The Primary English Encyclopedia: The Heart of the Curriculum, Third Edition
See also alphabet, non-fiction reading and writing
A dictionary is an alphabetically organised reference text which defines and gives the meaning or meanings of words. Some dictionaries provide further information, for example about the root and origin of the word and a guide to its pronunciation. The main purposes of a dictionary are to check spelling, to confirm that a word is being used appropriately or to find a synonym.
There is a wide variety of print and electronic dictionaries for children of different ages.
Word books for the very young are not, strictly speaking, dictionaries as they are often organised thematically rather than alphabetically. But they do foster an early interest in words and in ideas – see Janet and Allan Ahlberg’s The Baby’s Catalogue. They also help children see how illustration and written text link to make meaning. Young children find Richard Scarry’s colourful and detailed word books most entertaining – for example Cars and Trucks and Things That Go (Collins). Collins First Word Book provides bright double spreads of objects in familiar settings like the kitchen, garden and bathroom, surrounded by appropriate vocabulary. Words are helpfully embedded in phrases in My Oxford Picture Word Book – and there is now My Oxford Word Box, a CD-ROM combining stories with games, rhymes and word families. Alphabet books are an early introduction to alphabetic organisation (see under separate entry ‘alphabet’) and therefore are natural forerunners to first dictionaries. Many first dictionaries display the alphabet in upper and lower case round each page; Ladybird First Picture Dictionary highlights the letters dealt with on each double spread. A selection of early dictionaries has an important place in the early years classroom and might include Chambers First Dictionary, Dorling Kindersley’s My First Dictionary and My First Oxford Dictionary. For group or class based word level work with children aged six years and under The Oxford Reading Tree Dictionary is now in Big Book format. Teachers of the under sevens are familiar with the detailed and advanced questions young children sometimes ask. Dictionaries and encyclopedias intended for the younger age range sometimes do not give adequate coverage and explanation. Therefore it is wise to provide also a good dictionary intended for an older age group which teacher and child can use together when appropriate.
In the middle primary years, from about age seven to nine, there are good print dictionaries by the main publishers of children’s reference books and an increasing number of electronic versions. Good print dictionaries for this age range include The Usborne First Dictionary which includes puzzles and some excellent spelling tips. There are many splendid illustrated dictionaries for children up to the end of the primary years and some children will continue to feel more comfortable with these. The Oxford Young Readers’ Dictionary which has over 6,000 entries is a good non-illustrated dictionary for the over sevens. Most children’s dictionaries for the over sevens have ‘bold print’ head words, phrases and parts of speech, but this one is particularly clear, partly because of the choice of bold print on cream coloured paper. The ‘using this dictionary page’ is lucid and inviting.
Dorling Kindersley’s Incredible Amazing Dictionary has 1,000 words and offers games and puzzles to practise dictionary and alphabet skills. Word Bank and Crossword Creator help children compile their own personal dictionaries and the second of these includes Roget’s Thesaurus.
As children reach the later primary years, their grip on certain genre features of dictionaries – the use of phrases as well as sentences, the provision of several, often numbered, meanings and abbreviations – strengthens. As we would expect, in general illustrations become fewer and written entries becomes longer. However some children, and not only those with special learning needs, continue to benefit from carefully chosen illustrations. I have found children like using Usborne Illustrated Dictionary which looks inviting and has a particularly helpful user’s guide to parts of speech, and hints and guidelines on forming plurals and using apostrophes. Collins School Dictionary suits abler eleven year olds and gives good guidance on grammar and pronunciation. I like the generous spacing in this dictionary; each ‘sense’ is given on a new line. Another good dictionary for the last year of the primary school and into the secondary years is the Oxford School Dictionary which has over 40,000 head words, with plurals, tenses, nouns as appropriate and word origins for all root words. The format is plain and clear and new vocabulary, including words like ‘internet’ and ‘virtual reality’, are clearly explained. For key stage 2, Dictosaurus (Oxford University Press, 2006) is a multimedia resource combining a dictionary and thesaurus.
Specialist dictionaries – for example Dorling Kindersley’s Dictionary of Science – often provide a good browse – but lack of A–Z organisation in some of them makes them seem more like encyclopedias.
Teachers and librarians develop criteria for choosing print and electronic dictionaries for particular age groups. Some of the general criteria are similar to those we use for information texts and I have indicated something about what to look for in referring to particular texts above. The best print dictionaries are easy to use and in a clear and inviting format while electronic books, in addition, need to communicate information which may not be linear in a helpful way. If there are illustrations and diagrams these need to be appropriate, clear and well labelled. Written explanations need to be lucid and the words contextualised. It is worth checking that a new purchase covers the vocabulary children are likely to want to check across the curriculum. Clear explanations of new words to describe new technological concepts like ‘Homepage’, ‘Image map’ and ‘HyperText links’ are now required. I would also ask myself if the print or electronic dictionary was likely to encourage browsing and an interest in words. This means including some unusual and interesting words. You just need to look in children’s picture books to find some fascinating words which have a strong imaginative appeal, for example ‘rumpus’ in Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are (The Bodley Head), ‘exultation’ (of larks) in Patricia MacCarthy’s Herds of Words (Pan MacMillan) and ‘migration’ in Karen Wallace’s Think of an Eel (Walker Books).
New dictionaries in different media and format, and for all age groups, are published constantly. I have given some examples in the analysis above, but anyone updating their dictionary selection would find it helpful to look at the titles from some of the main publishers of children’s reference books which include: Collins, Dorling Kindersley, Global Software Publishing, Kingfisher, Oxford University Press and Usborne.
This is the complete article, containing 1,095 words
(approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page).
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