The Free Dictionary by Farlex: Vocabulary Practice

Details

Activity Description

Using this site, students will practice vocabulary by learning and using the word of the day, playing the spelling bee, and looking up two idioms and one acronym. Students can customize their page to include as many features as they like. Other features included in the side menu include a thesaurus, medical legal and financial dictionaries, acronyms, idioms, and encyclopedias.

This Web site is rich in possibilities. Beyond vocabulary practice the site offers a variety of dictionaries in various languages (Spanish, German, French, Italian, Arabic, Chinese, Polish, Portuguese, Dutch, Norwegian, Greek, Russian and Turkish). There are games to play: Hangman, Spelling Bee, Words Within Words, Matching. There are also great sources of information: Article of the Day; In the News; This Day in History; Today's Holiday; Today's Birthday; and Quotation of the Day.

Preparation

1. Preview the site to familiarize yourself with all it's features.
2. Print the Example Document titled Vocabulary Practice, one or more for each student.
3. Practice the different activities as you will be demonstrating them for the students.

How-To

1. Introduce the Web site.
2. Show the various features of the site.
3. Have students work in pairs to go through different parts of the Web site.
4. Hand out Vocabulary Practice worksheet.
5. Students fill in the word of the day for the next day, bring the worksheet to class and discuss what they learned.
6. See our suggestions for using The Free Dictionary app under Related Resources (above).

Teacher Tips

• You can start your day with the site. Have the assignment on the board and have students fill out the worksheet before class discussion begins.
• TheFreeDictionary now allows you to create your own personal homepage. This would be a fun activity to do with students, going over the various features together.

More Ways

Use the other features:

• Games to play:
  • Hangman
  • Spelling Bee
  • Words Within Words
  • Matching
• Sources of information:
  • Article of the Day
• In the News
• This Day in History
• Today's Holiday
• Today's Birthday
• Quotation of the Day
• Encyclopedia

Program Areas

• ABE: Adult Basic Education

Levels

• Low
• Intermediate
• High
• All Levels

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