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Spelling Bee contests (using words we can't pronounce)...


WhoRUSupposed2Be

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Has anyone ever watched the Spelling Bee Championship on ESPN?

Alot of times when I see these words, I try placing them into sentences that we use in everyday life.

Why doesn't the child ever get pass if they are off by one letter in these words that they have no familiarity with?

I had no idea that this word even existed...Maecenas which means cultural benefactor: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-spelling-bee30-2009may30,0,7886315.story

Second place went to the only finalist yet to become a teenager. Twelve-year-old Tim Ruiter of Centreville, Va., matched Kavya word-for-word until he misspelled "Maecenas," which means a cultural benefactor.

Question? Is there is hyphen inserted between Miss and Spelled when in conjunction?

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Some of you might remember me ranting about how useless the spelling bee was in the Thoughts thread. Most of the words used in the bee are words that are barely used in real-life situations today.

I do believe spelling is an important part of society, and there are often common spelling errors most people trip up on (just read some of the spelling that goes on in the forums). But contests forcing kids to spell words they'll never see again is silly.

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Some of you might remember me ranting about how useless the spelling bee was in the Thoughts thread. Most of the words used in the bee are words that are barely used in real-life situations today.

I do believe spelling is an important part of society, and there are often common spelling errors most people trip up on (just read some of the spelling that goes on in the forums). But contests forcing kids to spell words they'll never see again is silly.

They grow up to be the spelling police on ES :silly:

That's their purpose.

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Some of you might remember me ranting about how useless the spelling bee was in the Thoughts thread. Most of the words used in the bee are words that are barely used in real-life situations today.

I do believe spelling is an important part of society, and there are often common spelling errors most people trip up on (just read some of the spelling that goes on in the forums). But contests forcing kids to spell words they'll never see again is silly.

But, are these words even used among society today?!

I'm of the thought process that alot of these words are just assimilated for one's sake.

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I find the spelling bees fascinating. Many of the words these kids haven't seen, but because they know the root of the word, what part of the world it comes from, it's meaning ... they can figure it out. It's not just rote memorization. It's understanding culture, patterns and logic through competition.

Honestly, I don't see how participating in something like this is any less useful for a kid then playing a sport. Is throwing a ball in a hoop used in society today? :)

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I find the spelling bees fascinating. Many of the words these kids haven't seen, but because they know the root of the word, what part of the world it comes from, it's meaning ... they can figure it out. It's not just rote memorization. It's understanding culture, patterns and logic through competition.

Honestly, I don't see how participating in something like this is any less useful for a kid then playing a sport. Is throwing a ball in a hoop used in society today? :)

I am more inclined to say it increases their brain logic functions and further advances their learning curves.

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I agree that the kids in the spelling bee learn useful skills about language, but it's also based on knowledge of culture, geography and history. The last two kids that went out were for words that they just didn't know rather than couldn't derive.

Menhir (an upright standing stone often found in northwest France) knocked out the third person - I knew this one from reading the French comic The Adventures of Asterix!

And Maecenas was a famous patron of the arts and advisor to one of the emperors, so that could have been known too.

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I agree that the kids in the spelling bee learn useful skills about language, but it's also based on knowledge of culture, geography and history. The last two kids that went out were for words that they just didn't know rather than couldn't derive.

Menhir (an upright standing stone often found in northwest France) knocked out the third person - I knew this one from reading the French comic The Adventures of Asterix!

And Maecenas was a famous patron of the arts and advisor to one of the emperors, so that could have been known too.

Oh, so Maecenas was actually a person?

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