KEVIN LAZENBY OF OPELIKA, ALABAMA, COME ON DOWN! For the second straight year, this remarkably talented young man leads off Round Two of the Scripps National Spelling Bee any moment now.
There are two preliminary rounds today in which all 278 spellers will face the microphone, Dr. Jacques Bailly, and the cameras of ESPN3 online (in both "play along" and more aggressively chyroned versions). Spellers receive 3 points for each word spelled correctly today; add that number to yesterday's written round score, and the top up-to-50 spellers advance to the semifinals tomorrow.
You can follow along in a few places (in addition to here): the Bee website, and a few places on Twitter worth noting: @ScrippsBee, @APBenNuckols and hashtag #SpellingBee.
9:30 am: Sorry it's taken me awhile to get started (work!), but Round Two is up and running, with 120/125 of the spellers doing just fine on their first words.
9:55 am: Halftime! 130/138 get their +3s so far, and I fear this isn't the first time someone spelled "SAIG-way" like the vehicle and not the transition. For those keeping track of words of Hebrew/Yiddish origin, just one so far: DRAY-duhl, and only a few foodie words: ay-OH-lee, ESS-CAHR-go, joo-lee-ENN, mahtz-uh-RELL-uh, and zoo-KEE-nee among them.
10:37 am: 175/188 correct thus far, and America gets a new Words With Friends word: quonk.
10:49 am: A flih-buhr-tee-JIHB-uht! 191/207 correct so far, with lee-AZE and blah-ZAY being the last two errors.
11:05 am: muh-RAWD. Why not use the Tribe Called Quest definition? "Seven times out of ten, we listen to our music at night. The word 'maraud' means to loot. In this case, we maraud for ears."
11:12 am: Dude. reh-puh-RAY-shuns did not require that many lifelines from Dr. Jacques. And now it's back to foodie words: hahl-uhn-DAYZ, followed by yah-kih-TORE-ee.
11:46 am: Round two is complete, with 253/278 spelling correctly. Round 3 starts at 1:15 pm EDT.
I'm not seeing anything on the Scripps site under "Results". Is that the right place?
ReplyDeleteJust as I post that, up it comes.
ReplyDeleteGAH! My work's Inetrnet provider doesn't support ESPN3. Looks like I'm depending on you guys today. Thanks again for doing this!
ReplyDeleteI deliberately misspelled "Internet" in honor of this day. No, really.
ReplyDeleteA question: many of the words, especially in the later rounds, are not in any way "native" English words, and would not be considered English words by anyone but Bee people and perhaps the most inclusive dictionary editors. What are the criteria for determining a word is English enough to be included in the Bee?
ReplyDeleteIf it's in Webster's Third (and not a proper name, and a few other criteria), it's fair game.
ReplyDelete+5 for the flux capacitor joke on "solder"
ReplyDelete"Quonk" is a real thing now?<span> </span>
ReplyDeleteI was unaware that it was even a fake thing.
ReplyDeleteI think I just developed a strong rooting interest for Nejat Alkadir.
ReplyDeleteI've never heard a kid sound as scared as Nejat just sounded on "fenestrated." Or maybe she just has a high-pitched voice.
ReplyDeleteAnd Sunny Levine's "Howdy, Dr. Bailly" earns her a space on the watch list.
Jinx.<span> </span>
ReplyDeleteBut she nailed the word - might just be being on stage for the first time.
ReplyDeleteThat's too bad for Veto on blase -- I was expecting big things after the knuckle cracking.
ReplyDeleteGabbai! Oy.
ReplyDeleteNot a word to fluster five-timer Nick Rushlow. Did they use it in a sentence? "I can't believe the gabbai screwed up the order of aliyahs at my daughter's bat mitzvah!"
ReplyDeleteRUSHLOW!
ReplyDeleteI liked 205.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, now that we're into PA spellers, HUGE work-town rooting interest in Chester's Reena Benny, who nailed ignominious.
ReplyDeleteLisa, do you want a login? I can provide.
