Spellers in nervy war of words

A drone of monotonous chatter echoed in the school hall as pupils, teachers and parents watched some of the region's top spellers battle it out in Tahatai Coast School's Coastal Spelling Bee.
Hundreds of eyes were focused on 30 pupils selected by their primary schools to take part in yesterday's inaugural competition.
At times, the silence was deafening. Emotions were running high and it was obvious students were in it to win.
Some grasped their chairs so hard their knuckles were white as they waited to be called to centre stage.
Others fidgeted with their clothing and hair and some chewed at their fingernails.
When speller number three got up to speak, her hands were shaking uncontrollably.
Speller number 27 was scratching his leg constantly, while speller number 5 looked comfortable and relaxed. He even yawned once or twice throughout the competition.
One by one, the finalists from Tahatai Coast School, Mount Primary, Papamoa Primary, Omanu Primary, Te Akau Ki Papamoa and Arataki Primary, stood in front of a microphone in the packed assembly hall and spelled out their given words.
Round one started with simple words, such as able, buy, weird, usually and accident. Round two words were slightly harder, including destination, legend, flavour and concern, among others.
Two spellers were eliminated on the word licence and another departed on absolutely. Jewellery was another highly contested word and five pupils were eliminated. Different spellings of the word confused the pupils, judges and audience, however a re-test after the competition saw no student was disadvantaged by the original ruling, which saw the word spelled jewelry.
Contestants were slowly eliminated through rounds four, five, six and seven and, as the competition went on, the tension in the room grew. The audience held their breath as the words got harder and spellers began to doubt themselves. As the spellers became less aware of the words, their intonation increased as they spelled through the word, almost answering as a question rather than a statement.
Some pupils remained confident and spoke clearly with purpose.
Speller number two wowed the judges when he was tasked to spell encyclopaedia, which can be spelled with or without an "a". The speller said: "There are two ways to spell encyclopaedia, would you like me to spell both?"
Speller number five was offered a second chance after judges initially dismissed his correct spelling of knowledge.
Mount Maunganui Primary speller Samuel Taylor, 9, knew he spelled the work correctly and was pleased the judges brought him back into the competition after realising their mistake.
At the end of round seven, only five spellers were left.
Papamoa Primary pupil Brooke Broomhead, 10, was calm and won the competition with the correct spelling of irresistible, which three other contestants had already failed to spell. She felt nervous being on stage and hadn't allowed her father to bring a camera to the competition but he celebrated her win at the back of the hall with a small dance.
Tahatai Coast School literacy teacher Catherine Humphries said she was blown away with the calibre of spellers and that it was no easy feat to stand in front of people and spell a word out loud.
"These kids are not necessarily the sporty ones ... and I think this is a great way for the kids to show their academic skills in a fun way," Mrs Humphries said.
The purpose of the spelling bee was to increase literacy levels within Western Bay schools, she said.