Tag Archives: Akeelah and the Bee

Scripps National Spelling Bee

After having recently watched “Akeelah and the Bee,” I thought it would be fun for us to watch the finals of the 2008 Scripps National Spelling Bee. It’s just started, and there are 12 really awkward-looking adolescent finalists on stage.

Chloe is already frustrated, because after 30 seconds, there’s already a commercial. Actually, it’s the introductory credits.

If nothing else, I hope these little kids will inspire her. And I hope the show isn’t going to put us to sleep. Chloe’s clapping – a good sign. She’s not sure she’s interested in aspriring to the summit of spelling bees – the first finalist just got the dreaded bell for misspelling “tralatitious.” Which means passed along or handed down.

Uh oh – another commercial. Chloe’s calm this time, however. I think she’s a bit intrigued. But now she’s trying negotiate popcorn. And staying up until 9. She’s a tough one, my little Chloe. The problem with this spelling bee thing is that it would require one of us to coach her. I love to read. But reading dictionaries just doesn’t do it for me.

The smallest kid in the bunch just spelled “cryptarithm” (a cipher). And spelled it correctly without hesitation. Impressive. How about “hemeralopia” (a defect of vision)? The 13-year old just got that one right. Or “basenji” (a type of dog)? So far, no more kids have fallen for word traps. Maybe “empyrean” will do the next finalist in. Nothing doing. These kids are scary.

I think I’ll start reading the dictionary to Chloe tomorrow. We’ll start with the middle of the alphabet to keep it interesting and unpredicable.

Spelling Bee

Chloe has her first-ever spelling bee on Friday. She’s supposed to study the spelling words she’s accumulated in class over the last few months, and we started our preparations this evening. She spelled word after word after word. And in a tribute to the movie “Akeelah and the Bee,” which we watched together a couple of weeks ago, we stuck to the most difficult words from her lists.

But she was more interested in singing the spelling than actually spelling the words correctly. So she spent most of her time misspelling and then respelling. But she had fun, and I did a good job of maintaining a calm demeanor (the spelling coaching does get kind of boring after a few minutes, but I will admit to enjoying that more than some of her arts & crafts projects).

In the meantime, we’re making good progress with Matilda by Roald Dahl. We haven’t laughed out loud as much as we did the first time, but we’re enjoying it a whole lot. The downside is that Matilda’s precocious reading hasn’t really inspired Chloe to read much on her own, but that will come with time. I just know it will.