A mini-spelling bee was held to determine the students who’ll participate in the regional round of the Premier’s Spelling Bee Challenge in the coming weeks. Kids from years three, four, five and six tried their hardest to spell out words from the list with only four students able to pass through into the regional rounds.

Charlie Walsh and Mais Razize were the stage three winners to pass through into the regional round. Charlie won the spelling bee with the word "boisterous". The stage two winners were Dominic Barbara and Charlie Wellings. Dominic won with the word "appropriate"

School spelling bee coordinator Melissa Mack said students who progressed to the later rounds in stage three were asked to spell words including; reciprocal, circumstantial, prejudice, gymkhana, gelignite, sovereignty, plateau, seismograph, crustacean, pneumatic, carapace and frittata.

The regional rounds will be held in September. “Being able to visualise the word in your head and spell it out loud is a different skill to writing words correctly,” Miss Mack said. “Strategies like chunking into syllables, using morphemic and phonological  knowledge and skills is always very useful. But sometimes it comes down to two possible letter choices when spelling a particular word so, unless you know, you just have to make a guess and hope it's the correct one.”