Spelling Being (Guest Post by cian saywer)
A couple of months ago, a very reluctant participant in the school spelling bee – my daughter Lauryn – went on stage and spelled for 26 rounds. After about eight rounds, it was between her and one other person. Every time she stepped up to the microphone and the word was given to her – despite my original nonchalance – I became a little bit more shaky, my heart beat a tiny bit faster, and my breath was held a bit more deeply.
As words that weren’t anywhere near the grade two or grade three list began to enter into the arena I would tell myself that this was it. That it was all good. And it didn’t matter one bit that she was never going to be able to spell ‘dreadful’ or ‘easily’ (which it truly did not).
As words that weren’t anywhere near the grade two or grade three list began to enter into the arena I would tell myself that this was it. That it was all good. And it didn’t matter one bit that she was never going to be able to spell ‘dreadful’ or ‘easily’ (which it truly did not).They spelled cautiously, confidently, valiantly back and forth, and back and forth until he mis-spelled his word (which made me feel sad) and she correctly spelled two words in a row for the win. Even typing that makes me wince a little because, faced with the prospect of my children being entered into the mandatory grade level spelling bee, I had a quiet unease about the whole thing. I couldn’