Spelling Bee

When I was in 6th grade and in middle school, I won the spelling bee.

Not just the grade-level spelling bee, the SCHOOL spelling bee. That means I beat Eighth graders... at Spelling. I know. Try not to be jealous because at the awesomeness that is all of THIS spelling-bee queen-ness. It's rough but I know you can do it.

Of course, in the 7th grade, I was out first. It was a trick word that they planted JUST FOR ME. After all, they couldn't have me win, AGAIN... that would make the other kids feel bad. So, after I misspelled that word (totally on purpose - you know, to help the other kids in their winning-ness), I gracefully took my seat in the audience.

Regardless, I am a fantastic speller. I have never studied for a spelling or vocab test.. ever. It's one of the things I just am good at. Some of you are all about pinterest and home improvement projects and fashion and sewing... but you are you are missing out. I mean, I can't do ANY of ANY of that but that's okay. Who needs a skill that is actually interesting, useful and helpful? Certainly not this spelling queen been.

So, I get married and he is an excellent speller, too. That's good. We've got genetics on our side so I wasn't surprised when spelling and grammar came easy to my boys. In fact. the school can't find words HARD ENOUGH for them to spell. That's what we do in our gene pool. We can SPELL.

Then I had my perfect girl. This girl is sweet, kind, helpful, smart, athletic, generous, social, funny and a "pleasure to have in class."

We have found her fatal flaw.

She cannot spell. Like, she cannot spell AT ALL.

She botches the most common of words and I can't handle it.

I'm pretty sure this will be my biggest parenting challenge - to not ridicule her inability to spell.

We STUDY for her spelling tests - which are made up of words such as "them, what, who and me". We write and rewrite and alphabetize and orally recite every word on that list. We take pre-tests, mid-week tests and practice tests. STUDY for SPELLING? My daughter??? Absurd.

She will usually do okay on the test in class but come the next week when she is filling out some reading comprehension worksheet, she misspells the word. Not just one word. Pretty much all the words. Except her name. And the word 'love'.

Please don't tell me she needs to read more. She reads all the time. She reads everything... picture books, chapter books, magazines, snoops in my emails, Facebook's, texts. She's got the reading thing down. CLEARLY, reading and spelling are not the same thing. CLEARLY.

This girl cannot spell. It's some freakish genetic mutation - like my obsession with processed cheese and fried foods or Jace's love of wearing only underwear when he's at home. It's something that she will not overcome and will haunt her forever.

The whole cramming thing is working and teaching her a life lesson that she will be able to use in college (if you don't actually know the material, memorizing it for a test is sufficient enough), so I'm calling it a win. Well, at least, we're calling it sufficient. Whatever.

Next spelling test, we'll be learning how to use spell-check. It will be far more beneficial for her.