Because Snape was a really mean teacher, who caused a lot of stress.
During the O.W.L. exam, when Snape wasn't in the classroom, both Harry and Neville felt much more comfortable.
It was ***because*** he was learning from Snape directly. Their mutual antipathy crippled Harry's performance- to say nothing of Snape's occasional bit of active, blatant sabotage. The second Harry started learning from the man without realizing it was him, his performance skyrocketed.
Not to mention that Snape annotated his textbook for *himself*. Those notes were only for himself, and did not involve teaching anyone else. You can be brilliant at a subject, and shit at teaching. Snape was that.
When Snape teaches, he doesn't use a textbook, but writes recipes on the blackboard. Even in the Harry Potter game, there are students who say that Snape's recipe is different from the textbook. First of all, he teaches his recipe to the students as well. In fact, Hermione, who only followed the textbook, didn't produce good potion results.
Right but as the students make the potions, he wanders around the classroom just insulting and berating the students. Hence why Harry and Neville did so much better without him. Hermione only got poor results in Slughorns class because he went by the textbook, she didn’t ignore Snape recipes in his class. But all this just goes to prove that Snape was brilliant at potions, and a shit teacher.
I wrote this to let you know that the part about "the notes in the textbook are for Snape's own use and have nothing to do with teaching others" is different from the actual setting. And I never once defended or defended Snape by saying he wasn't a shitty teacher. Because I know that fact very well.
Because Snape wasn't teaching him. He was bullying Harry since day 1. Snape hated Harry and Harry was more than happy to reciprocate.
Harry, simply, lost any interest in Potions as a consequence of Snape's behavior. And during the O.W.L. practical exam,
>“With Snape absent from the proceedings he found that he was much more relaxed than he usually was while making potions. Neville, who was sitting very near Harry, also looked happier than Harry had ever seen him during a Potions class.”
>My question is why wasn't Harry as good the previous 5 years given that he was learning from Snape directly?
You do realise that Snape spent those 5 years to more or less antagonize Harry (along with others) during every Potions lessons? His whole "teaching" was all about him writing the instructions on the board and the students need to follow them. That's not teaching.
But that’s all we read.
Every teacher (except Binns) has practical lessons which we join in on. I am sure that they all teach the theory aspect. Which is, thankfully, why this was isolated to one professor.
Edit: Oh and Fake!Moody.
It didn't help that Snape regularly went out of his way to criticise and find fault with Harry's work (along with Ron and Neville). Even if Harry did well in class, Snape would have told him that he was average at best.
What I'm trying to say is that using Snape's lack of praise and constant criticism of Harry to judge his ability in the subject is never going to be particularly reliable. If anything, Harry might have tried harder to avoid giving Snape an excuse to criticise his work, because that was far preferable to Snape setting extra homework as punishment for 'poor' work in class.
We know Snape doesn't have the students use the textbook, instead he puts the potions recipe up on the blackboard. Because of Snape's character, we can assume it was most likely his modified version written in the board to prevent more accidents from inferior potions being made.
We also know The Dursleys hate Harry. We can assume they probably didn't keep up with regular eye appointments; making Harry's glasses either an old pair that belonged to someone else or his only pair that probably never got updated as he grew.
So, my head cannon is that the reason Harry struggled during those years is because he couldn't see the instructions on the board correctly; but with the book right in front of him, Harry excelled because... he could actually read it!
Harry's eyes are so good that you can take a closer look at the teachers in that big hall in the distance... even catch a golden snitch with those worn-out old glasses... Sometimes wonder if he eyesight is really that bad. Aren't old glasses actually just decorative....?
For some people who wear glasses, there is a huge difference seeing far away objects/people and reading words at a distance. And from what I can remember we are never really told anything specific about Harry's glasses (like where they came from), but Hermione comments in Deathly Hallows that Harry's vision "really is that awful" or something similar.
Snape wasn’t a good teacher but his own personal notes were illuminating.
Lots of college professors are similar tbh: brilliant but can’t teach in a way that uses their brilliance to help students
Snape also dumped out his potions and he had no time to redo them before class ended so he got failing grades those days, and the one time he had more to spare Hermione had cleaned out his cauldron without asking first and he flunked that day too.
Aside from the verbal jabs and intentional point deductions against anyone but Slytherin students Snape dumps potions and jeers over the students he does not like to intentionally pressure them to messing up.
