Life After Death - An Erica Black Continuation (4)

Fifty One

Erica Black stood on a table in the centre of a crowded Slytherin common room, surrounded by approximately 60 students aged eleven to eighteen, half of which already held their new class schedules for the coming school year.
"Okay, so moving on to my third years; Burke, Vaughn. Edwards, Leanne. Jones, Clarissa. McMillan, Abel. Radcliffe, Sophie. And Travers, Max." She called out, pausing in between or each of the third year students to collect the piece of parchment with their name on it. Once the final student had taken their schedule, the professor pulled another pile of papers from her pocket;
"Very good, second years listening up for you names now please!" So that's; "Carrow, Kathleen. Carrow, Paisley. Cooper, Florence. Cooper, George. Smith, Clyde. Wood, Vin. And Yaxley, Robert" Once again, she produced another set of schedules and began to speak but the volume in the common room had increased to the point where she could barely hear herself speak, let alone be heard by the first years;
"And now last but certainly not least, Our wonderful first years! Excuse me! Slytherin house!"
The common room fell dead silent at the sound of the usually quiet professor raising her voice at them. She paused for a moment to ensure the quiet would remain before speaking.
"That's better. Thank you. First years; listening ears. Second to Seventh years; inside voices please, I know it's an exciting time but you can discuss your schedules in a moment if you'd just let me finish my job first. Okay?" A low mumble of agreement rippled across the room.
"Perfect. So, as I was saying; Abbott, Cora. Clemente, Evelyn. Hawthorne, Arthur. Nott, Juno. Rosier, Clarence. Rosier, Dimitri. Rowle, Edward. And that is it! Thank you guys. I will be around for the next hour or so if you have any questions or concerns."

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Over the next forty-five minutes, Professor Black sat in an arm chair in the Slytherin common room as a few students approached her, some to chat and some with questions about their classes. For example, both of the Rosier cousins had approached her, one of the Carrow twins, Vin wood and one of the Coopers who, despite sharing a name, were, as far as anyone was aware, not related. Just as she was gathering her things to head back to her classroom, she caught the eye of a small, dark haired student sat reading across the common room. Leaving her things on her chair, she wandered over to the student and sat besides them.
"Alice in Wonderland. One of my favourites as a child. Where have you gotten to?"
"I've read it before, Professor" They responded softly, looking up from their book to address the professor who then smiled widely; "Perfect. Well then, what's your favourite part?"
"The dodo. I enjoy how he often uses big words but no one quite believes that he knows what they mean" Erica threw back her head in soft laughter at their answer, which both surprised and excited her. No one had ever responded in quite the same way before when asked that question. She nodded before turning to the student and saying;
"That is very good. I like the Cheshire cat personally, I find his mischief and backwards logic to be rather refreshing."

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"Hello, First year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws. My name is, as some of you may know, Professor Erica Black and I am thrilled to be introducing you to, what is my favourite topic and I hope will become some of your's too, History of Magic. This year we will be covering for key events and three key figures in Wizarding history. These are; The 1911 Gargoyle strike, The 1378 Soap Blizzard, The 1637 werewolf code of conduct and The invention and evolution of the self stirring cauldron. Emeric the evil, Uric the oddball and Elfric the eagar. Now, before we start, are there any questions?" She asked, glancing up at her classroom full of students to see one girl with her hand stretched so far in the air Erica thought he may well be in pain at the un-natural looking distortion. She had pale skin, dark hair and sharp features that reminded her of someone she couldn't quite seem to place. "Yes Miss..."
"Greengrass, professor. Hyacinth Greengrass." She replied in a clear and enthusiastic tone that one again rang bells in the professor's memory. And suddenly, it clicked, Greengrass. Astoria Greengrass. This must her niece or her niece's daughter or some other semi-close relation.
"Yes miss Greengrass?"
"Will we be studying any witches in history through the curriculum, Professor?"
"An excellent question Hyacinth! Although I regret to say that as a society, we know very little about witches throughout history. You see, whilst wizards appeared to have spent a lot of time sitting around, writing about themselves and each other, witches seemingly preferred to just get things done and no one thought to jot it down. However, if you'd prefer I can re-evaluate my choice for the teacher selected topic and we can swap out self stirring cauldrons for notable witches through the ages?" She looked over her classroom to see most of the students nodding enthusiastically at her preposition, Erica had to admit; she was also rather excited to be unlocking a new page of her own history book as well as sharing it with her students.
"Well then, I suppose it has been decided. Very well, I look forward to learning with you all. This year, instead of the invention and evolution of the self stirring cauldron, we will be looking into notable witches throughout history. This will likely include such witches as Bridget Wenlock, Sybil Trelawney, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena and Helena Ravenclaw, Violetta Beauvais and Ottaline Gambol amongst others. - Yes, Miss Greengrass?"
"How will this change in curriculum effect the marking system?"
"Once again, a very good question, Hyacinth. Ten points to Ravenclaw for consistently good questions. Yes, this will likely effect the marking system. We will probably have multiple smaller quizzes and then one overarching one at the end of the topic to recapitulate what we have learnt. Whereas, usually, we would do multiple overarching topic exam papers at the end."