Teaching Styles / Sorting Hat

[Ken Hutchinson]

No: HPFGUIDX 157901

>
> 
> > >> Betsy Hp:
> > > So Snape is making an important point.  Neville needs to learn to
> > > pay attention and follow directions, or someone might get hurt.
> > > Snape is doing the best he can to reach him.  I think it's
> > > especially telling that Snape expresses a bit of frustration
> >before
> > > he comes up with using Trevor as a guinea pig.  Snape has been
> > > trying to get that message across, and this is one way he's
> >thought
> > > of for doing so.
> 
> wynnleaf,
> I think is that Snape is the type of person to habitually make
over-the-top 
> threats.  They are soooo over-the-top, I'm always amazed that Harry,
Ron, 
> Hermione and Neville all believe them.  Apparently all the Gryffindors 
> believe Snape's threats.  And when the Slytherins think they're
funny, Harry 
> assumes it's because the Slytherins want to see terrible things
happen to 
> the Gryffindors.
> 

Ken:

Another thing to consider is that we only see Snape teaching through
Harry's eyes. I'm not sure everyone has picked up on this yet but
Harry is not what you would call fond of Snape (yes, irony intended).
I wonder how your average Ravenclaw would describe Snape as a teacher?
We never get that point of view. We only get what Harry wants us to
see and his impartiality cannot be relied upon. So you have to wonder
if Snape is as bad as Harry paints him. I've always been incredulous
that DD would allow such a poor teacher to instruct his most important
pupil in such a critical subject. Maybe the answer is that he didn't,
the problem is not Snape the teacher but Harry the student. I suppose
you could argue that he should have found Harry another potions
teacher because of the awful personality conflict between the two but
I now wonder if Snape isn't a lot better than the Harry filter version
gives us. Given all their problems Harry *and Ron* both do quite well
on their potions OWL. From what we see in the book neither is a great
student.

Of course the supporting material for this is Carol's beloved irony of
Harry's complete mastery of potions when taught by the HBP's potions
notes as opposed to his struggles when taught by the same HBP in
person. Nowhere is it stated, as Carol assumes, that Snape's
blackboard potions notes are the same as his scribbles in his old
textbook, yet that is surely a reasonable assumption. If they weren't
intended to be better than the textbook instructions then surely he
would have had the students read the instructions from the text as
Slughorn does. If anything Snape's blackboard instructions would have
some refinements over what he wrote in his textbook all those years
ago. The thing that *really* gets Hermione's goat about the HBP
textbook, I presume, is that she realizes that potions is *another*
subject where Harry would outshine her if he didn't detest the
teacher! She will give the Potter his due in DADA but *this* is too much.

Snape reminds me of several teachers I had in my educational career.
They were always the teachers that students feared. Pray that you get
Mrs. Rannow, not Miss Smith. Pray that you get that cute young math
teacher, not Mr. Moreland. Pray that you get *anyone* for English lit
except, and I'm sorry but I've forgotten his name. Of course I ended
up in the classes of all these dreaded hobgoblinish excuses for human
beings. And they were all *excellent* teachers. They were all strict
and demanding but all their reputations meant was that my fellow
students were lazy. Mr. Moreland's excellence as a math teacher has
served me well in my career as an engineer, too bad Ms. Rowling
couldn't have had someone like him, eh? Miss Smith, He Whose Name
Cannot Be Remembered, and, indeed, Mrs. Rannow all gave me the love of
literature and history that remains with me today. For all her
reputation as being friendlier than Miss Smith, Mrs. Rannow too had a
fist of steel that could occasionally be glimpsed beneath her velvet
glove. 

Is McGonagall any less fearsome than Snape in the classroom? She can
*seem* a warmer, grandmotherly type compared to Snape. But like Mrs.
Rannow, if you cross her ... well, wouldn't you rather find yourself
in Snape's hands? 

Ken