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OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — Fifteen months ago, Dev Shah spent a miserable five hours spelling outdoors in chilly, windy, damp conditions at a supersize regional competition in Orlando, Florida, only to fall short of his dream of returning to the Scripps National Spelling Bee. “Despondent is the right word,” Dev said. “I just didn’t know if I wanted to keep continuing.” Look at him now. Soft-spoken but brimming with confidence, Dev asked precise questions about obscure Greek roots, rushed through his second-to-last word and rolled to the National Spelling Bee title Thursday night. Dev, a 14-year-old from Largo, Florida,...

The eight co-champions of the 2019 Scripps National Spelling Bee, from left, Shruthika Padhy, 13, of Cherry Hill, N.J., Erin Howard, 14, of Huntsville, Ala., Rishik Gandhasri, 13, of San Jose, Calif., Christopher Serrao, 13, of Whitehouse Station, N.J., Saketh Sundar, 13, of Clarksville, Md., Sohum Sukhatankar, 13, of Dallas, Texas, Rohan Raja, 13, of Irving, Texas, and Abhijay Kodali, 12, of Flower Mound, Texas, hold the trophy at the end of the competition in Oxon Hill, Md., Friday, May 31, 2019. OXON HILL, Md. — The Latest on the National Spelling Bee (all times local): 12:07 p.m. Eight spellers...

(CNN) Bondieuserie. Bewusstseinslage. Ayacahuite. Most of us wouldn't even know how to pronounce those words, let alone spell them. The Scripps National Spelling Bee is a week away and it is sure to be filled with a plethora of problematic words. An international team of linguists from the language-learning app Babbel partnered with Merriam-Webster to analyze a decade's worth of words and find out what knocked out Bee contestants in the final round. Bondieuserie [bohn-dyooz-ree]: banal and often shoddy religious art (almost all religious art) Zenaida [zen-eye-da]: any bird of a genus of tropical American pigeons (know of some Mexican...

OXON HILL, Md. – The end of the biggest Scripps National Spelling Bee in history came abruptly, and it wasn't the conclusion that many expected. Naysa Modi, a poised and charismatic four-time participant whose long spelling career seemed to be building toward triumph, sat next to a newcomer whom she had already beaten this year — at the county level. But 12-year-old Naysa blinked immediately, mixing up the single and double "s'' in the German-derived word "Bewusstseinslage" — a state of consciousness or a feeling devoid of sensory components — and 14-year-old Karthik Nemmani seized an opportunity that he wouldn't...

“I just focused on my word and tried to spell it right,” she said. The 12-year-old spelled “marocain,” which is a dress fabric that is made with a warp of silk or rayon and a filling of other yarns. “It’s a like a dream come true. I am so happy right now,” she said. She rocked side-to-side, without completing a smile that began and went away, until her dad rushed to hug her. As the rest of her family joined her, the new champ finally let her happiness show. ... The winner receives a $40,000 grand prize and plenty of...

CNN does the impossible and finds a way to smear President Trump during their interview with National Spelling Bee champion Ananya Vinay. Far left cranks Alisyn Camerota and Chris Cuomo ask the champion to spell “covfefe” in an on-air test. Alisyn Camerota: So Ananya, we have a challenge for you. We’d like you to spell a word. It has recently become popular. We’re not sure if you’re familiar with it or know the definition. Do you know the word, ‘covfefe?’… Definition is a nonsense word made up by the 45th President of the United States.

The winning words in the nail-biter final were 'scherenschnitte' and 'nunatak' In a dramatic, flawless final round, two eighth-graders proved to be joint winners at the 2015 Scripps National Spelling Bee. One a girl and one a boy, one from Kansas and one from Missouri, one a five-time finalist and one a six-timer, 13-year-old Vanya Shivashankar and 14-year-old Gokul Venkatachalam put both their hands on the trophy and thrust it into the air on Thursday evening—after spelling word after word that few people could even hope to pronounce correctly. Shivashankar’s winning word was scherenschnitte, meaning the art of cutting paper...

... On television, the bee plays out as pure meritocracy. You spell the word correctly, you move on in the competition. No quibbling about home-field advantage, no refs making questionable calls. In this context, Indian Americans have been perfect winners, affirming the perception of them as model minorities. They are quiet politically, loud academically—characteristics ostensibly emanating from Asian cultural values. They are perceived as geeks, not only in the pejorative sense, but also as studious kids who represent the American ideal. Every time an Indian American wins, one more angel of America gets its wings. Meritocracy and the existence of...

For the first time in 52 years, the Scripps National Spelling Bee crowned two winners last night, after the final two competitors exhausted the word list. The winners were Sriram Hathwar, an eighth-grader from Painted Post, N.Y., and Ansun Sujoe, a seventh-grader from Fort Worth, Texas."I like sharing the victory with someone else," Ansun said. "It's been quite shocking and quite interesting, too. It's very rare."Here are the words that brought Thursday night's competition to a close, from the Scripps Spelling Bee site (we're including the definitions just in case you've forgotten them): "Sriram's championship word was 'stichomythia,' which means...

