tbh the most unrealistic thing in harry potter is when mrs weasley in the first book asks “now what’s the platform number?”
like this woman has been going to that school for seven years and then dropped kids off on the same place for nearly ten like why on earth would she forget the platform number
Y’know how parents often ask their kids questions with obvious answers, not necessarily for the sake of being rhetorical, but for more the sake of having them feel important and knowledgeable? It was Ron’s first year.
Perhaps she just wanted him to feel significant, to have that excitement.
Maybe it was a running gag – she might’ve done it with all of them. The older siblings might roll their eyes and groan, ‘Mum…’, but she would tut and look at the youngest member of the pack with an expectant patience in her eyes, along with the caring, motherly love. She might even do it the next year, with Ginny. It might’ve just been a thing, to ask, ‘Now, what’s the platform number?’, just to hear her kids chorus, ‘9 and ¾, Mum!’, though not always as enthusiastically as she’d hoped.
Not criticizing, because it initially pissed me off, too, but that’s just my two cents.this is so true
Adults especially do it with younger children–colors, alphabets, stop signs, animal sounds. It is amazing to see their reactions when they finally get it. Sometimes it backfires: when my niece was three, my sister asked her what color the stop sign was and she said, “Red, mommy. How do you not know that?”
Generally, though, it’s an educational tool and a good tactic for dealing with the littles. Kids are fricking sponges and they see everything and they learn more in 5 years than the next 80. And they have grown ups saying things to them information ALL THE TIME. You would be surprised at what they actually do know! Asking what seem like ridiculously rhetorical, obvious questions is a great way to
1. teach them
2. reinforce things they are learning
3. give them a chance to show off their knowledge & build self-esteem
and that is probably what Mrs Weasley was doing.
Alternatively, she does have seven children and children destroy mommy brain cells, so the part of her brain that remembers what the fricking platform number is might just be gone.
The Archery Range 