Susannah made it through the first round by spelling wanton. The very first word of that round was ballerina and the second word was giraffe, so I was thinking she'd have a good chance of making it through. Susannah was number 143 out of 154 and the words got progressively harder as the round went on, it seemed, so I got a little nervous about what her word would be. But she got one she could spell, thankfully.
Second round she wasn't so lucky. The 'pronouncer' said apartheid like apart-ate, which is one way to say it. In my head, I urged Susannah to ask for any alternative pronunciations, but she didn't. I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have spelled it right either way, but she was frustrated because she didn't 'hear' it right.
There were tons of 'foreign' words in the second round; that surprised me. I had fun trying to spell the words and even learned a couple of new ones today. What made me happiest, besides being so proud of Susannah, was knowing that Susannah had a great time even though she didn't make it past the second round. And, Susannah is motivated to learn more spelling 'tricks' and to try to get to the state bee next year too.
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