In 2011, Aundreta (my wife) was fascinated with the film Akeelah and the Bee that I picked up at the local D&R bookshop here in Konya. We had watched it together at the cinema when it first came out years ago. She wanted to show it to the students, and they really enjoyed it. We had not considered that the Turkish students would have never had need of a Spelling Bee, since the wonderfully efficient Turkish system is phonetic itself. We found that it makes a great teaching tool here as well for the English as Second Language students. Despite her temporary absence this year, the Hazırlık program continued with the Spelling Bee. The competition was fierce, and the tiered learning system was useful -- each level was only responsible for the words they had covered. It worked smoothly.
I am proud of all the competitors, and of the champions pictured here above. Feyza Nur B. (left) and Mehmet Akif E. (center) were in my class, so I knew their strengths and abilities.
