Several teams representing Ridgefield Academy recently earned Highest Honors in the 2024-2025 WordMasters Challenge™—a national vocabulary competition involving nearly 125,000 students annually.
The sixth grade team scored an impressive 189 points out of a possible 200 in the last three meets this year, placing second in the nation. In addition, the fifth grade team finished fifth (193 points), seventh grade placed sixth (171 points), eighth grade earned an eighth place finish (179 points) and fourth grade captured ninth place (184 points).
All five teams also placed nationally in the overall competition: fourth grade (with a cumulative score of 526 points out of a possible 600) in ninth place; fifth grade (559 points) in third place; sixth grade (545 points) in second place; seventh grade (525 points) in fifth place; and eighth grade (539 points) in seventh place.
Competing in the difficult Blue Division of the WordMasters Challenge™, fourth grader Siyana F., fifth graders Catherine F., Sebastian H. and Nishad K., sixth graders Minho C. and Ada G., and eighth grader Ollie H. each earned a perfect score of 20 in the recent meet. Nationally, only 47 fourth graders, 84 fifth graders, 29 sixth graders and 49 eighth graders achieved this result.
Other students at Ridgefield Academy who achieved outstanding results in the last meet of the year include: fourth graders Taylor B., Colin C., Elizabeth F. and Thomas H.; fifth graders Eliana A., Harper B., Ellis G., Jason G., Olivia H., Annabella M., William R. and Sawyer S.; sixth graders Max B., Joshua E., Samson G., Trey N. and Aliya W.; seventh grader Castine L.; and eighth graders Will B. and Quinn M.
Several students also earned Individual Highest Honors in the overall competition: fifth graders Catherine F., Ellis G. and Sebastian H. (with cumulative scores of 58 out of a possible 60 points); sixth graders Minho C. (57 points), Ada G. (57 points), May B. (56 points) and Aliya W. (56 points); and seventh graders Leo N. (57 points), Rishabh K. (54 points) and Adam O. (54 points). Highest Honors are reserved for students who place among the top 10-15 students in their division.
About the Wordmasters Challenge
The WordMasters Challenge™ is an exercise in critical thinking that first encourages students to become familiar with a set of interesting new words (considerably harder than grade level), and then challenges them to use those words to complete analogies expressing various kinds of logical relationships. Working to solve the analogies helps students learn to think both analytically and metaphorically. Although most vocabulary enrichment and analogy-solving programs are designed for use by high school students, the WordMasters Challenge™ materials have been specifically created for younger students in grades three through eight. They are particularly well suited for children who are motivated by the challenge of learning new words and enjoy the logical puzzles posed by analogies.
The WordMasters Challenge™ program is administered by a company based in New Jersey which is dedicated to inspiring high achievement in American schools. Further information is available at the company’s website: http://www.wordmasterschallenge.com
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