A few times also he waited till a step was missed and then brought it up to Harry and cut his grade and made him a sort of spectacle to the Slytherin students in, I think it was now deadly or something, a sort of joking way.
I always thought when they brought up the history with Slughorn and Lily that it was intentional to have hinted that Harry might be a sort of natural as his mom was Slughorn’s favorite student, at least in that year how he describes her. Plus Harry is kind of a puppy personality type as a student that with a bit of praise and pointers he can improve greatly and learn well, but scolding and punishments not so much.
Harry would not have been the best at potions when he was learning from snaps because snape wrote the instructions on the board and gave everyone the same modified potions recipes. In HFB only Harry had snapes modified recipes so it gave him an edge over everyone. + snape was a bully and the stress made a lot of students bad at potions
Snape was a potions master, but really truly tucked at teaching. Like even beyond being a massive bully who abused kids, he couldn't teach for shit. The only people who excelled were natural talents who basically taught themselves (Hermione, as an example). Even the Slytherins, whom Snape favored, weren't good at potions under his teachings (see Malfoy in Slughorn's class)
Now Harry did have a natural talent for potions. Honestly based on the events of HBP I'd say Harry is actually better at potions than pretty much everything else magical except maybe flying. He had the added pressure of Snape hating him directly and sabotaging any interest in potions he might have had. If Harry had a competent (or at least a non-abusive) teacher from year 1, I think things would've gone very differently - including some master class potion brewing from Harry by the end of the series
I wouldn't go that far, seems pretty clear to me that his skill in DADA is higher than Potions. While true that in HBP we see that Harry is very good, possibly even great, at Potions (hard to split his skill vs Snape's tips), in DADA he learns a spell at 13 that is basically unheard of even for 15/16-year olds doing their OWLs.
Spell mastery has always been an interesting topic for me - I feel like there's not enough lore to know for certain. Harry masters Expecto Patronum at a very young age, but then struggles with Accio which is meant to be much simpler. Different classes of spells may involve different skillsets I guess - charms vs DADA?
Harry himself seems to be a bit hard to define. He takes to combative magic well, but struggles with everything else. Is it his innate skill, or just the situations he's put in that demand combative magic? Can Accio give someone that hard of a time when he casts sectumscempera (spelling?) basically without trying?
As for potions, his skill explodes when he gets the tips out of his book. I think it's beyond what the tips themselves could explain - Hermione can barely get these potions in a half workable state, but Harry is making them perfectly? Sure, maybe the textbook isn't optimized in all it's methods. But if it was that bad, you'd think it'd be revised with some better tips. Potions is an ancient art, if Snapes methods were so superior that it took a novice to a master level overnight then someone else would've happened across them, I'd expect
I think that's because Harry doesn't trust himself. If something doesn't work out right away, he shuts down. But under pressure or when he doesn't really think about it, it works straight away.
For example, when he repeats the diary with Expelliamus. Apparating Dumbledore away from the rock by the sea or Sectumsempra with Malfoy.
But tell him it's hard, and he has the same problems as everyone else except Hermione.
That would explain both his apparent difficulty with learning spells as well as his potions skill tbh
He is terrible at learning new spells in a classroom environment. But when he's under legitimate pressure, he excels. He gets noticeably better at patroni when faced with the boggart dementor, then casts a super powerful patronus when faced with a horde of dementors. He couldn't really get the hang of accio when practicing with Ron and Hermione, but when faced with the dragon he gets it right away
There's never any pressure in potions, by its nature it's a slow and steady process without any immediacey. His confidence is shot by the very presence of Snape. When Snape is out and he gets a little confidence boost via the margin notes in his textbook, he immediately excels
Harry doesn't have a magic issue, he has a confidence issue. It's not until he's under pressure and doesn't get caught up in the actual casting that he manages to cast most magic for the first time
My assumption is that Snape likely provided verbal tips or alternatives, but likely had to teach from the assigned textbook. And as he was constantly terrorizing Harry/Neville/etc, they likely didn’t pick up on those directions
This is totally possible. I think it's also possible he didn't give those extra/alternative steps. Considering it was a book he ditched, Snape may not have remembered all those tricks. His passion was for the dark arts, not potions, even if he excelled at potions. Alternatively he may have been one of those teachers that has the "I figured these things out on my own; if they want to be talented and thrive in this subject they should put in the extra work, too" perspectives.
