dictionary skills: warthog
The Grammar Bit!
Learning how to use a dictionary is an important skill – one which you will be very familiar with now that you are in year 6. Dictionaries can be used to help you understand the meaning of a word and ‘stretch’ your vocabulary. They can also be used to help you spell a word correctly.
Dictionaries are ordered alphabetically with words that begin with A at the front and those that begin with Z at the back. Once you have found the general location of a word in the dictionary, you will need to look at the second, third and sometimes the fourth letters of a word to find its exact location. (Using a dictionary’s guide words, located at the top of each page, will speed up the process of finding the word that you need.)
Read the three scintillating sentences opposite. With your talk partner, use a dictionary to quickly locate one of the words highlighted in bold. How quickly were you able to do this? What is the meaning of this word?
Scintillating Sentences
1) The animatronic warthog must be accepted by the group.
2) By ferreting out parasites like ticks and fleas, the mongooses help keep the warthogs groomed.
3) For the warthogs, it’s worth enduring the pain of their mongoose beauty treatment.
Did you know?
At night, warthogs sleep underground. However, they do not dig their own burrows. Instead, they steal the burrows that other animals (such as aardvarks) have created.