Spelling bees are especially relevant for the
English language, because its spelling is so highly non-
phonetic. (I remember one
grade-school teacher illustrating this by writing "PHOTI" on the chalkboard and informing the class that, given the wacky behavior of English
pronunciation, it could even spell "
fish" -- his (?) explanation was something like
"PH" as in "
phoneme"
"O" as in "
women," and
"TI" as in "
pronunciation."
As a 2x former local spelling-bee champ, and 1x county spelling-bee champ, I must say I have
mixed feelings about them. Like most
talents, a
photographic memory for spellings is something that is more
luck than work, and so I personally felt strange at getting credit for something I had as much to do with as having
brown hair. Also, success in a spelling bee, in such an anti-
geek environment as
rural Ohio was in my youth, was a
mixed blessing. I really did feel a bit like a
freak, though proud at the same time.
Note that ability to spell need not
correlate with strong abilities in other seemingly related areas, nor does it imply strong "
normal"
intelligence. I was, for example, an
ADD child, and in the practice round of the first spelling bee in which I participated (where I went on to beat the county round), I misspelled the word "nail." (As "nial").