On a brightly lit stage, in front of a crowd in a dark, quiet theater, Matthew Prus prayed to God for help. In round 18 of the 2014 Regional Spelling Bee, the competition had come down to Matthew, a sixth-grade home-schooler, and Audrey Frische, a fifth-grade student at Allen Elementary in Soddy-Daisy. Audrey, the younger sister of 2012 and 2013 champion Nicole Frische, had just misspelled "hartebeest," a type of grassland antelope from Africa, spelling it with a "D" instead of a "T." If Matthew could spell the next two words correctly, he'd walk away the winner. First word: tokamak,...

The annual ritual known as the Scripps National Spelling Bee came and went last week with kids spelling words that, I suspect, many with graduate degrees couldn't spell. The winner was Arvind Mahankali, a 13-year-old eighth-grader from Bayside Hills, N.Y. Mahankali is the first boy to win the title since 2008. There is a lesson to be learned from the success of these young people, including the ones who came close to winning but didn't. It is the value of persistence. Mahankali won this year by spelling the German word "knaidel." He lost the bee three times before and was...

The 12-year-old who can spell better than spelling bee judges! Little girl eliminated after judges couldn't get 'braille' rightW-R-O-N-G A young girl with an affinity for spelling was erroneously eliminated from a spelling bee in Selma, California after she allegedly misspelled the word 'braille.' According to KMPH, Sierra Shoemaker, 12, provided the correct spelling for the word, but the judges had the word spelled with one 'L' and sent her packing with a second-place finish  'I didn't really want to say anything because when the word master tells you [that you] spelled a word wrong you don't really want to argue with...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A 6-year-old U.S. girl will become the youngest contestant ever in the Scripps National Spelling Bee after winning a regional competition in Virginia. Lori Anne Madison, of Woodbridge, Virginia, won the Prince William County spelling contest earlier this month, beating out 21 top elementary and middle school competitors. Her winning word: "vaquero," a word of Spanish origin meaning cowboy. "My parents quiz me. I read lists and I have a really good memory," Madison, who is home-schooled, told Fox's WTTG-TV, a Washington-area station. Madison was believed to be the youngest competitor ever, the Cincinnati-based National Spelling Bee...

This is a wonderful and uplifting story posted by Pat Dollard at his site! A most welcome change from all the bad news out there. The look on the girl's face when she sees her dad is priceless.

A spelling bee at a Boca Raton elementary school was actually a ruse for 9-year-old Skylar Johnson. Skylar's father, Staff Sgt. Therron Johnson, had been on tour in Iraq since last Christmas. But Friday, he was waiting to surprise her during the spelling bee. While Skylar was on stage spelling the word "Sergeant," the principal asked if she knows any sergeants. As soon as Skyler answered, "my dad," Staff Sgt. Johnson made his entrance. Skylar is completely stunned and in tears at the sight of her father, a man she hasn't seen in eight months. Unfortunately, Johnson is only home...

The stumble came in the word zulo, which means "hideout" in English, for San Antonio's sole contestant in the first-ever National Spanish Spelling Bee. Linda Duann Rodriguez, about to start her freshman year at East Central High School, confused the letter "z" with the letter "s" in the competition at the National Hispanic Cultural Center on Saturday morning. After the judges told her "incorrecto," she exited the stage as the third student disqualified and watched as the finalists continued competing. ...After two hours, Evelyn Juárez, a seventh-grader from Carlos F. Vigil Middle School of Santa Cruz, N.M., emerged victorious after...

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. -- In the end 14-year-old Sukanya Roy of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., with her penchants for writing invisible words on her palm, emerged the victor of the late night showdown at the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Her word: cymotrichous, meaning having the hair wavy. "It's just amazing. It's hard to fine the words," said Sukanya, who has spent the last three days working her way through an impressively complicated set of words with origins from around the globe. One by one, other Bee hopefuls were ultimately defeated by such polysyllabic tongue-twisters as sciamachy, a word that means fighting with...

What began as an exercise to help college students in Wisconsin master the Hmong language is now an annual test of suspense and nerves in St. Paul. "It's taken on a life of its own," said Tzianeng Vang, founder of the Minnesota Hmong Spelling Bee. Now in its fourth year, the bee is set for Saturday at Concordia University in St. Paul. Students from nine schools in the Twin Cities -- the most since the bee began -- will compete for a traveling plaque and bragging rights. Most important, the bee gives them practice pronouncing Hmong words, something many first-...

Shantanu Srivatsa and Anamika Veeramani sat nervously, side by side on stage. Once again, an Indian-American was going to win the Scripps National Spelling Bee. It was just a matter of what word and what time on Friday. Shantanu, 13, an eighth-grader from West Fargo, N.D., stepped to the microphone first and couldn't spell "ochidore." Anamika — showing the cool demeanor she kept throughout — kept her hands behind her back and rattled off the correct letters for the medical term "stromuhr." She didn't crack a smile until the trophy was presented. "It was too surreal," she said. "It was...

The Scripps National Spelling Bee highlights what a mess the English spelling is – a hodgepodge of orthographies borrowed from German, French, Greek, and Latin. Is it time for a makeover? The Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw is said to have joked that the word "fish" could legitimately be spelled "ghoti," by using the "gh" sound from "enough," the "o" sound from "women," and the "ti" sound from "action." Shaw was probably not the originator of this joke, but he was one of a long line of people who thought that the English language's anarchic spelling, a hodgepodge of Germanic,...