How to Use a Dictionary
Knowing how to use a dictionary is an important skill that you will use for life. Online dictionaries are important, but one cannot forget the importance of using a book as a reference! It is a great resource for you to visit to grow your vocabulary base and to improve your word choice when writing.
(Picture of Noah Webster, creator of Webster's Dictionary)
One of the original creators of the dictionary we use the most today was Noah Webster. He spent decades working on a finished product. The first edition of The American Dictionary of the English Language was published in 1828, when Webster was 70 years of age. He had published his first collection of words in 1806 and was the first to use American spelling and to include technical terms in science, for example, as well as literary words.
Here is a helpful website on how to use a dictionary. Please bookmark it and explore! This way you can visit it throughout the school year as necessary.
library.thinkquest.org/5585/dictionary.htm
After you have learned what you can find in a dictionary and how to use it, take the quiz that you can find at the bottom of that same website.
Here is a different type of website that works like a dictionary does. It not only gives you a definition of a word, but it also provides synonyms, antonyms and uses the word in a sentence. This way, you have more than one resource to visit for word help!