Nora Lloyd looked around the stage partway through Round 4 of the 2026 Schuylkill County Regional Spelling Bee and had a surprised look on her face. She had just spelled “CHORTEN” correctly and realized she was one of the last of the 42 spellers left in the competition.
Suddenly, she was the only one to spell a word correctly in that round and had just one more word to get right in order to be crowned this year’s champion.
Working off the unstudied Championship List of words for the beginning of Round 5, per the rules of the competition, Lloyd only had to spell “RIPPLES” to win. She repeated the word, spelled it right rather quickly, and before you know it, she was holding the custom-made trophy as the winner of this year’s Regional Spelling Bee.
The win punches Lloyd’s ticket to the 2026 Scripps National Spelling Bee in the Washington, DC area from May 26-28.
Lloyd, 11, is a fifth-grader at Blue Mountain Elementary-East and this was her first Regional Spelling Bee. On the day, she spelled the following words correctly to win the competition:
- TALENT
- ARMAMENTS
- HALLUCINATE
- CHORTEN
- RIPPLES
After the Bee. Lloyd told Coal Region Canary that her first word of the day was actually the toughest and not because of the word itself, but more because of the pressure of the Bee.
“My first word was definitely the worst,” Lloyd said, admitting there were butterflies as she awaited her turn. “I was shaking and my heart was pounding. Once you do the first word, it gets better, the nerves. You trust yourself a little more.”
As far as the spelling went, Lloyd believes her toughest word of the day was CHORTEN.
“I was debating if it could be an -en, an -in, or an -an,” she said of the word’s ending.
To prepare for this year’s Bee, Lloyd said she and her parents, Erin and George, practiced for hours. During those practice sessions, Lloyd said if she spelled a word incorrectly, she’d have to write it out a number of times. She also used the Word Club app and the Spelling Bee practice book to prepare.
Twice a week, Blue Mountain’s spelling coach Stephanie Gaddy had all the school’s spellers practice together, too.
“It paid off; she’s a hard worker,” proud mom Erin Lloyd said.
In addition to a custom trophy and monetary award, Lloyd also won a trip to compete in the 2026 Scripps National Spelling Bee. That’s what’s got her most excited. And until then, it’ll be daily practices, she says, to prepare.
Photos by Jacqueline Dormer
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