Guide Words and Alphabetical Order
These two words, printed at the top of a dictionary page, tell you the first and last entry on that page.
Guide Words
Found in parentheses or slashes right after the main word, this part shows you how to pronounce it.
What is the pronunciation guide?
In a dictionary entry, the abbreviation v. stands for this part of speech that shows action or state of being.
What is a verb?
While a dictionary gives you definitions, you use this reference book to find synonyms and antonyms.
What is a thesaurus?
In the sentence "The bark of the tree was rough," "bark" acts as this part of speech.
What is a noun?
Between the guide words "FLAME" and "FLIGHT," this word would appear on the page: Flash, Float, or Fable.
What is Flash?
The abbreviation n. after a word in a dictionary entry stands for this part of speech.
What is a noun?
You would look for the abbreviation adj. to find words that perform this grammatical job.
What is describing a noun?
If you need to find out how many syllables are in the word "caterpillar," you should use this specific tool.
What is a dictionary?
A word that is spelled the same as another word but has a different meaning (and sometimes a different pronunciation) is called this.
What is a homograph?
Put these three words in correct alphabetical order: Pebble, Peak, Peasant.
What is Peak, Peasant, Pebble?
If a word has multiple meanings listed in its entry, they are usually separated and marked by these.
What are numbers (or numbered lists)?
The abbreviation adv. stands for this part of speech, which often ends in "-ly."
What is an adverb?
If a writer wants to replace the overused word "said" with a more vivid word like "exclaimed," they should check this tool.
What is a thesaurus?
In the sentence "She will present the award tonight," the stress is on the second syllable because "present" acts as this part of speech.
What is a verb?
If the guide words are "SAND" and "SCALPEL," this word belongs on the page: Sample, Scale, or Satellite.
What is Satellite?
The small dots or spaces inside a headword (like dict · ion · ar · y) show you where to break the word into these.
What are syllables?
In a dictionary definition, the letter pl. indicates this grammatical form of a word.
What is plural?
Words that have the exact same meaning, which you look up in a thesaurus, are called this.
What are synonyms?
In the sentence "The referee decided to fair the match evenly," vs. "We had a great time at the county fair," the word "fair" in the second sentence refers to a public festival or gathering, acting as this part of speech.
What is a noun?
When alphabetizing two words that start with the exact same letters, such as "Track" and "Tractor," this rule determines which comes first.
What is "the shorter word comes first" (or the word that runs out of letters)?
This part of a dictionary entry explains where a word originally came from, such as Latin or Ancient Greek.
What is word origin (or etymology)?
If a dictionary entry lists prep., it refers to this type of word that shows location or time, like under, before, or through.
What is a preposition?
This type of dictionary lists specialized words used in a specific field, like medicine, science, or law.
What is a subject-specific (or specialized/glossary) dictionary?
Reading the surrounding sentences to determine which dictionary definition fits a word in a passage is using these clues.
What are context clues?