# What word did you miss in the spelling bee? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 19, 2001, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070 "2001-02-19T09:55:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Melpomene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/0ea827/32.png) [@Melpomene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melpomene)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/21 "2001-02-19T17:20:48Z")
The school-wide spelling bee when I was in 3rd grade. I was this tiny little thing up with all the big kids. The word was ‘bacterium’. I remember so clearly, standing there and thinking _oh!oh! I know this one! It’s b-a-c-t-e-r-i-u-m_. Somehow, when I opened my mouth, what came out was “b-a-c-t-e-r-i-m”. I just _forgot_ that damned **u**!!! It just didn’t come out! I did win 3rd place and I still have the trophy. I never did participate in another spelling bee ever again. It’s too bad since I probably would have made it pretty far, maybe even to Washington D.C. Oh well. _sigh_ The dream that will never “bee”. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/22 "2001-02-19T17:22:47Z")
7th or 8th grade: Omen Why was this so tragic? 1 - I had been interested in and reading up on superstitions for a long time. 2 - My parents were in the audience. I have never lived this down. ---
**Author:** ![headshok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@headshok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/headshok)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/23 "2001-02-19T17:30:08Z")
**Nocturne** : Hey, who would have thought there would be two Nat’l Spelling Bee contestants on the boards? I was just kidding about the bitterness thing, BTW. I had a great time, too; stayed in a nice hotel, got my picture in the paper, saw the sights, the whole bit. I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything. ---
**Author:** ![Tygr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/df788c/32.png) [@Tygr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tygr)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/24 "2001-02-19T17:33:26Z")
Lillies. 5[sup]th[/sup] grade, county level. Obviously I still can’t spell it. I’ve looked it up many time over the past twenty years, usually during a middle-of-the-night, can’t-sleep, thinking-too-much-about-all-my-past-failures session. I see it in the dictionary, but later I can never remember how it’s spelled. I don’t think Ziggy Freud hisself could get me over this mental block. Actually it’s part of a bigger trauma than that. My mother came to my school-level spelling bee. She sat in the very back. I won that contest, but afterward a classmate of mine (who had always had it out for me) went to the judges saying that my mother had been mouthing the letters during the contest and that’s why I won. She admitted to me that she had been doing this, but we both knew my eyes were so bad that I couldn’t see past the end of the stage anyway. I actually didn’t even know she was there, _because I couldn’t see her!_ More to the point, the school administrators knew my eyes were bad, too, but they still made the last ten contestants do another bee. I lost that one (“independAnt”). I’m not sure, but I think my mom complained after I lost. After that we had ONE MORE contest to re-determine the winner and I did win that. So that’s how I made it to the county-wide bee. Only to lose on my very first word, “lillies”. Hmm. P’raps it’s a good thing my new job offers mental health benefits. “Yes, I think I’ll have some good self esteem, please.” ---
**Author:** ![Turpentine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecd19e/32.png) [@Turpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turpentine)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/25 "2001-02-19T17:42:54Z")
Oh, in 8th grade it was “hyssop” C’mon, “hyssop???” WTF?? In seventh grade it was “zuccini” um…zuchinni? I still haven’t learned that one, but I never eat the stuff anyway so it doesn’t matter. In fifth grade I won. I could spell discipline. ---
**Author:** ![St.Attila](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e99b99/32.png) [@St.Attila](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/St.Attila)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/26 "2001-02-19T18:09:37Z")
6th grade. I had practiced my heart out the week before the municipal level Spelling Bee with two of my friends. One was also a municipal finalist; the other an advocate of creative spelling. We used the word list from the school Spelling Bee to practice. I kept getting stuck on “campaign,” insisting on spelling it “champagne.” Don’t ask. I still don’t know why I did that. My friend dropped out of the municipal Bee earlier than I, and now it was down to me and my arch-nemesis from my former school. What word did I get? “Campaign.” And yes, I spelled it “champagne.” It was bad enough that I had to lose, but to _that_ guy? On _that_ word? Talk about humiliation. ---
