I am not a spelling bee champ...

...well, I guess I technically was one of the fifth grade representatives in our school wide spelling bee, and I got past round one.  Then I totally bit it in round two (which ended up being the final round).

I wonder if that school really emphasized spelling...I remember getting a list every week or so.

But, I LOVE watching spelling bees.  I love words, though as writer I am often incompetent in putting them together and using them correctly, much less spelling them with accuracy.  Every year I would watch the spelling bee on ESPN and have a great time.  So when I read in the paper a few months back that the spelling bee would be on a Friday night, I was SUPER excited.

It would be on ABC network, which was alright.  In fact, I thought better because then the whole country could see how cool the spelling bee is.

I was wrong.

One might think that ESPN would play up the "sports" aspect of it all -- the back story, the rivaliries, etc.  When I would watch the spelling bee back in the day (I just realized the other day that ten years ago for me was 18 :|  I am getting old...), there was not that element at ALL -- it was all words, all the time.  No interviews, no backstory, just spellers.

But I guess the documentary Spell Bound changed all of that.  I you have yet to see Spell Bound, go out now and watch it.  It is the funniest and most heart-warming documentary you will see.  

As a junior high/middle school teacher, I often can be quite cynical about my profession, giving every event an eye roll and a scoff.  The Masses, the assemblies, the flippin' talent show - I  give it all the best laugh I can when I am organizing it all.  But, my heart goes pitter patter when watching kids doing the events -- my collegues say the best part of the talent show is watching me direct and smile during the performances (I will have to watch that next year...).  I am the same way during the spelling bee -- I totally root for the kids and feel for them when they miss a word.  I am so invested in them.

I guess I love them.  

Whatever.  It doesn't mean I let them get away with anything.

The disappointing thing about the ABC network spelling bee was HOW MUCH PRESSURE THEY PUT ON THESE KIDS!!!  No joke: one of the interviwers said to a girl "You are the favorite  to win tonight...".

I screamed at the tv - hello!  Pressure much!  Of course that girl did not win, and no doubt because she was nervous that she was the "favorite" to win that night.

And how the heck do people determine who is the "favorite"?  Seriously, THEY ARE JUNIOR HIGH KIDS - leave them alone! 

 The back story element was cool because you got to see some of the kids being kids.  The unfortune part is that it is difficult to predict who will be a winner or in the final round (ahem!  ABC...), so they only showed the back story of a quarter of the kids who made it to the final rounds.

I usally like to play along at home, and I was used to the ESPN format where they do not show the word till it is spelled.   No such luck on ABC - they flippin' show the word first off!  No fair - so I took to covering the screen with a notepad I use to write down food network receipes.

I spelled three words correctly: aurelian, boulangere, escapeche

The rest, yeh...

Here is the notepad - pathetic. I took high school Latin, college Ancient Greek and French, grew up speaking Spanish, have sung enough in German and Russian to get by, and am fairly good at guessing.   I even read Nietzche (and will never do it again).  But I could only spell three words. Granted, these words were HARD!  The hubby was excited when tautological made it in the bee because we are always reading tautological statements made by my students. For example, when I ask them to explain why they would choose the mean to represent a set of data, they write things like "I would choose the mean because it is the average". 

*sigh*

But to ask one of my students to spell Nietzschean in front of the whole country - I think we would both cry.

I will say this:   I totally rooted for the kid who won!  Sameer Mishra!

What a cutie!  He was really funny too - his word was numnah and he looked at the announcer and said "what?"

HAAAAA!!!

But as soon as he was given the origin (Hindi) and definition (horse blanket) he was good to go. There is a youtube video of his reaction, but I have difficulties with videos and even uploading photos, so google it.

And I was so glad to see such a variety of kids up there - different parts of the country and back grounds.  I love how multi-cultural America is.  And I love spelling bees.  So there you go.

But NEVER ABC network - PLEASE!!!