Hogwarts is a terrible school.

[gremcint]

and how about the also known case of two older brothers almost making their younger brother swear the unbreakable oath?

[Hyena Dandy]

My issue isn't that reading about "normal" subjects wouldn't have made as exciting a read; the issue is that those subjects just seem to disappear entirely.

I always figured wizards didn't need them. Can't read something? Magic it into words you can understand. Want to do math? Order the math to do itself. The more difficult sections, presumably, are electives. Any of the BASICS, I figured, you could just take a magic pill or something.

And I'm saying that while it's a problem, worrying about it is like worrying that the bank is going to declare you dead and give your money to somebody else. Sure, it could happen, but the steps for it to happen are so ridiculous, why would you establish blocks to protect against it?

Yeah, but that's happened.

Thing is, magically binding contracts must have, at some point, had someone tricked in or SOMETHING like that. I mean, yes, this specific one, but I figure wizards would have some law around it.

[s_stabeler]

and how about the also known case of two older brothers almost making their younger brother swear the unbreakable oath?

with that one, I'm going to assume it was the intent that got them into trouble, rather than any prospect of them succeeding- because IIRC, Fred and George weren't even at hogwarts then. I very much doubt they knew how to create an Unbreakable Vow.

[Lace Neil Singer]

I am fairly sure that the vast majority of Hogwarts students just sailed thru their years at school without anything majorly untoward happening. It's just Harry and his friends are focused on in the storyline of the books, so naturally stuff is going to happen to them. Otherwise, the story would be pretty boring. XD Gonna try and address the other points.

1. As someone else said, I would assume that those classes do take place but aren't focused on as the emphasis is on magic. Having said that, the classes do set essay writing; History of Magic for example. So it's logical to assume that some kind of instruction on how to write an essay was given.

2. I expect the parents deal with sex ed. This is something that muggle parents ought to do, rather than expecting the school to do it. XD As for muggle government, hell, most regular people aren't interested so why expect wizarding schoolkids to be? I expect that the older students are instructed on the Ministry of Magic, given that some of them would want jobs there, but there wouldn't be a point in giving classes on it early on. Again, the instruction is probably background.

3. The Forbidden Forest isn't part of the school, as such; it just happens to be on school grounds. The students are not allowed to go near it and are told not to go there; however, I don't think that the danger is quite as bad as you make out. It's implied in the books that Fred and George have sneaked in there, and since they obviously survived their trip, it can't be that dangerous. The most dangerous thing in there seemed to be a) the giant spiders and b) Voldemort when he was sharing Quirrel's body. Also, don't forget that in book three, Sirius was living in the Forest in his dog form all the time he was on school grounds. There are good creatures living there too, like the centaurs and unicorns, and I'd say that most of the creatures there are basically neutral.

As has been already said, the merpeople are not dangerous and people have bathed in the lake without being attacked, and in Book three, Lupin mentions that the Whomping Willow was declared out of bounds to students after one boy lost his fingers teasing it. It was specifically planted to protect students from coming across a werewolf, so was obviously considered to be a lesser evil than students being bitten.

4. Ahem, there was one giant spider, and one giant snake. The former was only there til the year Hagrid was expelled, then it was put into the Forest. The snake was only controllable by wizards able to speak Parseltongue and as was stated in the books, the only two Parselmouths to come to Hogwarts since Salazar Slytherin were Harry and Voldemort. So I expect it just resided in the Chamber of Secrets which was only opened again when Ginny brought in Tom Riddle's diary and unleashed the Horcrux within.

Even without moving staircases, it is entirely possible to get lost within a normal muggle school til you get used to the place. It has been shown in the books anyway that the portraits will help students to find their way to their classroom, as will, presumably, the ghosts. As for being locked out, well, Neville was locked out of the dorm in the first book and didn't get punished. The teachers aren't ogres; I would assume that if it's a genuine mistake, that you wouldn't be told off. It's implied in the books that Neville always has a problem remembering the passwords; he only was punished in book three cuz he wrote down the passwords and left them lying around for Sirius (thought then to be a dangerous murderer) to find. The punishment wasn't for forgetting the password.

Finally, Moaning Myrtle's a different kind of ghost, being the ghost of a teenage girl. Judging by descriptions of her appearence, she was unlikely to have attracted many teenage boys so it's no wonder that in her death, she'd want to make up for that. Word of God states that Myrtle is fourteen years old. She was also born in 1929 so it's unlikely that her watching of the boy Prefects is going to be anything but innocent. Finally, if you are uncomfortable about her being there, just tell her to cover her eyes while you get out the tub and she will comply. Just ask Harry.


5. The earmuffs do work, otherwise all the students in the first Herbology class would have been knocked unconscious when Professor Sprout pulled the first mandrake out of the pot. This is explained better in the book; namely, that the earmuffs shut out all sounds.

