A how to primer for Spelling Bee and Vocabulary for India

By Sandip K. Dasverma

Spelling Bee and Vocabulary contest run by North South Foundation in USA is now more than a decade old but “Indian Spelling Bee Competition started by K. P. Das memorial spelling Bee and Vocabulary Trust is only 3 years old and this year will be third year of it’s running. It was initially started Sandip K. Dasverma under banner of Diocese of North India, Cuttack. From the inception it is assisted technically by the North South Foundation, Chicago, and it still is done that way. But the conducting of the test successfully the Cuttack team has developed their own do’s and don’ts.
Both the problems and issues are different in Orissa/India, and are as follows:
1. Unlike North America the Indian program have to be school based and not based on volunteers among the parent-teachers and civil society..
2. Unlike America the participant number is high once the kids are motivated.
3. Transport is both expensive and a big hindrance for a separation of even 15 miles distance.
4. Indian English and American English are different both in spelling and pronunciation.
5. In India people are accustomed to get things free so a Rs. 10 entry fee can be questioned.
6. The numbers of participants are usually high because unlike America (only Indo-Americans), everyone is eligible to participate.

I will now describe the process how it is done which is the main question:
1. We sent in a letter to every school we targeted giving a date by which to send the name of the willing participants with a Rs. 15 fee / student.
2. Except a few schools which were under control of the diocese we had to pursue the school English teachers or the Head Master.
3. About 6 English medium schools (3 from Cuttack and 3 from Bhubaneswar) and 3 Oriya medium schools sent in about 500 applications.
4. The preliminary word lists(1000 words each for Spelling BEE and 1000 for Vocabulary) both of which was received from North South Foundation, were checked for variation in spelling, retyped, Xeroxed and sent to each student, as the preliminary word list. This is a very expensive proposition.
5. There was a shortage of good pronouncers and even English teachers did not have good pronunciations. Luckily we had couple of top class English pronouncers in Prof Gopa Das, Nita Das, Farley North, Mr. Stanley Wright, Mariamma Jachak among the teachers of New Stewart School, who took filled in creditably.
6. They conducted some demo competitions in various new schools, where it was not done in 2003. Now it is done through a demo VCD, from this year on wards.
7. We could use a few of parents as judges, who essentially were score keepers. However such practice increased the credibility of the team as they went back to other parents and testified about the fairness of the competition. It worked out to our advantage – we strictly forbade the parents or their friends not being in the room of their wards.8. Each kid was given 3 random words in the beginning, a list of 20 words dictated to them to write and then 3 random words to spell. The cut off for the spelling Bee was decided after both the Cuttack and Bhubaneswar competitions so roughly 20% was invited to the finals. All the score sheets signed by all of the a judge, the Chief judge and pronouncers were preserved – just in case. The 2nd bunch of the 3 words were from out side the list given. Again these words were obtained from the NSF data base and was kept under wraps by the Prof. Gopa Das who shared the list only at the last moment. She had made the necessary correction and duplication of the list.
9. In the finals 78 kids were invited for spelling Bee and some 52 for Vocabulary. They included at least one person from each participating school so they can carry the flavor of the final to their fellow students.
10. In the final same 26 word format – 3 plus 3 given at the beginning and the end by random picking and 20 words were dictated to all students.
11. In the final there were two ties which were eliminated by a tie breaker for which additional words not in the list was used.
12. In the final there were two stages for both. There was a semifinal after which the numbers were reduced to 30 in each category.
13. It was seen that the students came prepared for the finals.
14. Awards amounting to Rs. 22 thousand given away. Rs. 3000 for 1st prize, Rs. 2000 for 2nd prize and Rs.1000 for the third prize in each of Vocabulary and Spelling Bee. Five consolation prizes of Rs. 500 each was given in each category.