Literary Society of North Okanagan 13th Annual Spelling Bee

On October 12, 2022, members from each of CFUW Vernon and Men’s Shed joined forces to field a team at the Literacy Society of the North Okanagan’s 13th annual spelling bee.  By participating we became part of the group (including sponsors) that raised $18,000 for the Literacy Society’s Outreach program.   This amount is to be matched through BC’s
Raise-a-Reader campaign.  

We, the Bold’n Agers of CFUW Vernon, were appreciative of having the Hammer Heads from the Men’s Shed  (www.mensshedvernon.ca ) as part of our team. Other team names included the likes of Word Nerds (Nixon Wenger), Newsbees (Vernon Morning Star), Eggheads (Okanagan College), and Highway to Spell (Valley First Credit Union).   

At the end of the basic 3 rounds totaling 15 words, our combined team of Bold’n Agers/Hammer Heads didn’t do too shabbily, coming in tied at second (12 of 15 words correctly spelled) with 3 other teams.  There had to be a tie-breaker round as the Okanagan College Eggheads and Queen Beez came in at 13 correctly spelled words each.  Congratulations to the ultimate winner, the Okanagan College Eggheads. 

We were given only 45 seconds per word, although we were given the additional information of the word’s part of speech, origin and definition.  We also had the word used in a sentence.  All of this was very nice but not particularly helpful to our team.  Ah well …

Here are the word lists, for your reading and spelling pleasure!

PRACTICE ROUND:

  • gobbledygook;

  • Caribbean;

  • Chihuahua;

ROUND 1

  • bayonet;

  • diarrhea;

  • exorbitant;

  • hallelujah;

  • liquefy;

ROUND 2

  • anemone;

  • boutonniere;

  • Fahrenheit;

  • pinochle;

  • souvenir;

ROUND 3

  • ennui;

  • camaraderie;

  • architecture;

  • ptomaine;

  • wildebeest;

TIEBREAKER

  • sepulchre;

  • bougainvilea; and

  • tchotchke.

© CFUW Vernon 2023