Aidan was a top speller

Pretty Beach resident Aidan Clout was one of 50 of the state's top spellers to take part in the Junior and Senior State Finals of the Premier's Spelling Bee on Wednesday, November 9.

Aidan Clout is 11 and a Year 5 student at Pretty Beach Public School.

Aidan took part in the finals at the Eugene Goossens Hall of the ABC Centre, but did not win the competition.

"The finalists come from 47 schools across NSW - from Cobar in the far west of the state; to Cronulla in Sydney's south; and from Albury in the south; to Evans Head on the North Coast," said the Minister for education and training, Ms Carmel Tebbutt.

Ms Tebbutt said more than 1500 students from over 400 NSW schools took part in the regional finals of the Premier's Spelling Bee in September.

This is almost twice the number that took part in last year's inaugural Spelling Bee.

The spelling bee was open to students in public schools in two divisions - students in Years 3 and 4, and students in Years 5 and 6.

The words were arranged into several categories: general and reading, science and mathematics, words of the past, and words from other languages.

All words used in the competition were provided by the editors of Macquarie dictionary.

All finalists will receive prizes donated by Macquarie Dictionary and Franklin Electronics.

Press release, November 2 Sven Wright, Department of Education and Training