Two years after placing second, seventh grader Teddy Totten wins the Flagler County Spelling Bee

The Christ the King Lutheran School student will represent the county at the First Coast Regional Spelling Bee on March 7.

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After his final competitor misspelled a word, the spectators at the Flagler County Spelling Bee began applauding Christ the King Lutheran School seventh grader Teddy Totten.

But, Totten, a veteran of spelling bees, knew he still had to spell the championship word. He waved off the applause, explained there was still a championship word to spell and told the crowd to chill. After the laughter subsided, Totten correctly spelled, “astringent,” to win the county’s spelling bee championship Feb. 5 at the Buddy Taylor Middle School cafeteria.

Totten will represent Flagler County at the 81st annual First Coast Regional Spelling Bee on March 7 in Jacksonville. The regional winner advances to the 2025 Scripps National Spelling Bee on Memorial Day weekend in Washington D.C.

Victoria Rivera, a fifth grader at Bunnell Elementary School, placed second at the Flagler County bee. She finally misspelled a word, “assailant,” in the 12th round after spelling 11 words correctly. Totten had correctly spelled “consternation” in Round 12 to set up the championship word. He said “astringent” was his only word of the night that he wasn’t sure about.

“I didn't know if there was one or two s's, so I was just kind of guessing, you know, just assumed before it made the most sense,” he said.

He smiled when he didn’t hear the dreaded bell that denotes a misspelled word. Totten had been close before. He placed second at the 2023 Flagler County Spelling Bee when he was in fifth grade.

“I've been working at it, trying to get back here,” he said. “I wasn't here last year. It was actually the classroom spelling bee where I got a word and I knew how to spell it, (but) I just didn't think about it, and I spoke real fast and I misspoke. That was big step back, but I came back and got back to the county spelling bee and I did what I came here to do.”

Sixteen students in fifth through eighth grade representing nine schools competed in the county competition.

Totten, who is the son of Flagler County Judge Andrea Totten, said he has always been a good speller and admitted that his path to the championship did not include poring over the Scripps National Spelling Bee study guide, “Words of the Champions.”

“I just kind of looked at it, and I was like, ‘I can't even pronounce half these words,’” he said. “And I would occasionally pull it out and try to look up the definitions of some of the words, but I didn't really do that much. I just didn't look at it. I just kind of hoped that I would be able to spell the words. It’s probably not a good strategy. I wouldn’t recommend that.”

Flagler Schools Teaching and Learning specialist Celeste Ackerman was the announcer at the spelling bee. Dr. Christopher Stefancik, an alumnus of Flagler Schools and the district’s former coordinator of assessment, served as the word pronouncer for the third straight year. The job, Stefancik said, is gut wrenching.

“It keeps going through my mind that I mispronounce, ‘water,’ and now the student can’t get a scholarship.”

In fact, his pronunciations were spot on, as were Totten’s spellings. 

 

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