Run With The Fishes

It’s time for some parental bragging.

This weekend Zoey and I went to Crockett, Texas for a UIL contest. On the way we got to drive through the Davey Crockett National Forest. It was pretty cool. I kept expecting a man to walk through with his coon-skin cap looking for a bear. According to Wikipedia though, it’s named for him because he may or may not have camped there on his way to defend the Alamo.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand. In Texas they have this thing called UIL. From what I can tell, it’s sort of like an academic contest based on grade levels. Along with 2 other kids, Zoey was selected to do the Spelling portion for 3rd grade at her school.

We left early on Saturday morning, Zoey on the school bus and a line of parents driving behind. For some reason we weren’t allowed to ride the bus, and the kids weren’t allowed to ride with their parents. When we got to the school hosting the event, the place was a madhouse, there were so many 3rd through 5th graders who were each given five dollars for snacks and lunch. The concession stand had way too many sugar options. Kids were truly spinning around in circles then crashing to the ground.

About 20 minutes before it was time for the spelling event, Zoey must have started to get nervous. She told me, “Mom, I just don’t feel like this is the right day to do this.” After she finished she was all smiles. She said she didn’t realize it was going to be so easy. For some reason she thought the person telling them the words would say them so fast that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with them.

I signed her out of the school’s custody so that she could ride back home with me. Even though the buses were leaving, we decided to stick around and hear the results. We figured after all of the practice she had done and the long trip to get there, we may as well.

Out of all of the third graders there for our region (I think her teacher said somewhere between 30 and 40), Zoey tied for 6th place! Johan, the little boy she tied with was on her team. Her teacher told us that they each missed the same number of words and both missed the same tie-breaker. She also told us that they had been doing that all throughout the preparations.

I don’t know what I was thinking, because I didn’t bring the camera with us. Johan’s mom managed to take a few of the ribbon winners though. As soon as I have a copy, I’ll put it up here.