When three fifth-graders attended a Harry Potter reading group with me, we performed a perspective exercise around the topic of the new Nimbus 2001 brooms that Lucius Malfoy buys for the Slytherin Quidditch team.

The kids read aloud from p111 of the Scholastic paperback edition of Chamber of Secrets:

“But I booked the field!” said Wood, positively spitting with rage. “I booked it!”

“Ah,” said Flint. “But I’ve got a specially signed note here from Professor Snape. ‘I, Professor S. Snape, give the Slytherin team permission to practice today on the Quidditch field owing to the need to train their new Seeker.’”

“You’ve got a new Seeker?” said Wood, distracted. “Where?”

And from behind the six large figures before them came a seventh, smaller boy, smirking all over his pale, pointed face. It was Draco Malfoy.

“Aren’t you Lucius Malfoy’s son?” said Fred, looking at Malfoy with dislike.

“Funny you should mention Draco’s father,” said Flint as the whole Slytherin team smiled still more broadly. “Let me show you the generous gift he’s made to the Slytherin team.”

All seven of them held out their broomsticks. Seven highly polished, brand-new handles and seven sets of fine gold lettering spelling the words Nimbus Two Thousand and One gleamed under the Gryffindors’ noses in the early morning sun.

“Very latest model. Only came out last month,” said Flint carelessly, flicking a speck of dust from the end of his own. “I believe it outstrips the old Two Thousand series by a considerable amount.”

I asked them why they thought Snape did that.  Thoughtful Dude guessed because Slytherins are arrogant; the Art Master wondered if Lucius Malfoy had bribed Snape with the free brooms in exchange for putting Draco on the team, and then worried about what it would do to Draco’s self-confidence to think his father bought Draco’s way onto the team even though Draco is a good enough athlete.

I had them discuss Draco’s personality.  The new Seeker and the bought brooms:  why?  Did he buy his way onto the team?  Or could there be an alternate explanation for all the brooms?

Why is Draco only becoming a Seeker now instead of first year, like Harry?

HP/SS p152 “He’s just the build for a Seeker, too,” said Wood, now walking around Harry and staring at him. “Light — speedy — we’ll have to get him a decent broom, Professor — a Nimbus Two Thousand or a Cleansweep Seven, I’d say.”

“I shall speak to Professor Dumbledore and see if we can’t bend the first-year rule. Heaven knows, we need a better team than last year. Flattened in that last match by Slytherin, I couldn’t look Severus Snape in the face for weeks. . . “

• Where do people get their brooms from for Quidditch?
• Who paid for Harry’s broom?
• Read aloud how the House Cup was announced at the end of Sorcerer’s Stone.

HP/SS p306 “Someone standing outside the Great Hall might well have thought some sort of explosion had taken place, so loud was the noise that erupted from the Gryffindor table. Harry, Ron, and Hermione stood up to yell and cheer as Neville, white with shock, disappeared under a pile of people hugging him. He had never won so much as a point for Gryffindor before. Harry, still cheering, nudged Ron in the ribs and pointed at Malfoy, who couldn’t have looked more stunned and horrified if he’d just had the Body-Bind Curse put on him.

“Which means,” Dumbledore called over the storm of applause, for even Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were celebrating the downfall of Slytherin, “we need a little change of decoration.”

He clapped his hands. In an instant, the green hangings became scarlet and the silver became gold; the huge Slytherin serpent vanished and a towering Gryffindor lion took its place. Snape was shaking Professor McGonagall’s hand, with a horrible, forced smile.

Then I had them recall the passage from Sorcerer’s Stone where Oliver Wood says they’ll have to get Harry a new broom.  I asked them who paid for Harry’s Nimbus Two Thousand and had them read the line from the supply list specifying that first-years are not allowed their own brooms. 

Then one kid said, “Harry is rich!  He could have paid for his own broom!”

Yes.  But they didn’t make him, did they.

“McGonagall shouldn’t have asked to change the rule.  That’s…that’s cheating!”

Well, she had the right to ask, but it was Dumbledore’s choice to say yes.

I had them recall the change from Slytherin to Gryffindor for the House Cup.

Then I asked them why they thought Slytherin had put so much emphasis on winning the House Cup for six years in a row. 

They originally thought it was because Slytherins were ambitious.

I asked how the rest of the school viewed Slytherins, especially after Slytherin was the house most associated with Voldemort.  Everyone disliked them, the kids agreed, but those who had been Death Eaters deserved that.

I asked, but what about an innocent first-year Slytherin who had nothing to do with that?  Would they still have to deal with the same atmosphere?

I could see them thinking.

I said this was something I hadn’t thought about until I had kids, but…  What if you were a Slytherin parent with a ten-year-old, almost eleven, who was about to go to Hogwarts?  This struck a chord, since the fifth graders were 10, turning 11.  What if you were pretty sure your kid would get sorted into Slytherin and you were worried, scared, that your kid would get treated badly through no fault of their own?  Who would you talk to?

The headmaster, they said.

How do you think the Slytherin parents would feel after speaking to the headmaster?  Would they feel reassured?

[pause]  Noooo.  Because Dumbledore shows favoritism.  You’re not supposed to, but he favors Gryffindor.

So, who do you think the parents would talk to that could make them feel better?

All three kids gasped at once and said, “Snape.”

A six-year streak of winning the House Cup.  Snape was between 25 and 30 years old at the time.