**Author:** ![sorrel554](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/91b2a8/32.png) [@sorrel554](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sorrel554)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/27 "2001-02-19T18:09:54Z")
In 4th grade I went to the state spelling bee and was teased mercilessly as a result. So in 5th grade I was determined to lose on purpose (this is not one of my prouder childhood memories :D). I was going to go for a few rounds at the grade level and wait for a relatively hard word and take a dive. Before I could do that, though, I was given the word “self-addressed,” and without thinking, I said, “S-E-L-F-apostrophe-A-D…” instead of “hyphen.” In 3rd grade I misspelled “feigned” because I had had a teacher named Mrs. Fain and that was my only familiarity with that word. ---
**Author:** ![AETBOND417](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/47e85d/32.png) [@AETBOND417](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AETBOND417)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/28 "2001-02-19T18:22:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by D Marie \* > \*\*In 3rd grade I misspelled “feigned” because I had had a teacher named Mrs. Fain and that was my only familiarity with that word. \*\* Feigned in 3rd grade! That’s rough! I missed “neoplasm” in 6th. Only did the geography bee in 7th (did well). 9th grade I went to States and Nationals (BETA club, not Howard-Scripps). At States I got 2nd because I missed **“gneiss”**. Gneiss is a type of rock? WTF? Then at Nationals it was 10 times easier, but I only got 4th. I missed **chicanery** , as well as two more. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/29 "2001-02-19T18:32:16Z")
Dichotomus was my stumbling block (just kidding). > [@](#): > > _LazarusLong42 wrote:_ > 8th grade: argillaceous > As to the latter word, well–hell, I don’t even know that I’ve spelled it right here, and I’m not going to look it up to find out what the hell it meant. I know you don’t care and maybe don’t even really want to know but given the magic of the WWW (Merriam Webster Online): Main Entry: ar·gil·la·ceous Pronunciation: "är-j&-'lA-sh&s Function: adjective Date: circa 1731 : of, relating to, or containing clay or clay minerals ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/30 "2001-02-19T18:34:23Z")
My school district didn’t participate in any kind of formal spelling competitions beyond the classroom. That said, I won both years (fourth and fifth grade). I don’t remember the fourth grade word, but the fifth grade word was “conscience”, followed by “typewriter”. Robin ---
**Author:** ![KJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b2d939/32.png) [@KJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KJ)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/31 "2001-02-19T18:38:43Z")
I actually won the school-wide spelling bee in 5th or 6th grade, and went on to do the district-wide spelling bee (which I lost. I still probably don’t know how to spell half those words.) But in the 2nd grade spelling bee, I got one of those bitter memories that stick with you for the rest of your life. The word was “great.” Nobody in the class could spell it, they all (including me) thought it was “grate.” Every single person in the class got it wrong, and had to sit down. So the teacher said “Okay, everybody stand up again, we’ll do it again.” Again, everybody (including me) got it wrong. But about halfway through, when half of the people were out, the teacher said “This is ridiculous, I’ll just tell you; it’s spelled ‘grate.’ Next word.” The only thing is, half of the class (including me) was still out! And the other half - who had ALSO spelled it wrong (some even worse than me) - were still in! I was so pissed off! But somehow, being in 2nd grade, it didn’t occur to me to speak up (or maybe I did, and got hushed, I don’t remember.) Why should those @$\*@#@s still be in, when they had also spelled the word wrong!? AAAGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!! Looking back, it is kind of a minor annoyance, but I got so pissed off that I had unfairly lost the spelling bee. Argh. I was probably the gratest speller in the class, too. ---
**Author:** ![Nacho4Sara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Nacho4Sara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nacho4Sara)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/32 "2001-02-19T18:39:41Z")
Sixth grade, city-wide spelling bee. Condescend. I knew how to spell it, I really did, but I got up there and was so nervous I spelled “coincide.” It was humiliating. What about geography bees? I won the school-wide bee and got sent to city finals. I arrived there and realized that the goddamn maps were backward! Like, Europe and Asia were where North America should be. I was disqualified on my first question - I couldn’t find Africa, much less _Guam_. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/33 "2001-02-19T18:52:39Z")
Pomaceous. I spelled it “pomacious”. It means “relating to apples” or something like that. Effluent. I spelled it “efluent.” I’m still kicking myself about this one. I almost spelled it right, but then decided at the last minute that a word with double consonants would be too easy at this stage (??). I knew every single word of the contest after that one. Grr. ---
