Pelham labors to win 36-round spelling bee
The finals of the Hickory Creek Elementary fifth-grade spelling bee turned out to be a M-A-R-A-T-H-O-N.
In a 36-round battle that lasted nearly half an hour, Dillon Pelham emerged victorious when he correctly spelled the word ‘inferno.’ He edged out Colton Fincher who made the mistake of putting an ‘e’ on the end of ‘walrus.’
Pelham attributes his success to daily work.
‘I would study my words every night,’ said Dillon, referring to a list of common spelling bee words. ‘I would go over every word at least twice.’
Dillon’s studying paid off as he made it past some tricky words such as ‘ballerina’ and ‘awkward.’ Then he managed to win when a bit of luck came his way.
On round 35, Dillon misspelled the word ‘cosmos,’ which gave Colton a shot at victory. Colton would have been the winner if he correctly spelled ‘glitz,’ however he put an ‘s’ on the end instead of a ‘z.’
With both competitors missing their word, Dillon was called back and that’s when he won in the very next round.
In other grade-level action, Samantha McLain won a much shorter fourth-grade spelling bee by correctly spelling ‘tornado.’ Dylan Madison was the third-grade winner with ‘scared.’
School spelling bees are finishing up in preparation for the countywide spelling bee next Thursday, Dec. 6 at West Elementary. One overall winner will advance to regional competition on the campus of UT-Knoxville.
The countywide spelling bee will work as follows. Each of the grade-level winners from each school will compete against each other to determine a winner for that grade. For example, fourth-grade finalists from Morrison, Eastside, Dibrell, etc., will battle to determine one countywide fourth-grade winner.
Spelling bees for fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth grades will take place simultaneously at West in separate classrooms. The five winners will then advance to the gym to compete for the right to represent Warren County in Knoxville.
The Standard is sponsoring the countywide spelling bee and providing trophies and prize money to the winners. The countywide winner will receive $100 and a trophy. The five grade-level winners will receive $25 and a trophy.