Determining Meaning You can use a dictionary for many things. A dictionary can tell you what words mean. It can tell you how to pronounce, or say, words. It also tells which country words come from.

Alphabetical order Dictionaries are arranged in alphabetical order. For example, words that start with the letter A come first. After the A words come the B words.

Pronunciation Keys Dictionaries have pronunciation keys to help you pronounce words. Here is a pronunciation key

Which word has the same pronunciation as the word beat? chEt chet chat chät chEt shows the correct pronunciation. The key shows that E makes an e sound as in easy--the same vowel sound in beat.

Origin An origin of a word is the language the word comes from. Some words come from French. Some come from Spanish. Others are original English words. What is the origin of dog? dog ('dog) n. [English] 1. a mammal that eats meat and is related to wolves 2. a male dog The word dog originated from the English language. The origin is usually in brackets before the definition.

Guide Words Dictionaries have guide words to help you find the word you need. Guide words are at the top corner of the page and tell which words are first and last on the page. Words that come between these words in alphabetic order are on this page. Which word is on the page with guide words cool and cop? Words on this page must be between the words cool and cop when in alphabetical order. You would find the words cooler, coop, and cootie on this page.

Definitions A definition is the meaning of a word. Some words have more than one meaning. Dictionaries number the definitions when there is more than one. What is the meaning of the word fly in the sentence below? "He hit a pop fly past second base." fly ('flI) n. [English] 1. a winged insect, especially a housefly 2. a baseball hit high in the air 3. a fishhook covered to look like an insect The meaning in this sentence is a baseball hit high in the air, definition 2.

Syllables A dictionary will show how a word is divided into syllables. Here are some examples: forget cover illustration

Thesaurus A thesaurus is a reference book similar to dictionary. Instead of having definitions like a dictionary, a thesaurus has synonyms. Synonyms are words that have the same or almost the same meaning as another word. You can use a thesaurus to revise your writing. If you are writing a story and keep using the word "big," you can look in a thesaurus for other words that mean the same thing as "big" and use those instead. By using a variety of words, your writing becomes more colorful and more exciting.

Concept Words Concepts of words are very, very short definitions. Concepts are one word long. They describe the word you are looking up. For example, the concept for the word dog is "animal." The concept in a thesaurus entry is in parenthesis and capital letters.

Parts of Speech A thesaurus gives the part of speech of each entry. The part of speech tells how the word is used in the sentence. Below are abbreviations for parts of speech. v. = verb n. = noun adj. = adjective adv. = adverb Look at the thesaurus entry below. sag, v. lean, curve, bow (BEND) What part of speech is the word sag? The part of speech is abbreviated by v. This means "verb."

Synonyms The main purpose for using a thesaurus is to choose synonyms. Writers use a thesaurus when they revise their work. They can replace dull words with interesting ones. All the words listed after the entry word are synonyms, except the concept word. Look at the thesaurus entries below. date, n. appointment, engagement (ARRIVAL) date, n. day, year, hour, moment (TIME) date, v. fix the time, register (TIME MEASUREMENT) Which word would best replace the word date in this sentence? The sisters set a date to meet for lunch. day registered appointment year Substitute the word appointment for date in the sentence. Appointment makes the most sense: The sisters set an appointment to meet for lunch.

Antonyms Antonyms Sometimes the thesaurus will show antonyms of a word. Antonyms are words that have an opposite meaning. The thesaurus will use ant to show that the words listed are antonyms instead of synonyms. Here is an example: sad adj. heavyhearted, mournful, sorry, unhappy ant glad

Glossary  A glossary is an alphabetized list of words and their meanings. You will often find glossaries in the back of your textbooks. A science textbook will have a glossary that lists science words and their meanings. Below is an example of a glossary.

Footnotes Footnotes are notes that appear at the end of a piece of writing. Each note has a number that matches with a number in the text. These notes give extra information about something in the passage. Sometimes, passages will have footnotes to help you figure out the meaning of difficult words.