NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Next week, hundreds of kids from across the country will be in Washington, D.C., hoping to spell their way to victory in the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Five spellers will be representing the Volunteer State, including Armaan Singhvi, a Nashville fifth grader at Harding Academy who says he's ready for the competition.
"He's our class dictionary," said Harding Academy fifth grade teacher Jennifer Belcher. "When anybody needs help spelling a word, they don't get on Google, they don't ask me, they ask Armaan."
Armaan says his favorite word is one of the longest words in the dictionary: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis — 45 letters long with 19 syllables.
For all you word nerds, it's a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silicate or quartz dust, occurring especially in miners.
Outside of the classroom, Armaan says he likes golf, tennis, art and poetry.
He's even the Tennessee State Elementary School Chess Champion.
But what's now catapulted him to the nation's capital, along with 233 other spellers, is a dedication that's far from an apathetic Bewusstseinslage, a word Armaan can also spell correctly.
(Bewusstseinslage is defined as a state of consciousness or a feeling devoid of sensory components.)
To qualify for the Scripps National Spelling Bee, Armaan won the Tennessee regional spelling bee, at Nissan Stadium.
"It was pretty nerve-wracking," Armaan said. "There were 52 other spellers there — some older, some younger — they were all quite formidable opponents."
Now Armaan will take his winning ways all the way to Washington, with some wonderful words as the world watches.
"If you just try really hard and practice and practice, you can achieve what you want," Armaan said.
The 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee hosted by Levar Burton starts next week.
You can watch the Semifinal and Final rounds of the competition Wednesday and Thursday starting at 7 p.m. on the Ion Network — that's Channel 28 over the air in Nashville.
Ion Network can also be found on channel 230 on Comcast Xfinity, channel 250 on Dish and channel 305 on DIRECTV. For other providers, here is a list of where you can watch Ion.
