LYNN — Thanks to spelling, fifth-grader Giovanni Ciafardoni was able to overcome his fear of being on stage.
The Ingalls Elementary School student is a hopeful contender for the 34th Annual Daily Item Regional Spelling Bee. After outspelling his classmates in November, Giovanni took home the win for the schoolwide bee in January.
“It was amazing and I couldn’t believe I won,” he said. “I was feeling nervous because I never really go on stage or do things like that in front of people but I had a fun time after getting used to it. I conquered that fear.”
Mariah DeRosa, Giovanni’s coach and Ingalls Elementary School’s spelling bee coordinator, said the January event was an hour and a half long and served up the most words she had seen in her five years at the school. Giovanni’s winning word was “invalid.”
“In the last round, with the last three students, it was very intense,” said DeRosa. “So, for him to win that, it was huge.”
The fifth-grade spelling champ said when it came down to the last word, he could hear his classmates rooting for him.
“I didn’t want to let them down and I didn’t want to let my parents down,” he said.
On Friday, Giovanni completed the preliminary written round after studying this year’s Scripps spelling test with DeRosa. There are 110 hopeful contenders from schools in Bristol, Essex, Middlesex, Norfolk, Plymouth, Suffolk, and Worcester counties who find out their spelling bee fates on Monday with the announcement of the top 50 students.
“I think I did pretty good on the written test,” Giovanni said. “All 40 words were tough and there were some I didn’t know, even some in other languages.”
The top students chosen to participate in the regional spelling bee will get instructions and guidelines from Scripps, according to DeRosa. The training for each student really begins once they know the words they need to study.
While his favorite word to spell may be his name, Giovanni said, if he is chosen to participate, he will study any words he has to in preparation of the regional bee.
“I know there is going to be way more people and it is going to last way longer,” he said. “I’ll be nervous but I know I can overcome it. I already overcame it once.”