ReplyDelete"Gnathonic" was on the Championship Word List in 2003 - and missed in the same way, by Evelyn Blacklock.
ReplyDeleteI think we're out of Blacklocks, aren't we? Seven Blacklock siblings made it to the Bee, but I think only Evelyn made a serious run at winning.
Seven? Wow, I don't think I realized there were so many. Has it been that long?
ReplyDeleteI thought there were seven. Further research shows a "mere" five. I think now they made seven total appearances.
ReplyDeleteStill, a lot.
Does anyone have a facial hair count yet?
ReplyDeleteDoes the speller named Yad count within the Hebrew word mentions?
ReplyDeleteWell, on the one hand....
ReplyDeleteKayla just blitzed through seh-ruhn-DIP-uh-tee like she's late for another event.
ReplyDeleteThe clapping-while-spelling was a nice touch.
ReplyDeleteYou'd have to count every speller whose name could be a Hebrew word. I wonder how many Beths have been in the Bee.
ReplyDeleteIchabod is from a Hebrew word? Who knew? ( <span>אִי כָבוֹד</span>, says wikipedia)
ReplyDeleteI am waiting for the 6 year old then I gotta turn this off.
Dig on and/or shout out to NPR in the cicada sentence. Amusing. We'll hear that on Wait Wait this weekend if they're on the ball.
ReplyDeleteI keep thinking these kids are 8 and then looking at the roster and they're 11 or 13.
On deck NOW: 6-y.o. Lori Anne Madison.
ReplyDeleteLori Anne is adorable. And in 2nd grade? And self-possessed. Also, she spelled dirigible right.
ReplyDeleteNailed it.
ReplyDeleteSam Estep doesn't really need to think about tahini this much, does he?
ReplyDeleteAnd Lori-Anne done fine on dirigible.
So, changes from last year, they are very specific on "I don't know if you're saying it right, I can tell you that we don't hear any mistakes, but that's not to say you're not making any mistakes in saying it, just that we're not perceiving any, and so you're possibly saying it wrong, and may be saying it right, and we can't say for certain but we think so on the 'saying it right'. Possibly. Also, please read this 50 paragraph document about how we are not responsible when we answer the question of whether you are saying it correctly and initial each paragraph. Then please say it again towards the judges."
ReplyDeleteSomething musta happened there.
Love these posts. I can't watch it live, so if anyone wants to post any sentences, that would be lagniappe.
ReplyDeleteGladly! Do you need an e-mail? If so, lisadotklischatverizondotnet.
ReplyDeleteDon't like this. (For the not watching: an extra speller. Samantha Steele of ESPN. Haw haw! Gets a hard word, makes it all silly. I can't believe there's only two pronunciations! Spelling is so crazy! I am so amusing! Calls up Lori Anne, who doesn't need this, imho. Lori Anne says she's never heard of the word (slobberhannes, apparently a real word), by saying "I think it's a joke" - she's handling this better than I would. She's under enough pressure, leave her alone.)
ReplyDeleteAnd we resume at 3:15, or they regather then and we resume later?
And hooray for Lori Anne! The six-year-old spells dirigible correctly.
ReplyDeleteThey had a teaser of her on the news yesterday, which my son called me in to hear. He said "you'd think she'd have a bigger vocabulary since she's a speller," and I said that's what's so great - she talks like a six-year-old (with exceptions, certainly), rather than peppering her conversation with big words. Not that I think most spellers do that (in fact, it seems that most of them don't), but she's such a prodigy that my son expected it. I liked that what she said was something any six-year-old might've said (something like 'I don't know why it's a big deal that I'm six' and 'it feels like it's a dream'). I really get the sense from the interviews with her (keeping in mind what Adam said earlier about the interviews just giving us a tiny picture and not leading to us knowing all about the kids) that she's a very very smart kid who is pretty down-to-earth, who loves language and wants to learn all about it the way some young kids want to learn all about Pokemon.
