DICTIONARY SKILLS/ dɪkʃənri skɪls/

Group members:

1) Lui Chai Ying2) Mohd Iszwan Bin Isnin3) Yong Fee Sim

What is dictionary?

• Reference book containing words, usually arranged in alphabetical order.

• It gives information about their meaning, pronunciation and uses.

WHAT ARE THE DICTIONARY SKILLS?

1Guide Words

2Headwords

3Syllabication

5Accent Marks

4

phonetics symbols

6Part of Speech

7SpecialForms

• Different dictionaries have different numbers of guide words on the top of each page.

• At the top of each page of the dictionary, there is one GUIDE WORD.

• The first word is the same as the guide word at the top of that page

• Using alphabetically order, you will find all the words.

• Example: Page 588 in the Oxford Advanced

Learner’s Dictionary shows the first word is same with the guide words, “forgive”.

1Guide Words

• The words you look up on a page are printed in bold type.

• Example:

“Rubber” (on page 1292). It is written in bold type and

found toward the middle of the right hand column.

2Headwords

• Words divided into syllables by placing a dot (•) or slash (\) between them.

• Knowing where to split a word correctly

• Examples:

3Syllabication

rab·bit

re·flec·tionpre·sen·ta·tion

• symbols that follow the headword and are set off with slashes (/)

• Help to pronounce words correctly

• Most consonants are pronounced only one way

• Example: “Can you tell me what is the first sound is in fish?”

“It’s /f/”

4Phonetic Symbols

• It tells you to put a little more stress on the syllable that follows the accent mark than on the other syllables.

• Examples: husband – primary stress / ˈhʌzbənd /

continue – secondary stress / kənˈtɪnjuː /

presentation – tertiary stress / ˌpreznˈteɪʃn /

5Accent marks

• The short forms printed in italics are useful. Here’s a simple explanation.

• Some words can be used in several different places in a sentence.

• This means that the word can be used as a noun, a word that names a person, place, or thing, or it can be used as a verb describe an action.

• Examples: The light is not bright enough. (noun-

naming a thing)

I always light the oil lamp when power goes off. (verb-shows an action)

Mary usually decorates in a light style. (adjective- describes something)

6Parts of speech

• The part of speech abbreviations are listed here.

n..................nounpron.............pronounadj...............adjectiveadv..............adverbvb................verbconj.............conjunctionprep.............prepositioninterj............interjection

Continue…

• Some words in English are inflected .

• If a word has some special forms, they are listed after the part of speech.

• Examples: What is the plural of “tomato”?

(tomatoes) What is the past tense of “rise”? (rose)

• If a word has more than one acceptable spelling, it is also listed here.

• Usually the preferred spelling is given first.

7Special Forms

References

•Anonymous. (2008). Retrieved 25 June, 2012 from

http://www.tlsbooks.com/dictionaryskillsreview.html.

•Anonymous. (1998). Dictionary Skills. Retrieved 26

June, 2012 from http://www.nald.ca/library/learning/

academic/english/diction/module1.pdf.

•Barry & Scholes,A.( 2001) Collins Junior Dictionary

Skills. London, England: Harper Collins Publisher Ltd

•Wright, A. (1998), Dictionaries, Oxford University

Press, Hong Kong.