As for training brooms, well, kids have those as shown in book four. Presumably, Madame Hooch wasn't planning on having the brooms go very high, just as a driving instructor doesn't plan on letting you drive very fast on your first lesson. However, if you accidentally put your foot on the accelerator and zoomed forward at fifty miles an hour, despite the teacher telling you to be careful, well, that wouldn't be cuz of the abilities of the teacher. This is a fair enough analogy of what Neville did, a boy who's always being described as accident prone.

Hagrid's name was cleared and he knows a lot about magical creatures. I would far rather have a teacher not fully qualified teaching me who knew about the subject he was teaching, rather than a fully qualified teacher who didn't know his arse from his elbow. And believe me, I've encountered a few of those in my school years, as well as a very competant student teacher who taught the French class as a substitute when the teacher was ill or on holiday. The fact that she wasn't qualified didn't take away the fact that she was completely fluent in French, both written and oral.

Professor Binns is a ghost. Correct. However, he's still the best man for the job, given that he knows his subject and there probably isn't anyone else who's as suited for the job as he is. Also, Dumbledore is an equal opportunities employer; he's also employed on the teaching staff a former Death Eater (Snape) and a werewolf (Lupin), so why is it so surprising that he'd hire a ghost?

6. Seriously? You're citing Professor Umbridge as a reason? Her punishments were entirely her idea, and she had the power to continue using the Blood Quill on Harry cuz he wouldn't tell anyone. By the time she started using it on other students, she was already ruling the school with the Ministry backing her all the way. In any case, as has been previously stated, Harry's years at school can't really be seen as an average student's life.

Regarding Harry's punishment; this also has been answered in the thread. Hagrid said, more or less, "There's nothing in the Forest that will hurt you when you're with me or Fang." While Harry, Hermione, Neville and Malfoy were in the forest, they were with Fang and/or Hagrid all the time, so were perfectly safe. The reason why Harry was put in danger was cuz Malfoy legged it with Fang at a time when, as I stated before, Quirrel was roaming the forest with Voldemort sticking out the back of his head. This isn't a regular occurance at Hogwarts.

Wow, that's a long post. O_o

[wolfie]

I would far rather have a teacher not fully qualified teaching me who knew about the subject he was teaching, rather than a fully qualified teacher who didn't know his arse from his elbow. And believe me, I've encountered a few of those in my school years, as well as a very competant student teacher who taught the French class as a substitute when the teacher was ill or on holiday. The fact that she wasn't qualified didn't take away the fact that she was completely fluent in French, both written and oral.

This is also touched on in "Mathemagics" by Esther Friesner. Short form: Texas was short on qualified teachers, so they allowed people without the proper paperwork, but with experience in the appropriate subjects, to teach, on the condition that they get the proper paperwork within a set number of years. The protagonist's boyfriend was one of these people - if, when he was in University, he had taken what was basically the same course, except with an EDU prefix instead of a MATH prefix, the state would have considered him fully qualified to teach math.

[gremcint]

2. I expect the parents deal with sex ed. This is something that muggle parents ought to do, rather than expecting the school to do it.

except it's a boarding school so that doesn't work as well as one might think and lots of muggle parents don't teach sex ed even though they should.

4. Ahem, there was one giant spider, and one giant snake. The former was only there til the year Hagrid was expelled, then it was put into the Forest.

I'm sorry but I don't know what you define as giant but the dozen or so dog sized and larger spiders would be giant to me.

[s_stabeler]

a) the spiders, while Aragog was still alive, didn't attack students except under one specific situation- the student going deliberately into the area where the spiders live.
b) there was only ever ONE Acromantula in Hogwarts (Aragog)

[HYHYBT]

Only the one, until the end of the last book, a part I've never quite understood. If I'm remembering right, the spiders swarm the school, get Hagrid, and leave again without doing anything else. Seems strange.

Oh, and there was at least one in the maze, but that was a special occasion and doesn't take away from their not generally being outside their part of the forest.

[Mr Hero]

Wouldn't it be possible to teach muggle topics in the wizard classes?

Potions: Chemistry and Math. Chemistry is obvious, but what about if you need to double or triple the size of the batch you're making? Math would come in handy.
Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures: Biology

And just about all classes would require reading and writing skills.

[Andara Bledin]

I also wonder about whether there is a formal curriculum. It seems that every teacher can do just about whatever they want and there are no educational goals set by the goverment or school governors that the school and children have to meet.

The kids have to eventually take the OWL. And, honestly, having a useless teacher for a term is pretty typical in any school system. I mean, really, I had a useless literature teacher for 5th grade (seriously, the woman couldn't spell simple words such as "soccer" and couldn't conjugate a verb to save her life) and two years later my brother had the same useless teacher that couldn't keep up with literate 9-year-olds.

Hell, if we'd have had a Lockhart-caliber teacher, it would have been an improvement. He may have been there mostly as shameless self-promotion, but the events he was teaching about were at least accurate but for a change of protagonist.

As for the lack of typical classes, I'm fairly certain they exist, but the vast majority of kids (and likely adults as well) don't want to wade through the mundane when reading a book that's such high fantasy. And, to be honest, most authors aren't good enough to put it in without breaking the flow.

hardly-we have one confirmed case of a magically binding contract being imposed on someone without their will. I'll admit that we don't know how it works- but it is still pretty disturbing that it can happen at all.

