Find Your Own Way

[Ráhel Sárközi]

Calling:
Aaron Joseph Moore
Geraldine Cliff
Kallistos Rolleston
Karina Fuchs
Katherine Lorelia
Maeve McKenna
Mikala Palakiko
Stefano Rice

Ráhel pulled back her hair into its normal ponytail as she waited for her students to arrive. The morning had been a buzz of last-minute activity for her as she set up the room to her own specifications, setting out the printed map that she'd found, one per student, and retrieving the box of compasses that she had secreted away somewhere silly last term.

She stood at the front of the room as her students arrived, smiling and returning greetings if they were offered, but otherwise not engaging yet. Her last name was written on the board, along with a pronunciation key for those who had never needed to pronounce it properly before.

[Geraldine Cliff]

Gerri left her previous class and headed towards the social studies wing. Her dad had been excited when she'd told him she would be taking geography this term - It had been one of his favorite subjects, he'd said - and that made her look forward to the class even more. He was coming to visit for a weekend soon, his four days off coinciding with days where she wouldn't have to worry about school, and she was really looking forward to that!

Her attention had to turn back to school as she found the classroom, and she took a seat right in the front of the room, smiling at the teacher and offering a quick greeting before she took her seat. This woman had been another reason Gerri wanted to take the class - It appeared she spoke Hungarian, and that was pretty cool in and of itself.

[Karina Fuchs]

Karina appreciated direction that having classes start gave her, and fell back into her easy morning routine. No reason to worry about what she'd do that day, it was scheduled for her - Grab breakfast, head to the barn. Turn out Ella, clean her stall, shower, take her backpack, and head to classes.

Now, she stepped out of one classroom and headed towards the next, greeting the teacher as she entered, and picking a seat against a wall, somewhere in the middle. She looked forward to the class, but she did have to admit - As much as a schedule was nice, it was also a bit tiring.

[Maeve McKenna]

If anything, once classes started, Maeve felt like she didn't stop the entire day. She was pleased that she was fit, and wondered if anyone here used this as a training plan for marathons. She giggled at that thought as she made her way to her next class.

She gave the teacher a shy smile before she made her way to a desk and pulled out the folder labelled Geography. Her parents had questioned her need to take this class, as she had lived and breathed reading the terrain since birth, but she loved learning how the earth worked, and all the people in it. It was also a good thing for her dragon to learn too.

[Stefano Rice]

Seth breezed from one class to another, his mind already working out what he could do when the school day was over. Now that the days were getting cooler and shorter, it meant that tree climbing, and even rock climbing, was more and more out of the question, but there had to be something that he could do to get his heart-rate up, and not end up in the principal's office.

Walking into the classroom, he gave the teacher a bright smile and then his eyes swept over the class, and he walked to sit at a desk in the centre of the room. Not close enough to the front that he looked over eager and not far enough back that he seemed to be hiding from something.

[Mikala Palakiko]

Mika was bored!!! He could think of so many other things to be doing, other than sitting in a classroom and listening to some teacher or another and regurgitating things that had, in all sense, already been done by another person! However, this was the way of life, and other than facing expulsion and being sent home to finish out his high school career in Hawaii - or a military camp - he had no choice but to move from one classroom to the next each time the bell sounded. At least the indoor side of things finished at lunch.

He strolled into the geography classroom, giving the teacher a bright smile, and walked over to drop himself into the chair of a desk by the wall, so he had the wall to hold him up if nothing else, and he grabbed the notebook he'd need for the class.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Time management was never Kall's biggest thing, and chatting between classes generally took precedence over getting to the next class, and he blamed it all on his mom's for making him such a well-rounded people person. He did however have a phone with an alarm that went off when he was pushing it to get to class before the tardy bell, so he managed to always get to class on time.

Walking into the classroom, he gave Ms Sárközi a warm smile before he walked over to where Gerri was sitting, dropped his bag on the ground and sat down. "How's life treating you, love?" He asked his Housemate with a bright smile as he grabbed the first notebook he put his hand around in the bag, followed by a handful of pens.

[Ráhel Sárközi]

Ráhel waited for the bell to ring, then smiled and started class, "Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Geography. While today is going to be a bit of a lecture, please bear with me - I need to give you a baseline of information before we can start on our unit properly, and I hope that will be of more interest to you. We will be using the basics of orienteering to improve map-reading skills, the understanding of scale and topography, and we'll be discussing physical geography throughout this unit as well."

She paused, giving students a moment to catch up, and then started on her lecture, "For those of you that aren't familiar, orienteering is an outdoor activity using a detailed topographic map and a compass to navigate through the terrain and find a series of terrain or man-made features indicated on the map. It originated as a military exercise in Scandinavia in the early 1900s." She smiled, "In front of you, you have an orienteering map, which you are welcome to peruse and make notes on if you wish. Now - Taking a look at the map, what components do you see?"

[Geraldine Cliff]

Gerri smiled as her housemate chose to sit next to her, and laughed at his endearment, "Well enough. You?"

She turned her attention to the teacher as the woman started class, quickly pulling out a notebook and a pen to take quick notes. Today sounded interesting, even with it just being a lecture. She scribbled down some of the history and then looked at the map the teacher talked about. It looked different from a normal map - More colors than usual, and more specific than one might expect to see for what appeared to be a city park. As Ms. Sárközi asked about features on the map, Gerri raised her hand, and then answered, "It has the compass rose on the top left."

[Karina Fuchs]

Karina focused again as the teacher started the class, and listened patiently to the introduction. Lectures, while boring, were just a fact of life as a student. But at least this sounded like it would be a cohesive unit, building on a basic premise to discuss what they would be learning.

When their attention was called to the map, Karina looked down and glanced over the map. She could name the parts in German, but she wasn't completely sure about their English counterparts. It was her first time really contemplating maps in English, which seemed weird. She'd been here for a while now, but just had never needed a proper map.

[Maeve McKenna]

Maeve grinned, map reading was nothing new to her, as it had been an important part of her schooling right from day one, which was kind of important when you kind of lived in a forest and there wasn't always signal for a mobile phone.

She studied the map in front of her, feeling a little homesick, and raised her hand when another student had given an answer. "Maps have a grid." She could have named a new more, but didn't want to come off as a know-it-all - see, she could listen to her inner dialogue when it was telling her to be quiet.

[Stefano Rice]

Seth groaned at the mention of a lecture, but perked up at the thought of orienteering, not that he'd ever done any before, as it would mean they would be outside to do stuff, and he loved exploring.

As the woman spoke, he wondered why this wasn't something his parents had found for him to do, it would have got him outside and doing stuff, while not also looking for trouble. "Maps have a scale." He said after he raised his hand into the air.

[Mikala Palakiko]

A lecture? Time for a nap! Mika wasn't stupid enough to even make it look like he was going to go to sleep though, not the best way to start the school year.

He studied the map in front of him and arched an eyebrow as others in the class answered the teacher's question about components. He'd never really been big on reading maps, he came from an island, not too many places to get lost where one would need a map. Orienteering sounded interesting enough though, so he'd at least pay attention.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall pulled a face. "Weather is warmer back home. I'm pretty good though."

He grinned as Gerri pulled out a notebook and pen. "If you're taking notes, I won't need to. Just copy yours." He said quietly. He grabbed his own note book and settled down to do some learning. It seemed a lot of things they did had a military background, which was amusing.