Your word is /ôr?THä?r?f?/

For better than ten, perhaps fifteen years I was the pronouncer at our regional Scripps Howard Spelling Bee. I have mentioned spelling bees and my experiences with them in about a dozen previous posts over the last ten years.

The subject of the last half of John Ramos’s Reader Column this week concerns an unhappy experience his son suffered during the bee held at their school. His concerns ended up in my District email inbox last week and I sent Mr. Ramos a reply that attempted to put things in perspective and console him. From the conclusion of his column I gather I was not the only school board member to reply to his complaints.

As for the title of this post – I was attempting to find a synonym for the world “spelling.” I didn’t really find one. Neither would my headline space permit me to post the word I copied from the Internet, demonstrating its proper pronunciation. It couldn’t recognize the symbols for getting the pronunciation right. Golly, I can do something better than my blog software. I love those upside down e’s.

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