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What's the Buzz? Level One Bee (Beginning) Words for Grades 1-3

In this class, young students will learn about competing in spelling bees and the Scripps National Spelling Bee program. They will also learn to spell Level One Bee (beginning) spelling bee words and 450 words on the school study list.
Pamela Howell
Average rating:
4.9
Number of reviews:
(83)
Class
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What's included

1 live meeting
55 mins in-class hours per week

Class Experience

I will ask an ice breaker question of the students and encourage them to interact with me and other students for a few minutes at the start of each class.
Then, for each class, I will follow this format as we learn Level One Bee (beginning) words.
1. Introduce my background and experience as a county spelling bee coordinator associated with the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
2. Explain what spelling bees are all about and how students might consider competing in one in their local communities.
3. Learn to spell 10 words commonly found on spelling bee competition lists. We will practice 10 new words every class. We will learn the definitions of these words along with their country of origin, part of speech, as well as the etymology of the words. Words will come from school study lists provided by the Scripps National Spelling Bee program and will get harder as the class progresses.
4. Practice the spelling words in creative ways. (See below for examples.)
5. Spelling bee each class to work on words.
6. Wrap up and question and answer session.

Here are the activities I have planned for the first 10 classes and I will update the classroom page with more activities as we go along.
Class #1:  Write this week's spelling words in shaving cream. This week's words are punting, crowd, secret, fumble, pond, health, pardon, shake, kiddo, and proof.
Class #2:  Create your own crossword puzzle with this week's spelling words. This week's words are gorp, town, bingo, clever, inside, reply, frozen, special, film, and results.
Class #3:  Use magnetic letters, alphabet blocks, scrabble pieces or a combination of all three to spell out this week's spelling words. This week's words are soda, seal, twirled, disembark, admit, grown-ups, pieces, brass, onshore, and stunts.
Class #4:  Memory game using flash cards. (I will supply the "cards" on our classroom site and students will need to print them off and cut them into flash cards.) We will play the memory game using this week's spelling words. This week's words are deny, jolly, powder, earthquake, walnut, sawdust, flustered, barber, chimes, and cabin.
Class #5:  Play the Floyd Danger Spelling Quest online game using the built-in spelling words. No new words this week.
Class #6:  Write a story using each of this week's spelling word. This week's words are faint, manger, peppermint, broth, ash, flame, grits, cliff, hem, and candles.
Class #7:  Act out this week's spelling words. This week's words are brim, plot, desk, bobcat, polo, roller, stark, drum, snarl, and argue.
Class #8:  Make up a song using this week's spelling words. This week's words are loppers, petal, giant, sniffle, mouth, filters, cone, never, silly, and Monday.
Class #9:   Use a fly swatter to swat the words as they spell this week's words. The words will be provided on a classroom site and students will need to print them off on note cards or pieces of construction paper. After class and with parents' permission, I will encourage the students to tape up this week's list throughout their homes and swat the words each time they spell the word correctly. This week's words are grub, hook, number, cooking, amazed, collect, local, proper, basement, and ripple.
Class #10: A class spelling bee using all of the words we have learned so far!
Learning Goals
Students will learn what spelling bees are and how they might participate in one in their local communities. (While I can't guarantee every community will offer a spelling bee, I will try to help your student find one in which they can compete.)
Students will learn about the Scripps National Spelling Bee. (Although most of its participants are from the U.S., students from countries such as The Bahamas, Canada, the People's Republic of China, India, Ghana, Japan, Jamaica, Mexico, and New Zealand have also competed in recent years. Historically, the competition has been open to, and remains open to, the winners of sponsored regional spelling bees in the U.S. (including territories such as Guam, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, the Navajo Nation, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, along with overseas military bases in Germany and South Korea). Participants from countries other than the U.S. must be regional spelling-bee winners as well.
Each class, students will learn new words commonly found on spelling bee competition lists.
As we progress through the course, I will also share competition tips such as ways to calm nerves, how to speak into a microphone, remembering to ask all the questions needed to fully understand the word before spelling it, etc.
Students will learn that spelling can be fun, especially if you use shaving cream or any other fun, creative way of practicing spelling! The engaging spelling activities will come from various sources like ThoughtCo.com and Study.com. (I have a subscription to Study.com) and the activities on ThoughtCo.com are free to use. Some websites I will use are listed below.
learning goal

Other Details

Parental Guidance
Shaving cream will be used for the first class. (If students have an allergy to shaving cream, they may use store-bought whipped cream like Kool Whip or even toothpaste.)
Supply List
A journal.
A pen or pencil.
Colored pencils. (At least six, different colors.)
Shaving cream (or whipped cream or toothpaste).
A drop cloth or something plastic to cover their desk so they don't get shaving cream everywhere.
A set of magnetic letters, alphabet blocks, Scrabble letters or a combination of all three. Use whatever you have at home. It doesn't have to be new or fancy.
A fly swatter.
Tape.
Some construction paper or note cards.
I will supply the words for the students to learn each week.
Students will need to download the free Word Club app through the Scripps National Spelling Bee. We will use this app frequently. It has a variety of games and spelling bee words to help students learn.
Other supplies for this ongoing class will be items commonly found at home, so there won't be the need to buy anything else.
External Resources
In addition to the Outschool classroom, this class uses:
Joined January, 2020
4.9
83reviews
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Teacher expertise and credentials
I am offering this class in particular because of my experience coordinating the Tom Green County (Texas) Spelling Bee when I was special editions editor of the San Angelo Standard-Times in San Angelo, Texas. I ran the county bee and chaperoned the county winners and their families at the Scripps National Bee in Washington. D.C. for three years. I have also always enjoyed spelling and sharing my love of words with my students. I believe that learning to spell can be fun and I would love to help students succeed in spelling bees.

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Live Group Class
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$15

weekly
1x per week
55 min

Completed by 80 learners
Live video meetings
Ages: 5-8
1-6 learners per class

This class is no longer offered
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