I saw Akeelah and the Bee today. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT FOR THE FAMILY. It is about a 11 year-old girl from the L. A. ghetto who enters the National Spelling Bee.
A film celebrating knowledge, intelligence, good grammar, and ethics is hard to find.
Akeelah is coached for the Bee by a UCLA professor of English who insists on promptness, optimism, and good work habits (certainly good lessons for today's students to learn.)The importance of reading and language study is stressed for champion spellers--not just rote memory which is how I always passed the spelling tests. I never knew how important Latin was to spelling. Latin was not a subject my tiny high school offered--I am sorry I missed it.
This one will join my shelf of good teacher videos right up there with Mr. Holland's Opus and Dead Poets Society. Don't miss it. The theater today was full of kids who applauded every Akeelah accomplishment.
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