Yay! She's just a few towns over from me.
ReplyDeleteThey resume at 1:15 (spellers 1-138) and 3:15 (139-278). And the Steele bit was painful.
ReplyDeleteDrat - one breakfast meeting and I miss the entire round. Thanks for the recap, all.
ReplyDeleteThe kids were even making fun of it - can't remember who but one kid asked "am I saying it almost 100% perfectly?" because Dr. B kept saying "I can't tell you whether you're saying it 100% perfectly" (or similar)
ReplyDeleteOh, and one last question - what's the deal on speller #278 being out of order?
ReplyDeleteWhat was the sentence?
ReplyDeleteYeah, I really don't like calling in the spellers for cute bits during the rounds. Let them do whatever they like to do during the Bee (focus, relax, practice, whatever) and don't mess with them.
ReplyDeleteIt was gratuitous, a sentence that ended with a list of three sounds, including as the last two "the chuckling of NPR listeners, and the chirping of cicadas"
ReplyDeleteI'm not watching (grrr) and that guy is from my hometown. What was the sentence?
ReplyDeleteProbably a protest, since that sponsor has two spellers, and 278 is a repeater. Here's the local writeup from that bee: http://articles.boston.com/2012-03-24/metro/31234034_1_scripps-national-spelling-bee-first-several-rounds-words
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of the time in 2007 that I was on stage, in my chair, and that random [apparently famous] ESPN reporter guy came and sat down next to me and started grilling me about what I thought of the round.
ReplyDeleteAnd in my head, I was like, "go away. I don't want to talk to you right now."
But of course, I had to politely smile and answer his questions.
Interviewing spellers at the end of the day? Sure. Mid-round? It's distracting, not to mention cruel [they're kids!] The spelling bee is every bit as stressful as a major athletic competition. Can you imagine an ESPN-covered football game where after every change of possession they stopped the game to pull random players off the field and interview them? Uh, no. Half the time they barely get the coaches to agree to give anything more than the standard "ball control slash focus slash generic adjustments" coming out of halftime. Seriously, give the kids a break.
Something along the lines of "'And now I will solder the circuit board onto my flux capacitor,' Gregory joked, to the uncomprending stares of the students in his eighth-grade shop class."
ReplyDeleteI can't be the only one that loved Trevor Paulsen's shirt. But they never would've let us get away with that when I was spelling.
ReplyDelete[If you missed it: https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/35512_417510724955201_1426939834_n.jpg ]
They were doing it during the primetime rounds last year. It was awful.
ReplyDeleteWords I have never heard of (less common at this stage of the competition, though there will be lots of them once we get to later rounds) include the following: kudize (to praise, back-formed from kudos, but unless they said that, I would've probably gone with c); coffle (a group of animals, prisoners or slaves chained together in a line); gymnure (any of a species of hedgehog-like mammals with a long muzzle with a protruding snout - I like that they're also known as moonrats); ullage (the amount by which a container falls short of being full - good word); kyoodle (to make loud useless noises -- I could've used that word when the kiddo was young!).
ReplyDeleteSlobberhannes is a card game of the Hearts family. A Hoyle I read said that the game's lack of widespread popularity is due probably to its name.
ReplyDeleteMost spelling bee words really don't fit into everyday conversation.
ReplyDeleteI could use a login as well -- the website is refusing to cooperate with me. Giving me an error message even though I know I'm using the right login. =/
ReplyDelete[ SamirPatelNLC at gmail]
ReplyDeleteWell, except for the food words, which are pretty much all I say in regular conversation anyway... ;-)
ReplyDeleteUllage is an amazing word which will now be added to my regular vocabulary, confounding all of my friends. Thanks, Scripps!
ReplyDelete"Maraud" was used at my local bee. (Wisconsin) during the first off list round. The person before me got it and at first I didn't recognize it. Then after she got a sentence, I realized it was like the Marauders Map in Harry Potter. Then I got syndicate. :P There is really an element of luck in spelling bees.
ReplyDelete