**Author:** ![Gazoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ce73a5/32.png) [@Gazoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gazoo)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/34 "2001-02-19T18:59:38Z")
**KJ** , I feel your pain. Here is my _only_ spelling bee experience – First Grade Spelling Bee, just our class. My very first turn comes up. The teacher says, “you.” “You?” I ask, thinking she couldn’t possibly give me a word this freakin’ easy. “Incorrect,” she says, thinking I was starting to spell it beginning with the _letter_ U. I’ve carried this around for a long time, it eats at me. I have to get it off my chest – You Y-O-U You Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![sulawesi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbe5ce/32.png) [@sulawesi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sulawesi)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/35 "2001-02-19T19:16:42Z")
I was in the county spelling bee in 4th and 6th grade. I also did an unofficial one in 2nd. Anyway, in 2nd, I misspelled dense as “dence”. Because it rhymed with fence and I had no idea what it meant. In fourth, it was adamant I misspelled, as “atoment”. I guess I thought it had something to do with atoms. :rolleyes: And in sixth, I honestly have no idea what I misspelled, except that the word before was hibachi and mine was many times harder. ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/36 "2001-02-19T19:19:06Z")
**Cranky** - me too – 3rd in the county bee. My word was “hearsay” and without thinking I spelled “heresay”. Combined hearsay and heresy, maybe? My oldest son made it to the city bee in Seattle, and lost on “vicissitudes.” I think it’s kinda weird how we remember this. For me, it’s been more than 40 years. ---
**Author:** ![Winnowill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/4491bb/32.png) [@Winnowill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winnowill)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/37 "2001-02-19T19:50:11Z")
In 6th grade: Lilac. I KNEW it was spelled L-I-L-A-C, dammit. So what did I say? “L-I-L-A-K…C!” Tried to cover my mistake, but it was too late. And, of course, it gave the correct spelling to the next guy, an 8th grader, who won on the next word. Showing that I had the bridesmaid gift in spelling bees, the very next year, I was again one of two remaining contestants. My word? PACHYDERM (I will never forget how to spell it.) I missed it. Other guy got it. His final word for the win? Feline. C’mon. And what happened the year I actually won the school-wide Bee? A blizzard wiped out the city-wide, and it wasn’t rescheduled. I do firmly believe that there is a gene for spelling ability. I have it. My husband does not. Either you can spell, or you can’t. But someone who can spell is usually able to spell most words, even if they’ve never been seen or heard before. Julie ---
**Author:** ![iampunha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/74df32/32.png) [@iampunha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iampunha)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/38 "2001-02-19T20:16:21Z")
Along with IJGrieve, I’ll try your quiz, smug. 1.anoint 2.coolly 3.supercede 4.irresistible 5.development 6.alright / all right (both are words, IIRC. The difference is in the meaning) 7.separate 8.tyranny 9.harrass 10.desiccate 11.indispensable 12.receive 13.pursue 14.recommend 15.desperate 16.liquify 17.seize 18.cemetary 19.subpoena 20.definitely 21.occasion 22.concensus 23.inadvertent 24.miniscule 25.judgment 26.inoculate 27.drunkenness 28.occurence 29.dissipate 30.weird 31.alot / a lot (different words, different meanings. A lot is a phrase, you just have to be careful how you use it). 32.accommodate 33.embarrassment 34.ecstasy 35.repetition 36.battalion 37.despair 38.irritable 39.accidentally 40.liaison 41.memento 42.broccoli 43.millennium 44.yield 45.existence 46.independent 47.sacreligious 48.insistent 49.exceed 50.priviledge MSWord lists, in some cases, both words as being spelled correctly. 😕 Oh, and I went out on autumn back in grade school. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/39 "2001-02-19T20:18:11Z")
In 5th grade or so, I was the last man, er, girl, standing but missed “etymology”. Had never heard of it before. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2001, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070/40 "2001-02-19T21:27:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jadailey \* > I do firmly believe that there is a gene for spelling ability. I have it. My husband does not. Either you can spell, or you can’t. But someone who can spell is usually able to spell most words, even if they’ve never been seen or heard before. I have often suspected this myself. Working among my fellow engineers is sometimes maddening (the “spelling” gene is rarely found in conjunction with the “engineer” gene). I have never participated in any kind of “official” spelling bee; in fact, I’ve only competed in _one_ classroom bee. AFAIK, we never had a town or parish bee back home–not that I would have been likely to enter (I’m not fond of undergoing tests in front of an audience). As for that one classroom bee in 4th grade…I didn’t miss anything. It seemed to annoy my teacher, because she wouldn’t let me sit down–after a few rounds, only I was left standing (the word I won on was “delicatessen”). She made me stand there for the rest of the hour, spelling steadily more obscure words. FWIW, the last word before the bell rang was “empyreal”; she had resorted to her unabridged dictionary by that point. She had a hard time coming up with a sentence for it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-word-did-you-miss-in-the-spelling-bee/55070.md?page=3)