1. An official will read rules 1 to 14 aloud before the beginning of each contest and, when the number of competitors has been reduced to two, he or she will read rules 15 to 16 unless those present agree unanimously to waive the reading of the rules.
2. The pronouncer, judge(s) and other officials will be in complete charge of the contest. Their decisions will be final in all matters, except protests. Any questions or protests about the spelling(s) of a word or the running of the contests must be referred to the officials immediately (before the beginning of the next round). NO PROTEST WILL BE ENTERTAINED AFTER THE CONTEST HAS ENDED.
3. For each contest there should be an arbiter whose duty is to hear any protest as they arise and decide on them before the contest continues. The arbiter's decision shall be final. If possible each contest should be videotaped or recorded so that any point of contention may be reviewed.
4. This competition is open to all contestants ages 6-8 (Junior) and 9-15 (Senior).
5. In competition, words may be chosen from any source deemed appropriate by Spelling Bee officials and will not be limited to any particular list.
6. Preliminary Rounds will be held in each area, using recommended wordlists, and the listed rules and regulations. Each Province may send 75 participants per category to the Provincial Finals with 20 participants per category per province advancing to the National Championship finals.
7. The competition will be oral; contestant must spell the words orally and the use of pens and/or pencils and paper will not be allowed.
8. Contestants may pronounce their words before spelling them, after spelling them, or not at all.
9. A written contest will be used at the National championship only (recommended).
10. Once a contestant has begun to spell a word, he or she may not ask for a word to be re-pronounced, defined or used in a sentence. Also, having started to spell a word, a contestant will not be given any opportunity to change letters already pronounced. A speller may retrace provided that letters and their sequence are not changed in retracing. Spellers are not required to indicate capitals, apostrophes, or other punctuation.
11. If a manual word is unclear to a contestant, he or she may ask for the word to be re-pronounced, but will not be given a definition or a sentence, unless the word is a homophone in which case the Pronouncer should give the definition without being asked. If inadvertently, no definition of a homophone is provided, then any spelling of the given word will be accepted except for a spelling, which is that of a proper name. Note: Proper name is a noun that names a person or place, for example: Lee, Mary, Maine, Wales. Note: Rule 12 is for the tiebreaker round only.
12. If a tiebreaker word is unclear to a contestant, it is the responsibility of the contestant to request that the word be re-pronounced, defined and/or used in a sentence. The Pronouncer will grant the request(s) until the officials agree that the word has been made reasonably clear to the contestant. If a word is a homophone, the Pronouncer should give the definition without being asked and a sentence if the contestant requests it. If, inadvertently, no definition of a homophone is provided, then any spelling of the given word will be accepted except for a spelling, which is that of a proper name. If a contestant requests and is given a sentence for a homophone from the tie-breaker list, even without the definition, then the speller must give the correct spelling of that word.
13. Officials may disqualify any contestant who ignores a request to start spelling his or her word within a reasonable length of time. Also, A SPELLER WHOSE SPELLING OF A WORD IS NOT AUDIBLE TO THE OFFICIALS MAY HAVE HIS OR HER SPELLING RULED INCORRECT.
14. When a speller fails to spell a word correctly, the next contestant will be given the same word to spell. If every contestant in a round misspells the same word, all contestants will remain in the competition.
15. The elimination procedure changes when the number of contestants is reduced to two. At this point, when one contestant misspells a word, the other contestant will be given the opportunity to spell the same word.
16. If the second contestant spells the word correctly, plus the next word on the pronouncer’s list, then he or she will be declared champion. If the contestant misspells the word on the pronouncer's list, then both spellers continue in the contest. If both contestants misspell the same word, then both continue in the contest.
TOP
|
1. Final consonant doubled
(a) A word ending in a single consonant preceded by a single vowel generally doubles the final consonant before a suffix beginning with a vowel, if it is a word of one syllable or if the accent falls on the final syllable of the original word: plan, planning, planned; refer, referring, referred; bid, bidding, bidden; acquit, acquitting, acquitted; commit, committing, committed.
Exceptions: avoid, avoided; benefit, benefited.
(b) When a word ends in L, the final consonant is usually doubled before a suffix: cancel, cancellation.
NOTE: Words ending in a single consonant preceded by a single vowel do not double the final consonant before a suffix beginning with a vowel if a shift of accent results from addition of the suffix: prefer, preference; transfer, transferable; confer, conference.
2. Final E
(a) Words ending in a silent E usually drop the E before a suffix beginning with a vowel; dine, dining; trouble, troubling, subdue, subduing; desire, desirable.
Exceptions: dyeing, singeing (to distinguish from dying and singing); shoeing.
