Spanish spelling success for Perse pupil
Ariana Sabourian (Year 7) demonstrated excelente español to come third in the national finals of the Foreign Language Spelling Bee.
Both she and fellow Perse pupil Jo Zhou (Year 7) qualified for the national finals at Cambridge University after finishing in the top three of the regional finals in Spanish.
They had to learn 300 words in preparation for the national finals of the competition, which saw participants given a word in English that they had to translate into the relevant language before saying the spelling out loud.
Each contestant had just a minute to get as many translations and spellings correct as possible, with just the top four in each language category making it through to a grand final.
Jo narrowly missed out on qualifying despite a great effort, but Ariana did extremely well to reach the deciding stage.
Ariana said: “All the language grand finals were in the same place and the Spanish final was last, so I’d heard all these words in French and German and it was a bit confusing!
“I was a bit stressed at the start, but I managed to come third. I was really surprised, but very proud as well.”
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