the homework for, cursebreaking was definitely one of Aire’s favorite and best subjects.
Healing Class ~ P
Aire was never going to be a healer, but she did insist on taking healing because of how useful it could be in a scrap. She kept mostly on top of the material, and could usually perform a spell or potion given instructions. In theory, she loved the puzzle behind diagnostics–but in practice, she didn’t have the knowledge needed to solve healing puzzles, and she couldn’t quite concentrate when the puzzle was a living soul, not a teacup or a room. Oh well, at least she knew she could patch herself up until someone more qualified on the subject could figure out what was wrong.
Mythology ~ E
Aire approached the NEWT classes with the same cavalier attitude she had OWLs. She still got notes and tutoring from Austen on the subject, mostly as a matter of conversation than actual studying. She didn’t think she would do well on the exam given how casually she took the subject, but what she didn’t realize was all the conversations and doodling insights was how she was studying.
Study of Ancient Runes ~ E
Aire’s efforts and continued study of Runes had finally paid off with an O in her retake OWL. She carried the confidence and learnings forward, and combined the runic knowledge she’d built with her love of architectural design and earned a very solid E grade—she wasn’t going to be translating and interpreting ancient texts, but it was more than enough to know what kinds of runic magic she could use in designs and work now..
Wandless Magic ~ T
Aire generally did well in Wandless over her years in the class, but as she dedicated more time to her studies, she ironically had less time with wandless practice. Still, she did decently well most of the time—which would be relevant if she hadn’t slept through the exam.
Posted: Sun Jan 15, 2023 11:41 am
Astronomy - A Charms - O Defence Against the Dark Arts - A Herbology - A Potions - D Transfiguration - A
Arithmancy - EE Art - O Cursebreaking - EE Healing - P Mythology - EE Study of Ancient Runes - EE Wandless Magic Practice Class - T
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