An 'extravagant' feeling

Tennesia Malcolm, Staff Reporter

There is a common thread linking Westmoreland and St James in The Gleaner's Children's Own Spelling Bee competition.

Camara Webber, who won the Westmoreland trophy for Haddo Primary a year ago, last Thursday took it home again; this time in St James.

Now wearing the white of Mt Alvernia High School, 12-year-old Camara finished ahead of Menen Maxwell, a Rastafarian from Hosanna Prep.

Nine-year-old Menen - who had spelled impressively along with teammate and champion boy Javayne Parkins, who placed fourth - found her stumbling block when she came upon G-U-S-S-E-T.

Unable to spell the word, it passed to Camara who was clearly familiar with it.

Done deal

G-L-O-S-S-I-T-I-S would seal the deal.

This was after four hours of spelling by 58 of St James' finest bees in the sweltering heat of the Burchell Baptist church hall.

In victory, Camara 'feels extravagant', as she should, according to mother, Carmen Gregg, who said her daughter did it almost on her own.

"I work with her at home because the book has a lot of new words," she hastened to add.

Camara agreed, saying her family also assisted in giving "words of encouragement".

"I tell her to take half-hour before she goes to bed and on weekends she can study the book ... (sticking) to the new words. Just go through the book and find (them) and that's what she did," Camara's mother said.

But there was some help coming from her new high school as well.

"I got the booklet and I started to work with her," winning teacher Audrey McGhie said.

She went on to reveal a little of their strategy. "I assign the words like from A to H and I tell her to go home and spell them and when we would meet the following week, we would just go through."

tennesia.malcolm@gleanerjm.com

 eekends she can study the book ... (sticking) to the new words. Just go through the book and find (them) and that's what she did.'

Top 5

1 Camara Webber, Mt Alvernia High

2 Menen Maxwell, Hosanna Preparatory

3 Adriena Cribb, Eber Preparatory

4 Javayne Parkins, Hosanna Preparatory

5 Candice Barrett, Supreme Preparatory