In this modern age, many of our youngsters and oldsters alike use all sorts of electronic gadgets – computers, cell phones, you name it – to express themselves via the written (or at least keyboarded or “texted”) word. Particularly in the case of rapid-fire texting and email, the spelling skills of these communicators are sometimes suspect.
But not so at the old-fashioned spelling bee, as we saw this week during the 84th Scripps National Spelling Bee in Oxon Hill, Md.
Thirteen young finalists, narrowed down from thousands of competitors from across our country, were in the showdown.
Do you “old-timers” recall, from your now seemingly ancient school days, when all the kids in a class – maybe 30 – were lined up around the room for a spelling bee?
The teacher would call out a hard word. If a bright student spelled it correctly, he or she continued to stand. But if a child misspelled a word, the unfortunate student had to sit down.