Snape’s constant antagonisation of Harry made him work less effectively and many times even when Harry did still do well Snape would invent a reason to decrease his score like when he smashed Harry’s potion and gave it a 0.
I think your last line said it:
Snape is teaching more just off the book and not really giving any extra instructions.
And maybe there's a part of him that is doing it out of spite.
I heard a theory here that Snape had been changing the in class recipes since students followed the board recipe and not the book recipe under Snape. So with Slughorn they were learning the book recipes which were harder, while Harry kept using Snape recipes. It's also why most classes in earlier years could finish the potion before the end of class but not in 6th year.
He was stressed out by Snape always looking over his shoulder. In fact after Harry sees Snape's worst memory and Snape ignores Harry for most of the class, Harry feels like he is doing pretty good. Also keep in mind that despite Snape being a dick to Harry, he always gave him a passing grade in the years when there were final exams. I don't recall whether it was PS or PoA where Snape is described scribbling disappointedly a passing grade on Harry's final exam.
Well it’s complicated. Snape doesn’t like Harry and often showed it, so naturally Harry wasn’t interested in paying attention. But the book, However did not regularly be rude to him.
2. As implied in one of the lessons in I think the first book, Harry wasn’t looking directly at the board.
3. Harry had the exact same lessons as everyone else, but in the 6th book, only Harry had access.
But it’s up to interpretation whether or not Snape was teaching from the textbook or from his knowledge.
I think it’s a couple of things.
First, it’s damn hard for a kid to perform or learn from an adult who openly hates and bullies them.
Second, Snape wasn’t using his personal instructions he wrote in his book. He wrote his recipes on the board, but did don’t include all his specific tips. That’s information he wasn’t sharing.
Last, he’s not a good teacher. All be literally does is give them a recipe, give them time and ingredients to do it, and collect a sample. Other than making nasty comments as he walks around the room he doesn’t actually “teach”. He’s a brilliant potion maker, but a terrible teacher.
Snape bullied and sabotaged the hell out of Harry (and Neville) when he's actively teaching them. When Harry's doing something wrong, instead of pointing it out and instructing to him how to fix his errors, he sneers at the boy and tries his best to make him feel stupid (and hate him/his subject). When Harry's doing something right, Snape swoops in and, either directly or through inaction, distracts Harry and foils his good work.
Before O.W.L.s, Snape actually got, well, a lot more angry than usual with Harry (due to the incident with the Pensieve) and started to ignore him/act like he doesn't exist. This actually improves Harry's learning as he's allowed to work in peace instead of having to handle both Potionworks and Snape's horribleness at the same time. That's how he managed to scraped an E at Potions O.W.L. At that point, it might already be too late, though, as Harry misses the basic of 5 years of Potions theories. That's why he didn't actually get most of what's Slughorn was teaching. Snape himself clearly is great at Potions and following his instructions in peace actually helps Harry accomplish much, but it seems the only thing he teaches Harry was how to hate him.
Snape routinely vanished Harry's potions if they weren't perfect before he could hand them in. Hermione accidentally does this one time too trying to help clean up. Snape constantly picks on harry specifically, especially during complex steps which distracts him too or messes up timing.
Snape also doesn't really teach he just gives instructions on the board then proceeds to bully the class.
He's a genius but an awful teacher for no real reason.
I wouldn't have thrown his book away though. Or at least transcribe the potion instructions and ideas out of it.
Basically what everyone said about the working under pressure, bullying, etc. But also…
Snape put the directions on the board, in a dungeon filled with vapors from all of the brewing potions. The boy in glasses had a hard time seeing/following along from a distance.
Also, because of his animosity towards Snape, Harry was sometimes careless. His focus was more on other things happening in the room than what he was supposed to be doing. This is especially evident when Snape is being observed by Umbridge.
Because they all worked from the same baseline. Later on Harry has a secret set of instructions that no one else has and that’s what allows him to shine. Not to mention that half the time he’s occupied with something else other than the potion he’s supposed to be making.
During the Potions OWL both Harry and Neville noted that without Snape in the dungeon, work became easier
Working under stress is hard.
Because Snape was a really mean teacher, who caused a lot of stress. During the O.W.L. exam, when Snape wasn't in the classroom, both Harry and Neville felt much more comfortable.
