It was a war with the words  at the Backward Spell Bee inter-school competition held in the City recently.  A large number of students participated in this competition, which necessitated them to write and spell words backwards.

The final round was split into two parts. First, the students had to go through a written round wherein words had to be identified and then written down in both the proper form and backwards. This was followed by an oral round. Each contestant was here asked to spell the words-proper and backwards.

Contestants were divided into two categories: classes 5 to 7 and  classes 8 to 10. Over 500 students from CMR NPS, St Charles, Maxwell Public and Maruthi Vidyalaya among other schools participated. Authors K A Antony and Flavia Saldanha Fernandes were present to inspire the children.

While the spirit of creativity ruled the day, there were a few words that emerged troublesome. The juniors for instance found 'alibi'  and 'honeybee' similar and the words naive', 'voila' and 'voodoo' had them in quandary. On the other hand it was words such as 'sabre', 'psalm', 'koala' that gave the seniors  a tough time.  Also while the 'Paen' was confused for 'Peon',  'idyll' was thought to be 'ideal'!

Ayushi of St Charles High school, however says that the contest made for a thrilling experience. "Spelling tests are a regular in school. But what made this event creative was the fact that we had to write and spell words backward."  Says Rahul of CMR NPS:  "This sort of an exercise is really fun. But since there were similar sounding words, we had to concentrate." The task of spelling backwards is no easy task, but  it was surely something that had caught the imagination of these children.  The event was organised by Au-to-Zu for u that works towards exposing students to arts, language and craft related activities.  Mentoring sessions on various skills and techniques are also organised so as to enrich a student's academic career in the long run. “Au-to-Zu which aims at  reaching out to kids is managed by a team of journalism, IT, HR, education and marketing professionals, adds Creative Head and Founder Alaesheebam V Srinivas. Currently, this community is networked with 20 schools and 2,500 student-members and plans to reach out to more in the years to come.

Winners of the Backward Spell Bee competition

Juniors :
I place: R Abhishek, Maruthi Vidyalaya (ICSE)l; Manraj Bevli and Udit Jain, CMR NPS
2nd Place: G S Godwin, Good Year - Hennur
3rd Place: S Salastina, St Charles (State)

Seniors :
1st Place: D Sylvia Sussanna, St Charles (State)
Ayush Bhargava and Armaan Atreya, CMR NPS
2nd Place: K Vignesh, Shanthi Children School
3rd Place: S Taveer Ahmed, Good Year - Hennur