A Californian eighth grader (age 13) won the 78th annual National Scripps Spelling Bee in Washington, correctly spelling "appoggiatura," meaning "an embellishing musical note." Unfortunately, one of our area contestants lost with the word "retiary," meaning "of or like nets or netmaking." Another local kid lost on the word "acarophobia," meaning "fear of mites, small insects or worms."

Because I occasionally post on OEDILF, I think it interesting that 2 of those 3 words started with "a." However, people have already written limericks on both of them.

Do they have spelling bees in England?

Spelling bees aren't a tradition over here in the way that they are in the States.

The BBC borrowed the idea last year and ran a moderately successful series called Hard Spell. They have a pretty difficult spelling game at http://www.bbc.co.uk/hardspell/hardspell_game.shtml

This message has been edited. Last edited by: arnie,

Interesting site, Arnie. I find the timed spelling unnerving.