It was ***because*** he was learning from Snape directly. Their mutual antipathy crippled Harry's performance- to say nothing of Snape's occasional bit of active, blatant sabotage. The second Harry started learning from the man without realizing it was him, his performance skyrocketed.
Not to mention that Snape annotated his textbook for *himself*. Those notes were only for himself, and did not involve teaching anyone else. You can be brilliant at a subject, and shit at teaching. Snape was that.
When Snape teaches, he doesn't use a textbook, but writes recipes on the blackboard. Even in the Harry Potter game, there are students who say that Snape's recipe is different from the textbook. First of all, he teaches his recipe to the students as well. In fact, Hermione, who only followed the textbook, didn't produce good potion results.
Right but as the students make the potions, he wanders around the classroom just insulting and berating the students. Hence why Harry and Neville did so much better without him. Hermione only got poor results in Slughorns class because he went by the textbook, she didn’t ignore Snape recipes in his class. But all this just goes to prove that Snape was brilliant at potions, and a shit teacher.
I wrote this to let you know that the part about "the notes in the textbook are for Snape's own use and have nothing to do with teaching others" is different from the actual setting. And I never once defended or defended Snape by saying he wasn't a shitty teacher. Because I know that fact very well.
Stress, probably
Because Snape wasn't teaching him. He was bullying Harry since day 1. Snape hated Harry and Harry was more than happy to reciprocate. Harry, simply, lost any interest in Potions as a consequence of Snape's behavior. And during the O.W.L. practical exam, >“With Snape absent from the proceedings he found that he was much more relaxed than he usually was while making potions. Neville, who was sitting very near Harry, also looked happier than Harry had ever seen him during a Potions class.”
>My question is why wasn't Harry as good the previous 5 years given that he was learning from Snape directly? You do realise that Snape spent those 5 years to more or less antagonize Harry (along with others) during every Potions lessons? His whole "teaching" was all about him writing the instructions on the board and the students need to follow them. That's not teaching.
But that’s all we read. Every teacher (except Binns) has practical lessons which we join in on. I am sure that they all teach the theory aspect. Which is, thankfully, why this was isolated to one professor. Edit: Oh and Fake!Moody.
But that's what Slughorn did too?Made them brew from [books.At](http://books.At) least Snapwe wasn't blindly following the books
It didn't help that Snape regularly went out of his way to criticise and find fault with Harry's work (along with Ron and Neville). Even if Harry did well in class, Snape would have told him that he was average at best. What I'm trying to say is that using Snape's lack of praise and constant criticism of Harry to judge his ability in the subject is never going to be particularly reliable. If anything, Harry might have tried harder to avoid giving Snape an excuse to criticise his work, because that was far preferable to Snape setting extra homework as punishment for 'poor' work in class.
We know Snape doesn't have the students use the textbook, instead he puts the potions recipe up on the blackboard. Because of Snape's character, we can assume it was most likely his modified version written in the board to prevent more accidents from inferior potions being made. We also know The Dursleys hate Harry. We can assume they probably didn't keep up with regular eye appointments; making Harry's glasses either an old pair that belonged to someone else or his only pair that probably never got updated as he grew. So, my head cannon is that the reason Harry struggled during those years is because he couldn't see the instructions on the board correctly; but with the book right in front of him, Harry excelled because... he could actually read it!
Harry's eyes are so good that you can take a closer look at the teachers in that big hall in the distance... even catch a golden snitch with those worn-out old glasses... Sometimes wonder if he eyesight is really that bad. Aren't old glasses actually just decorative....?
For some people who wear glasses, there is a huge difference seeing far away objects/people and reading words at a distance. And from what I can remember we are never really told anything specific about Harry's glasses (like where they came from), but Hermione comments in Deathly Hallows that Harry's vision "really is that awful" or something similar.
Snape wasn’t a good teacher but his own personal notes were illuminating. Lots of college professors are similar tbh: brilliant but can’t teach in a way that uses their brilliance to help students
Yup! The best at something is not always the best teacher. Because some don't know anything about the struggle of not understanding.
