student achievement
Harry was not exactly a stellar student. Part of this had to do with being in Ravenclaw - expectations were you either knew what was going on or had enough sense to ask for help, and Harry, after the upbringing he survived, understood very little of what was going on, but also had the Rules ingrained into his psyche. Don’t ask questions. And at first, Harry didn’t know how much he didn’t know because the year was just starting, and introducing topics was always a time where he felt overloaded with information even back in Muggle school, where he eventually began to understand a few weeks into the year. The problem was, at Hogwarts, he didn’t have the threat of being noticed by the teachers hanging over his head like the sword of Damocles, keeping his grades above failure while remaining below Dudley’s. No, at Hogwarts Harry just had class after class of notes and practicals and fending off Snape’s insults and then more notes. Harry tried to make sense of what he was supposed to be learning, but by the time he understood one concept the professor had moved on to the next and his notes showed this, with random quotations from various lectures interspersed in what was otherwise his own thoughts as he frantically tried to figure out what he missed.
The other reason Harry’s academics were achingly ordinary was that he had eleven years less experience than the majority of his classmates. The differences extended beyond magic - Harry spent hours in the library just reading about how essays were supposed to be organized. Harry had overheard Granger yapping on about how Muggleborns were all attending tutoring sessions, but Harry was not about to willingly go spend more time with that witch. Besides, he wasn’t a Muggleborn. Just a freak, like always.
All these problems accumulated in the form of first term grades. Halfway through October the students all were to go find their House Heads to go over the comments various Professors left, because the term was only halfway through so students would be able to fix their achievements if necessary. Harry allowed this announcement, like most others, to go in his good ear and promptly get lost in the crevices of his mind while he read about the actual crevices he could create in his mind to protect himself against Occlumens. Michael Corner had recommended the book when he saw Harry reading a book on repressed memory written by Muggles.
Harry’s blissful ignorance lasted until Charms class. There he was asked to stay after class for a bit, in a tone that Flitwick had only ever spoken in back in that awful September health check. Harry’s mind fell through the crevices, and he failed to write a single word of the lecture down, instead remembering that hideous Hospital Wing, that bizarre scan.
After class, Flitwick luckily gave Harry an out. ”Harry, I believe you forgot to come find me yesterday to receive your midterm comments. Would you like them now?” Harry shook his head, and the half-goblin sighed. “Alright, but we need to discuss them. How about we meet up in my office after dinner?” Harry nodded, and fled the room to meet up with Ron. He spent the rest of the afternoon near the Hufflepuff Commons playing Gobstones with Ron, his head once again empty.
After dinner, it would fill with dread.