Visual Dictionary

Mirriam-Webster have an online Visual Dictionary that is pretty handy, thanks to The SMARTBoard Podcast for this. It’s a very well laid out visual dictionary. There are a couple of different ways you can search the dictionary.

Firstly is by word – type in a word or the start of a word in the search box and it will show you the matches (if there is more than one). Choose the word you want and click GO TO and you are away.

Secondly you can find by theme. On the main page there are 15 different areas ranging from astronomy, clothing & articles, communication, society, sports and games etc. Here you just click on your area and then continue through the lists that it presents to you narrowing down each time until you come to the word you want. Or if you’re like me you will just play around until you find an interesting word or image.

Once you’re at your word you can see the image and also a description of the word. You can click on the small red arrows and a new window will open where you can listen to the word being pronounced. For some images there are labelled diagrams or coloured diagrams such as this one for Automobile Systems.

This is a cool tool to have for your visual learners or when you’re kids just don’t understand a word, what better way to show them. I use google images search for this reason, but at times it can be a bit risky. There is also a very cool Game Of The Week where they take an object and give you the labelled diagram and your job is to fit in the correct words. Would be a great language/reading opening activity once a week to do up on the SMARTboard or through a projector.

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