What I Learned

I remember my ELA teacher announcing the class spelling bee, and being so excited. I was so eager to participate and win, and I did! My winning word was 'cliques'. I felt pretty proud of myself, but I needed to go beyond that. Fast forward a couple weeks and it was time for my school spelling bee, which I also won on 'kaleidoscope'. I ran onto the bus and texted my mom and we celebrated that night. A few more weeks in and it's regional spelling bee time, I was terrified. I have really bad social anxiety, and it proved to be my downfall.

How I Lost My Spelling Bee

I had won my class Spelling Bee, with a tie between me and a classmate. I took the school spelling bee and came out 3rd place, while my classmate who tied with me got 1st and went to regionals. I cried so much that day. The thing is, the judge of our Spelling Bee didn't really pronounce the words correctly, for example, "fulcrum" he said "fulfrum" and in my case, "extricates" he said it singular, "extricate" I asked to repeat the word and he said the same thing. So I assumed it's singular, not plural. That's how multiple people got out. For his pronunciation error.

Study Resources

Study Resources

We want our national finalists to be as prepared as possible for the national competition in National Harbor, Maryland. Merriam-Webster Unabridged is the official dictionary of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, and every word from the competition will come from this source. All national finalists receive free access to a one-year subscription to Merriam-Webster Unabridged Online.

Sponsor Portal - Education Series

Welcome to the Scripps National Spelling Bee's Local Sponsor Education Series! 

Each of the lessons within this series includes a video from a member of the Bee team with information about a certain topic involving the administration of your local area spelling bee program and a section within the Local Sponsor Education Series workbook. Once you have finished all four lessons, you can complete a short multiple-choice quiz to test your understanding of the material.

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