&uot;I can still remember the word I lost on,&uot; Judy Knudtson, director of curriculum for the Albert Lea School district, told the 39 fifth-to-eight-grade students participating in the district-wide spelling bee Wednesday at Southwest Middle School.

It is an American rite of passage: the school spelling bee. For many, it is the first time anyone remembers having to speak into a microphone or address an auditorium audience.

There are shaky voices, nervous stances, and of course, misspelled words.

But the abilities of these students to spell is always surprising. Sometimes the audience hasn’t heard the word. Sometimes you’ll hear a someone whisper to their neighbor the &uot;correct&uot; spelling before the child spells it, only to be proven wrong by the student.

Wednesday’s bee was no exception. Ten students from each grade were chosen through class spelling bees in schools throughout the district to take part in the event. They all competed in the same bee, regardless of grade level.

They spelled words like &uot;treason,&uot; &uot;hector,&uot; &uot;pagoda,&uot; &uot;ragwort,&uot; &uot;vindicate,&uot; &uot;postmortem,&uot; &uot;dietetics,&uot; &uot;botany,&uot; and &uot;septuplets.&uot;

The contest started at 1 p.m. and stretched into mid-afternoon, at 3:15 p.m. Near the end, four finalists were told they’d be advancing to the regional tournament in Rochester in late February. The four were all from Southwest Middle School.

Casey Bartness, Ryan Hoium, Katherine Ladwig, and Liam Moore were the four finalists. But the competition had to go on to place the four.

After a few rounds, Hoium and Ladwig were the only two left; Moore had placed in the finalist position, and Bartness in the third-place position.

Hoium and Ladwig battled it out until the word &uot;alkaline,&uot; which Hoium misspelled and Ladwig spelled correctly. She then spelled insecticide correctly and won the first-place trophy.

The four students have the opportunity to advance to a state championship from regionals, and from state to nationals.