Spelling Champs to Compete in National Bee

AP via Yahoo! ^ | Wednesday, June 1, 2005 | PAULINE JELINEK

[Momaw Nadon]

WASHINGTON - Seventh-grader Tyler Curtis says he's never had to worry much about doing well at his studies, and he's not about to start now.

That's saying something. Tyler is facing 272 of the country's best young spellers — and the biggest prize ever — at the 78th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee running Wednesday and Thursday.

"It would be nice to win," the 13-year-old from Camden, Tenn., said Tuesday. "But I'm not going to get all stressed out over it."

His competitors include 145 boys and 127 girls aged 9 to 14, mostly from around the country and U.S. territories. There are more than a dozen foreign students from as close as Canada and as far away as New Zealand.

All contestants take a written test early Wednesday, then face oral quizzing from a list of some 950 specially chosen words.

Each speller wins at least $50, and the first-place winner gets $28,000 in cash, scholarships and bonds, plus a set of encyclopedias and other books from Encyclopedia Britannica. That's some $10,000 more than in previous years because of the addition of a cash award and a scholarship for 2005.

The contest is administered by E.W. Scripps Co., and the youngsters have all won local contests sponsored by Scripps papers or other individual newspapers. It was started in 1925 by the Louisville Courier-Journal with nine contestants and was suspended only during the World War II years of 1943-1945.

Over the years, the contest has produced its share of joy, queasy stomachs and tears. But if contestants were nervous ahead of the competition, they weren't admitting it Tuesday.

"If I don't make it this year, I'll try again next year," said 13-year-old Erica Little of Freeport, Ill.

"I came here for the fun," said Little, who made the trip a family vacation and was touring Washington with her parents and grandparents, her 10-year-old brother, Blake, and friend Molly Neary.

Since arriving in the capital over the weekend, contestants have had a full schedule of non-spelling activities — a pizza party and board game festival one day and picnic the next.

"Just coming to Washington was the goal," said 12-year-old Theodore Yuan of Lincolnshire, Ill.

The seventh-grader said he was a bad speller until fifth grade, then surprised his parents by winning the first time he entered his school's spelling bee.

___

On the Net:

Scripps National Spelling Bee:
http://www.spellingbee.com/

[Momaw Nadon]

FYI and discussion

GO HOMESCHOOLERS!!!

[Momaw Nadon]

Ping!

[StarCMC]

The Thampy family is from around here. I wonder if they have a contestant this year. They do so well at spelling AND geography. Pretty amazing.

[politicket]

17 of the 34 homeschoolers at the National Spelling Bee have advanced to Round #3. My son didn't quite make it, but gave it a whirl. We're going to cheer on the remaining homeschoolers towards hopeful victory.

[gobucks]

mega bump. Think, mineral springs, NC...

[Cagey]

According to a rscheearch taem at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Such a cdonition is arppoiately cllaed Typoglycemia.

Amzanig huh? Yaeh and yuo awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt.

[ShadowDancer]

You are duly enrolled.

[Momaw Nadon]

17 of the 34 homeschoolers at the National Spelling Bee have advanced to Round #3.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think 13 of the 34 homeschoolers have advanced to Round #5.

These are the remaining homeschoolers:

1. Brown, Laura

5. Horton, Jonathan

7. Foster, Levi

11. O'Dorney, Evan

45. Olson, Kimberly

59. Shepherd, Joseph

126. Brazeal, Forrest

133. Smith, Hannah

142. Ausick, Jack

172. Winchester, Marshall

238. Patel, Samir

253. Peacock, Cari

263. Nieman, Claire

Round 5 begins at 10:00 a.m. (EDT) on June 2 (Live on ESPN)

[politicket]

I'm not sure if Patel Samir is homeschooled or not, so I'm not counting him in the total.

I count 12 kids out of the remaining 51 (or just under 25%). Keep praying for a victory for the homeschoolers!

[hsmomx3]

At least he made it. Tell him we are proud of him!!!!!!!!!!!

[politicket]

At least he made it. Tell him we are proud of him!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you! We're having a great time in Washington and we hope to cheer on a homeschooler to victory tomorrow. The big contest seems to be between the homeschoolers and the kids with Indian ancestry. These two groups represent around 45% of the children left standing.

All of the children here (homeschool, public, private, etc.) are a lot of fun to visit with and provide great hope for America's future!

[octobersky]

According to this blog, Patel is homeschooled. I suspected that the "Patel Achievement Academy" might be another name for his homeschool. At any rate, it certainly is a euonym (winning word, 1997)!

[Momaw Nadon]

Placemarker.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I've been wondering about your son. Congratulations on his accomplishment.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

A grade school principal once told me it is not important for children to learn to spell because we have spell checkers and it's not important that they know how to do math because we have calculators.

He also thinks events such as spelling bees are wrong because there will have to be losers and it will be harmful to the losers self esteem.

I suggested all sporting events end in a tie and he claimed sporting events are different.

[politicket]

Patel is homeschooled. I suspected that the "Patel Achievement Academy" might be another name for his homeschool. At any rate, it certainly is a euonym (winning word, 1997)!

Thanks for the link! That means we still have 13 homeschoolers active instead of 12. Woohoo! We're going to head down to the ballroom in a short while and cheer them on!

[Momaw Nadon]

Does anyone know if there will be a live webcast of the Spelling Bee?

[politicket]

There will be no live webcast, but the Bee updates their site pretty regularly at http://www.spellingbee.com.

Also, there will be live television coverage on ESPN beginning at 10:00 a.m. EST.

[Momaw Nadon]

Start of Round #5.