(b) Words ending in silent E generally retain E before a suffix beginning with a consonant: complete, completeness; enforce, enforcement; vague, vagueness; manage, management, engage, engagement; use, useful; care, careful.
3. Final Y
(a) Words ending in Y preceded by a consonant, change Y to I before a suffix: heavy, heaviest; lively, livelihood; salary, salaried; necessary, necessarily.
(b) Words ending in Y preceded by a vowel generally retain Y before a suffix: annoy, annoyance, annoying; journey, journeyed; gay, gayest.
Exceptions: duly, truly, wholly.
4. Final C
Words ending in C with the hard sound of K — add K before I, Y or E; Picnic, picnicking; panic, panicky; traffic, trafficking; mimic, mimicked.
5. Final N
Words ending in N retain the N before the suffix — ness; Sudden, suddenness; clean, cleanness; keen, keenness.
6. Words with IE and EI
An easy way to remember the rule for IE and EI is to learn the following rhyme:
I before E
Except after C
Or when sounded like A
As in neighbour and weigh
e.g. believe, reprieve, receive.
7. Words with ABLE and IBLE
In writing the adjectival form of certain words there are no definite rules but the following guides may be helpful.
Words ending in —ation, usually take the suffix ABLE; duration, durable; adaptation, adaptable; words ending in —sion or —tion usually take the suffix IBLE; division, divisible; permission, permissible; destruction, destructible.
8. Words prefixed by DIS or MIS
When the prefix DIS or MIS is added, no change is made in the original word. A double S occurs only where the original word begins with S: disappear, misdirect, dissatisfied, disrobe, misbelieve, misspelled.
9. Plurals
(a) When a noun ends in Y preceded by a consonant, the plural is formed by changing Y to I and adding ES (to the singular): variety, varieties; monopoly, monopolies.
(b) When a noun ends in Y preceded by a vowel, the plural is formed by adding S to the singular: holiday, holidays; journey, journeys; attorney, attorneys.
(c) When a noun ends in O, the plural in most cases is formed by adding S to the singular: piano, pianos; ratio, ratios. Sometimes the plural is formed by adding ES to the singular: potato, potatoes; veto, vetoes.
(d) When a noun ends in F or FE the plural in most cases is formed by adding S to the singular: sheriff, sheriffs; plaintiff, plaintiffs; staff, staffs; safe safes. Sometimes the plural is formed by changing F or FE to V and adding ES: knife, knives; shelf, shelves.
(e) The plural is formed in some nouns by a vowel change instead of by the addition of a suffix: goose, geese; man, men; mouse, mice, foot, feet.
(f) Some words retain their original Greek or Latin plural forms.
The singular and plural forms are given here: analysis, analyses; basis, bases; Phenomenon, phenomena; parenthesis, parentheses; hypotheses, hypotheses. Certain Latin words are almost always used in the plural such as data and incunabula.
(g) Some nouns are rarely if ever used in the singular: annals, athletics, clothes, nuptials, scissors, obsequies.
(h) In compound nouns the plural is usually added to the last member, but sometimes the first member: cupful, cupfuls; mouthful, mouthfuls; passer-by, passers-by; son-in-law, sons-in-law; coat -of-arms, coats-of-arms; court-martial, courts-martial.
10. English and American spelling differ in several points
In competition either spelling will be accepted. It may be useful to know some of the main differences. For instance, the use of OUR and OR.
11. Euphony in spelling
The following rules govern the use of A and AN:
The form A is used before a word beginning with a consonant sound (including aspira H and the initial W sound heard as in one).
A Royal Canadian Air Force plane, a university, a history, a hero.
Before a vowel or silent H the form AN is used; an hour, an object, an air force plan.
Exceptions:
(a) When the initial letter begins with the sound of a vowel, the form AN is used: an NCO, an RCAF plane, an M.D.
(b) When the letter H is only half aspirated and the accent is on the second syllable: an historical event, an heroic act.
WORD SELECTIONS
A panel of educators and other professionals was responsible for the selection of words for this manual and various tie-breaking lists. Sources included the textbooks, reading material and references recommended for the respective age groups. The correct spelling of each word was verified by reference to reputable dictionaries and technical publications.
PARTICIPANTS:
For each word, this manual provides alternative spelling(s), phonetic pronunciation, the part of speech, one or more definitions and sentence to show the use of the word. In competition, however, contestants will be tested only on the spelling and need only one form; the additional information is given only to help the contestant learn the word.
ABBREVIATIONS:
adj. adjective; adv. adverb; n. noun; v. verb; conj. conjunction; pron. pronoun; part. participle; prep. preposition; h. homophone; interj. interjection.
TOP
|
