LI boy competes in national spelling bee

East Meadow's Naman Shakrani, a sixth-grader at W. Tresper Clarke Middle School in Westbury, is one of 275 of the country's best spellers competing for the top title at the Scripps National Spelling Bee that opens Tuesday in suburban Maryland.

Naman, 10, and the other contestants begin with preliminary rounds Tuesday and Wednesday -- both written and oral -- that will winnow the group down to no more than 50 semifinalists competing on Thursday.

Naman is ready, said his father, Kamlesh Shakrani.

"He's very excited and very confident," he said.

Stacy Breslin, principal of Clarke Middle School, said, "The students and staff are extremely proud of Naman and his accomplishments and we wish him luck moving forward. He is a fine representative of Clarke Middle School."

Naman prepared by studying a 2,600-page dictionary and spelling the toughest words he finds on a given page. He won the Long Island Spelling Bee in March, competing with 20 other spellers in fourth to eighth grades. After 10 rounds, he correctly spelled "noctograph," which is a writing frame for the blind.

In Round One Tuesday at 8 a.m., the spellers are to gather at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, Md., and take a written 25-word test. Each word is worth one point, and the 25 words spelled will count toward each speller's preliminary score.

Next, all 275 spellers participate Wednesday between 8 a.m. and 5:15 p.m. in Rounds Two and Three onstage in the convention center's Maryland Ballroom. Immediately after the conclusion of Round Three, spelling bee officials will determine from competitors' scores who qualifies for the semifinals.

On Thursday, semifinalists will compete between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., with spelling survivors advancing as finalists to the championship that evening at 8:30.

Wednesday's preliminary rounds will be broadcast on ESPN3, and the semifinals and finals will be broadcast on ESPN.

The spellers in this year's Scripps bee are from the 50 U.S. states, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, and Department of Defense schools in Europe, as well as the Bahamas, Canada, China, Ghana, Jamaica, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea.

Last year, Anamika Veeramani, 14, from North Royalton, Ohio, won after spelling the word "stromuhr" -- an instrument that measures the flow of viscous substances, such as blood through an artery.

The winner gets about $40,000 in cash and prizes. The national level has no lower age limit, but eighth grade is the cutoff to compete.