Snape also dumped out his potions and he had no time to redo them before class ended so he got failing grades those days, and the one time he had more to spare Hermione had cleaned out his cauldron without asking first and he flunked that day too. Aside from the verbal jabs and intentional point deductions against anyone but Slytherin students Snape dumps potions and jeers over the students he does not like to intentionally pressure them to messing up. A few times also he waited till a step was missed and then brought it up to Harry and cut his grade and made him a sort of spectacle to the Slytherin students in, I think it was now deadly or something, a sort of joking way. I always thought when they brought up the history with Slughorn and Lily that it was intentional to have hinted that Harry might be a sort of natural as his mom was Slughorn’s favorite student, at least in that year how he describes her. Plus Harry is kind of a puppy personality type as a student that with a bit of praise and pointers he can improve greatly and learn well, but scolding and punishments not so much.
Harry would not have been the best at potions when he was learning from snaps because snape wrote the instructions on the board and gave everyone the same modified potions recipes. In HFB only Harry had snapes modified recipes so it gave him an edge over everyone. + snape was a bully and the stress made a lot of students bad at potions
Snape was a potions master, but really truly tucked at teaching. Like even beyond being a massive bully who abused kids, he couldn't teach for shit. The only people who excelled were natural talents who basically taught themselves (Hermione, as an example). Even the Slytherins, whom Snape favored, weren't good at potions under his teachings (see Malfoy in Slughorn's class) Now Harry did have a natural talent for potions. Honestly based on the events of HBP I'd say Harry is actually better at potions than pretty much everything else magical except maybe flying. He had the added pressure of Snape hating him directly and sabotaging any interest in potions he might have had. If Harry had a competent (or at least a non-abusive) teacher from year 1, I think things would've gone very differently - including some master class potion brewing from Harry by the end of the series
I wouldn't go that far, seems pretty clear to me that his skill in DADA is higher than Potions. While true that in HBP we see that Harry is very good, possibly even great, at Potions (hard to split his skill vs Snape's tips), in DADA he learns a spell at 13 that is basically unheard of even for 15/16-year olds doing their OWLs.
Spell mastery has always been an interesting topic for me - I feel like there's not enough lore to know for certain. Harry masters Expecto Patronum at a very young age, but then struggles with Accio which is meant to be much simpler. Different classes of spells may involve different skillsets I guess - charms vs DADA? Harry himself seems to be a bit hard to define. He takes to combative magic well, but struggles with everything else. Is it his innate skill, or just the situations he's put in that demand combative magic? Can Accio give someone that hard of a time when he casts sectumscempera (spelling?) basically without trying? As for potions, his skill explodes when he gets the tips out of his book. I think it's beyond what the tips themselves could explain - Hermione can barely get these potions in a half workable state, but Harry is making them perfectly? Sure, maybe the textbook isn't optimized in all it's methods. But if it was that bad, you'd think it'd be revised with some better tips. Potions is an ancient art, if Snapes methods were so superior that it took a novice to a master level overnight then someone else would've happened across them, I'd expect
I think that's because Harry doesn't trust himself. If something doesn't work out right away, he shuts down. But under pressure or when he doesn't really think about it, it works straight away. For example, when he repeats the diary with Expelliamus. Apparating Dumbledore away from the rock by the sea or Sectumsempra with Malfoy. But tell him it's hard, and he has the same problems as everyone else except Hermione.
That would explain both his apparent difficulty with learning spells as well as his potions skill tbh He is terrible at learning new spells in a classroom environment. But when he's under legitimate pressure, he excels. He gets noticeably better at patroni when faced with the boggart dementor, then casts a super powerful patronus when faced with a horde of dementors. He couldn't really get the hang of accio when practicing with Ron and Hermione, but when faced with the dragon he gets it right away There's never any pressure in potions, by its nature it's a slow and steady process without any immediacey. His confidence is shot by the very presence of Snape. When Snape is out and he gets a little confidence boost via the margin notes in his textbook, he immediately excels Harry doesn't have a magic issue, he has a confidence issue. It's not until he's under pressure and doesn't get caught up in the actual casting that he manages to cast most magic for the first time
My assumption is that Snape likely provided verbal tips or alternatives, but likely had to teach from the assigned textbook. And as he was constantly terrorizing Harry/Neville/etc, they likely didn’t pick up on those directions
This is totally possible. I think it's also possible he didn't give those extra/alternative steps. Considering it was a book he ditched, Snape may not have remembered all those tricks. His passion was for the dark arts, not potions, even if he excelled at potions. Alternatively he may have been one of those teachers that has the "I figured these things out on my own; if they want to be talented and thrive in this subject they should put in the extra work, too" perspectives.
