Hogwarts classes and textbooks

[Jerri/Dan Chase]

No: HPFGUIDX 182640

> Carol responds:
> They don't take Astronomy for five years. The core curriculum,
> required for all first- and second-years, is Potions, 
> Transfiguration,
> Herbology, Charms (classes taught, perhaps coincidentally, perhaps
> not, by the Four Heads of Houses), Defense Against the Dark Arts, 
> and
> History of Magic.

It's true that Astronomy class isn't mentioned often, but there are 
reasons I think that they take Astronomy for their first 5 years at 
Hogwarts:

1.  In SS, page 133, when describing their classes it says:  (Page 
numbers from U.S. hardback editions)

"They had to study the night skies through their telescopes every 
Wednesday at midnight."

(True, it doesn't call the class Astronomy, but what else would it 
be?)

2.  Later in SS, page 242, when they get caught after getting rid of 
Norbert:

". . . let alone being up the tallest astronomy tower, which was 
out-of-bounds except for classes."

(True, it doesn't say that HRH were in classes that met there, but if 
not, how did they know how to get to the tower?  When they need to 
find the North Tower for their first divination class they have no 
idea of how to get there, but not only do they know how to get to this 
"tallest astronomy tower", but Charlie assumed that they would know 
how to find it as well.)

3.  In PoA, page 318, they all have an Astronomy exam:

"Then came Astronomy at midnight, up on the tallest tower; ..."

(And Astronomy wasn't listed as a "new" class, so I again assume that 
it had been a consistant part of their class work from the beginning, 
although not often mentioned.)

5.  In OoP there are a number of Astronomy references.  I don't have 
page numbers for them, I can't find my book at the moment, but wasn't 
it in this book that Harry and Ron are writing essays on Jupiter's 
moons, which Hermonie fixes for them.  Harry had Mice on one moon 
instead of Ice, and I think Ron's essay was worse than that.  Also, of 
course, they all take an OWL exam in Astronomy, both a theory one in 
the morning and the practical at night, when they observe the fates of 
Hagrid and McGonagall.

Would Ron and Harry write essays or take exams for something that they 
didn't have to for class?

I feel pretty sure that there were other occasional references to 
Astronomy throughout the books, for example, when they did the 
Astrology portion of Divination they said or thought something about 
what they had learned in Astronomy.

So, I hold by my belief that the Hogwarts core curriculum for the 
first 5 years included Astronomy.

Jerri