Would that be more or less disturbing than people serving jail sentences for things they did not and should have been known to not have done? Not to mention those who've been executed based on known bad investigations. Then again, by the logic of "it can be abused so should not exist" most things would be immediately rejected.

Also, pretty sure that despite being bound to be entered into the competition that there was always an option to just not engage. I mean, the first thing was opening the egg, so if you just ignored it entirely, you'd be right out.

Potions: Chemistry and Math. Chemistry is obvious, but what about if you need to double or triple the size of the batch you're making? Math would come in handy.

That's all basic math, though, stuff that is typically required to be mastered before you're even old enough to start at Hogwarts.

[s_stabeler]

1) I repeat, yet again, the issue is that you can be bound to a magical contract without actually yourself consenting.

2) As for Sirius Black, he should have been given a trial, but it was less obvious than it seems. He was found at the scene of the crime, with evidence that 13 people had been blown up, and was apparently gibbering about having killed people, and there was testimony, in good faith, that he was the Potter's Secret Keeper. He probably would have been convicted at trial. Yes, its' disturbing he wasn't given one, but there is evidence that they aren't quite capricious enough to imprison people on a whim. (Hagrid was believed to have opened the Chamber the last time, so he WOULD have been a prime suspect this time.) Note that even when the ministry was actively harassing Harry, they never tried to throw him in Azkaban, even though they probably could have drummed up charges ( accusing him of killing Cedric, for example)

[Andara Bledin]

1) I repeat, yet again, the issue is that you can be bound to a magical contract without actually yourself consenting.

And I will, again, reply that this is really no different than what occurs right now in this world. Children in particular are quite regularly bound by contracts they had no input towards. The magical part of things is really a red herring.

[Hyena Dandy]

That's all basic math, though, stuff that is typically required to be mastered before you're even old enough to start at Hogwarts.

And the more advanced things, I think, are implied to have been taught. The reading and writing that we'd teach in one way, they teach in another. I mean, they may not have English Lit classes, but they do seem to learn the essay writing we do, probably comprehension and such too.

It does seem odd that the texts one might need for such aren't mentioned, no Wizard fiction or whatnot - But then again, Hogwarts could be seen as a much more necessary life-skills school. Students only have so many hours in the day, and when kids live in a world where they NEED to control their powers, I'd rather have my student study "How not to blow himself up" rather than reading Catcher in the Rye. I imagine that Wizards migth well have universities and whatnot later, too.

It was my understanding that Arithmancy was basically numerology. So while math is involved, it's primarily a form of divination. Apparently, one Hermione can tolerate, as opposed to the astrology, dream interpretation, tasseomancy, and crystal-gazing taught in Divinations class.

The implication I'd got was that, Arithmancy was a bit more like... Magical-Equivalent To Engineering. I mean, since Astrology exists in the Harry Potter universe, and they don't call it Astromancy, I imagined Arithmancy would be something quite different from Numerology. How to do magic with numbers, not see the future.

Which brings up the point - If Wizards can do Astrology, why can't non-Wizards? Do they see different planets? A lot of what we know about life in early modern Europe - Werner and Brahe's weather diaries, and Aubrey's group of biographies (Brief Lives) - Come from people trying to prove Astrology. Then again, an implication I got from Harry Potter was that some people might be gifted with future-seeing, and stuff like Astrology/Tea Leaves might be just a way to focus that sight.

[Kaylyn]

The implication I'd got was that, Arithmancy was a bit more like... Magical-Equivalent To Engineering. I mean, since Astrology exists in the Harry Potter universe, and they don't call it Astromancy, I imagined Arithmancy would be something quite different from Numerology. How to do magic with numbers, not see the future.

Which brings up the point - If Wizards can do Astrology, why can't non-Wizards? Do they see different planets? A lot of what we know about life in early modern Europe - Werner and Brahe's weather diaries, and Aubrey's group of biographies (Brief Lives) - Come from people trying to prove Astrology. Then again, an implication I got from Harry Potter was that some people might be gifted with future-seeing, and stuff like Astrology/Tea Leaves might be just a way to focus that sight.

The thing is, Astrology exists in "our" (muggle) world (this isn't a debate on whether it works or not, of course, merely that it is a thing that exists), as does Astronomy, both of which were taught at Hogwarts. Arithmancy also exists in our world, as (you guessed it!) a form of numerology. To say they just used the name to cover some real-world topic would be odd, because why wouldn't they just say "math" or "trigonometry" or "calculus" even, if other real-world topics aren't given a different name?

[HYHYBT]

If Wizards can do Astrology, why can't non-Wizards?

The same question with other subjects: care of magical creatures and herbology are about animals and plants that are themselves magical, though having access to magical *healing* is a good idea when dealing with them. And especially potions: mix these ingredients, which in this world exist, together the right way and the result will have a magical effect, but there's nothing about the way they're mixed itself that seems to require magic. You'd think at least some of them would have been leaked to the rest of the world at some point, or even discovered by muggles.