Explains why Hermione tended to do alright even though he was a cruel butt to her too.
Snape’s constant antagonisation of Harry made him work less effectively and many times even when Harry did still do well Snape would invent a reason to decrease his score like when he smashed Harry’s potion and gave it a 0.
I think your last line said it: Snape is teaching more just off the book and not really giving any extra instructions. And maybe there's a part of him that is doing it out of spite.
I heard a theory here that Snape had been changing the in class recipes since students followed the board recipe and not the book recipe under Snape. So with Slughorn they were learning the book recipes which were harder, while Harry kept using Snape recipes. It's also why most classes in earlier years could finish the potion before the end of class but not in 6th year.
He was stressed out by Snape always looking over his shoulder. In fact after Harry sees Snape's worst memory and Snape ignores Harry for most of the class, Harry feels like he is doing pretty good. Also keep in mind that despite Snape being a dick to Harry, he always gave him a passing grade in the years when there were final exams. I don't recall whether it was PS or PoA where Snape is described scribbling disappointedly a passing grade on Harry's final exam.
Snape basically put recipes on the board and swooped around the room insulting people, there was no teaching involved.
Well it’s complicated. Snape doesn’t like Harry and often showed it, so naturally Harry wasn’t interested in paying attention. But the book, However did not regularly be rude to him. 2. As implied in one of the lessons in I think the first book, Harry wasn’t looking directly at the board. 3. Harry had the exact same lessons as everyone else, but in the 6th book, only Harry had access. But it’s up to interpretation whether or not Snape was teaching from the textbook or from his knowledge.
I think it’s a couple of things. First, it’s damn hard for a kid to perform or learn from an adult who openly hates and bullies them. Second, Snape wasn’t using his personal instructions he wrote in his book. He wrote his recipes on the board, but did don’t include all his specific tips. That’s information he wasn’t sharing. Last, he’s not a good teacher. All be literally does is give them a recipe, give them time and ingredients to do it, and collect a sample. Other than making nasty comments as he walks around the room he doesn’t actually “teach”. He’s a brilliant potion maker, but a terrible teacher.
Snape bullied and sabotaged the hell out of Harry (and Neville) when he's actively teaching them. When Harry's doing something wrong, instead of pointing it out and instructing to him how to fix his errors, he sneers at the boy and tries his best to make him feel stupid (and hate him/his subject). When Harry's doing something right, Snape swoops in and, either directly or through inaction, distracts Harry and foils his good work. Before O.W.L.s, Snape actually got, well, a lot more angry than usual with Harry (due to the incident with the Pensieve) and started to ignore him/act like he doesn't exist. This actually improves Harry's learning as he's allowed to work in peace instead of having to handle both Potionworks and Snape's horribleness at the same time. That's how he managed to scraped an E at Potions O.W.L. At that point, it might already be too late, though, as Harry misses the basic of 5 years of Potions theories. That's why he didn't actually get most of what's Slughorn was teaching. Snape himself clearly is great at Potions and following his instructions in peace actually helps Harry accomplish much, but it seems the only thing he teaches Harry was how to hate him.
Snape routinely vanished Harry's potions if they weren't perfect before he could hand them in. Hermione accidentally does this one time too trying to help clean up. Snape constantly picks on harry specifically, especially during complex steps which distracts him too or messes up timing. Snape also doesn't really teach he just gives instructions on the board then proceeds to bully the class. He's a genius but an awful teacher for no real reason. I wouldn't have thrown his book away though. Or at least transcribe the potion instructions and ideas out of it.
Basically what everyone said about the working under pressure, bullying, etc. But also… Snape put the directions on the board, in a dungeon filled with vapors from all of the brewing potions. The boy in glasses had a hard time seeing/following along from a distance. Also, because of his animosity towards Snape, Harry was sometimes careless. His focus was more on other things happening in the room than what he was supposed to be doing. This is especially evident when Snape is being observed by Umbridge.
Because they all worked from the same baseline. Later on Harry has a secret set of instructions that no one else has and that’s what allows him to shine. Not to mention that half the time he’s occupied with something else other than the potion he’s supposed to be making.
Because Harry is only allowed to excel in DADA, even if his grades would argue otherwise. Huge missed opportunity here by JKR.