Tips from the top speller.

Planning a trip to Indianapolis next April for our Tulip Time Scholarship Games? If you're a speller, take a tip or two from Sai Gunturi, this year's Scripps Howard national spelling contest winner.

The Texas twelve-year-old built on strong showings three years in a row to finish first in this year's contest in Washington D.C.

"I did pretty well in fifth grade," says Sai. "I competed again in sixth grade. And because I did well in sixth grade, I did it again in seventh grade."

That translates as a 32nd, a 16th, and a 7th place finish, all respectable, but nothing compared to Sai's big number 1 this year. At the end, Sai was a little excited.

"I felt lightheaded, then all my adrenalin went down so I had no energy left," he says.

The win came after months of practice an hour and a half every night and four hours on weekends. Sai says he didn't memorize the spelling lists, but practiced with his family. "They not only helped me with the spelling, they gave me moral support," he says.

Studying Latin in school helped Sai with certain spelling rules. "Usually you don't, for example, find the letter k in Latin. If you asked for a word origin and they soy Latin, you know not to put a k in there," he says.

Sai also studies the violin and science. One possible long-term goal is becoming a genetic engineer. "It might expose me to all those words," he says. "Science words in science class, and Italian words from music."

Keeping busy is important to Sai. If you want to get busy winning our spelling contest next spring, he has three easy to spell words of advice:

"Stick with it!"

GET THE WORD

Here's a start on our word list for our body-parts spelling contest next spring. Watch these pages or our Web site, www.uskidsmag.org, for more.

Beginner
6 and under:

ankle
body
bone
brain
brow
calf
chin
colon
ear
elbow
finger
foot
groin
hair
hand
knee
liver
lobe
lung
mouth
neck
nerve

Junior
7 to 8:

aorta
artery
biceps
bladder
cranium
deltoid
eyebrow
eyelash
femur
fibula
forearm
hamstring
ileum
iris
nostril
patella

Advanced
9 to 10:

appendix
bowel
cecum
clavicle
cochlea
cuticle
diaphragm
esophagus
follicle
gracilis
humerus
jugular
lumbar
mastoid
molar
pancreas
quadriceps
retina

Super
11 to 12:

brachialis
calcaneus
capillaries
cerebellum
coccyx
encephalon
epithelium
gastrocnemius
hippocampus
jejunum
larynx
macula
meninges
myocardium
neuron
pericardium
phalanges