French Spelling Bee

Students in year 7 had an exciting French day out last July 5th 2016, taking part in a Spelling Bee competition in French at a national level. We had two competitors – Mia Nunes and Morgan James-Eyers- as well as 3 supporters – Chloe Hobbs, Lilly Attanoos and Thomas Das Simpson.

We had an early start as we were picked up in Barry by a coach at 7.15 am. We were the first school candidates in the Cardiff area to be picked up which ended up making the whole journey was quite long. We traversed the little winding roads of the Welsh valleys towards Aberystwyth which was quite a challenge for our stomachs, but a lovely sight to behold the picturesque Welsh landscape nevertheless!
We arrived at the Medrus Conference Centre, in Aberystwyth at about 11am and students had their lunch straight away as
the event started at 12 noon. Due to the numbers of pupils competing in the French round, we had preliminary rounds before the final.  The first preliminary was from 1-2 pm.  Only the top 4 winners (from each of the 3 competing rooms) were to proceed to the next preliminary round.  The second preliminary was from 2:10-3 pm.  The top four winners from this round went through to the final round.  In each of the rounds the contestant was given only one minute to translate and spell as many words as possible. This seemed a very tall order! Mia and Morgan gave it their best shot, but did not make it through to the final. We were very proud of them though as it was quite a daunting task in the first place, bu in front of a large audience it was even more challenging!
As  we had to wait for the final round, we decided to take a breath of fresh air and explore the surrounding area. We went round the beautiful University campus and by the Library. We had a photo shoot on the hills looking over the city and ended up greeting sheep in neighbouring fields.
It was 4 pm: time for the final! The top candidates sounded like machine guns as they hastily translated and spelt lists of words thrown at them randomly by the computer. Quite an experience!
Then 5 pm came; time to head back home through the same winding roads. We were all a bit tired by then, but all felt that even though we had won no award to take home, it had been a really worthwhile day out.

Posted: 12th September 2016