ISL AMABAD: The 10th `Dawn in Education Regional Spelling Bee Contest` started in Islamabad on Tuesday.

The competition has been organised by Dawn in par tnership with the Oxford University Press (OUP) with the collaboration of the United States Department of State.

As many as 1,170 students from 130 schools in the north region, from Gilgit-Baltistan to Jhelum, are participating in the four-day competition held at Islamabad Club.

Though the participants have been divided into three age groups 9 to 11, 12 to 14 and 15 to 17 years on Tuesday the contest was held for children in the age group of 9 to 11.

The competition of six out of the nine pools completed on the first day while the remaining three pools will take part in the contest on Wednesday.

The elimination rounds of the contest will start on Wednesday.

It may be noted that in 1998 Dawn became the first newspaper in Pakistan to launch a Newspaper in Education Programme (NIE). Such programmes are widely practiced by leading newspapers in Europe, North and South America and Asia.

Spelling bees organised worldwide are a common phenomenon at both regional and national levels. A spelling bee is essentially a spelling competition amongst schoolchildren at the school level. The winners then participate in a regional/national inter-school spelling contest. As part of Dawn in Education Programme, the first ever national spelling championship was conducted in Jan-Feb 2005.

The Dawn in Education Spelling Bee aims to expand children`s horizons beyond the classroom and enhance their process of learning. The contest is designed to help students improve in their spellings, increase their vocabulary, learn new concepts and develop the correct usage of the English language.