Spelling. It can be easy, it can be difficult and it can be frustrating. School spelling bee winners gathered at the district spelling bee at Emery High to experience all these emotions as they battled for the chance to go to the regional spelling bee to be held at Grand County High School this year on March 8.
The winner of the regional spelling bee will go to Washington DC to participate at the National Spelling Bee the end of May.
To qualify for the district spelling bee you must place in the top three in your school. All the local elementary schools as well as the junior highs sent representatives. Emery High principal Larry Davis was the pronouncer for the event with Gwen Callahan and Jared Black acting as judges.
Davis called each student up to the microphone to spell their last names in the practice round. Each round consists of one word spelled for each contestant. The words come from the Scrips word list and the Webster dictionary. Davis explained the rules for the contest. Some words sound the same and are spelled differently. The speller can ask for a word to be repeated, they can ask for an alternate pronunciation, word origin and which part of speech the word is. They can also ask for the word to be used in a sentence. The spelling bee was taped in case there was any questions about how a word was spelled or pronounced. Once a speller begins a word, if he is to stop, then he must proceed and spell the word in the same order he started.
If a word is capitalized then the speller must say capital and then begin to spell the word. After the end of each round any speller who spelled their word incorrectly took their seat in the audience.
Round one began with words like writhe, desolate, testimony, abominable, delicacy, medallion, engineer, intellectual, onus, unchangeable, establishment, capillary, bombastic, zoology, speculate, misinterpret, ultramarine, adorned, despicable, supremacy, impromptu. After the first round four spellers took their seats.
The spelling bee ended after six rounds and Laicee Kenner from Cleveland Elementary was crowned the top speller of the day. Second place went to Huntington Elementary student Madisyn Alton and Ridge Nielson from Canyon View Junior came in third. Kenner spelled the word pestilence as her winning word.
Participants in the district spelling bee included: Savannah Williams from Book Cliff Elementary; Ethan Anderson, Parker Sermon and Zachary Jorgensen from Castle Dale Elementary; Tiana Jensen, Lainee Jensen and Laicee Kenner from Cleveland Elementary; Jimmy Behling, Cayden Fox and Kayla Winn from Ferron Elementary; Madisyn Alton, Allen Durrant and Dylan O’Connor from Huntington Elementary; Shem Guymon and Ridge Nielson from Canyon View Junior High; Kyson Stilson, Danyale Service and Thomas Sawyer from Cottonwood Elementary; Jacob Powell and Kaitlyn Gilson from San Rafael Junior High; Tyrell Shumway and Dakota Wetherington from Green River High.
County students spell it out for a top spot
"Winners include: Ridge Nielson, third place-Canyon View, Madisyn Alton, second place-Huntington Elementary, and first place winner Laicee Kenner from Cleveland Elementary,front with trophies; other participants include: Savannah Williams from Book Cliff Elementary; Ethan Anderson, Parker Sermon and Zachary Jorgensen from Castle Dale Elementary; Tiana Jensen and Lainee Jensen from Cleveland Elementary; Jimmy Behling, Cayden Fox and Kayla Winn from Ferron Elementary; Allen Durrant and Dylan O'Connor from Huntington Elementary; Shem Guymon from Canyon View Junior High; Kyson Stilson, Danyale Service and Thomas Sawyer from Cottonwood Elementary; Jacob Powell and Kaitlyn Gilson from San Rafael Junior High; Tyrell Shumway and Dakota Wetherington from Green River High."