Scotch College

The Ozspell Odyssey

Ozspell, a new national spelling competition, provided vocabulary extension and a spelling challenge within the curriculum for Year 7 and 8 during Term 1. Following an inclass spelling activity to determine a class champion, a lunchtime spelling bee, following the Ozspell format, led to three boys representing Scotch at the Boroondarrah District Final. Congratulations to Tim Powell from Year 7, Matthew Ng and Angus Wong from Year 8, who represented Scotch on the day. Angus Wong continued to the next stage of the competition and picks up the account at this point….

After winning the Ozspell spelling competition within Scotch, I already felt that I had achieved something great. I continued to the District Final at Ivanhoe Grammar School. Winning that was a big surprise to me considering the quality of the field.

The National Championship in Sydney during the holidays was the final stage of the competition. Just going to Sydney was exciting for me.

After two days of tough spelling I managed to win through to the championship finals. This was the first time that I have ever been in a competition of such proportion and I enjoyed every minute of it. The nerves while I waited for my word and the pressure from the crowd awaiting my spelling, made it harder and more exciting. I reached the last 15 out of 161 district champions with words like obsequious, neologism and odyssey. I finally stumbled on the word magnanimity.

I was extremely proud of making it to the top fifteen and the little bonus of $300 was great. The first ever Ozspell competition was a success and I was part of it. Last of all I would like to thank everyone for their support especially my family and the teachers at Scotch.

Angus Wong 8A