When I think back on my days in high school, I always wanted to be the smartest person in the class by saying the least. I depended on my writing abilities to get me there. I never used the thesaurus tool, but I knew many people who did because they wanted to "spice up" their papers.
A friend and I were discussing this at lunch the other day. She needed to write a paper, and she wanted to use different words than what she normally uses. I warned her that it could be a bad idea to use the thesaurus tool because sometimes the words are synonyms, but they do not make sense in the context of the sentence or paragraph.
Then I failed at being funny by trying to make a joke that she did not get.
Anyways, with more and more schools buying more kinds of technologies, how appropriate would it be for students to use a thesaurus app on an iPad or similar device in school? Would they benefit from expanding their vocabulary in a new way, or would the words be learned and forgotten?
Personally, I have always used a thesaurus when writing papers so I think it is very helpful. However, if I find a word that I think I want to use I look it up in the dictionary to make sure it fits my sentence. If students are being cautious and checking the words that they are using, I think it could expand their vocabulary. Although, if students are just plugging in random words it could very easily go wrong (like the episode of "Friends")!
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that it could go both ways depending on the student. However,I feel that this provides a new learning opportunity for students, one teachers can take advantage of. For instance, a teacher could give students a list of words and have them find a synonym for each of the words on their device, and then throughout the week give students various assignments or activities encouraging them to apply these synonyms in order to learn them.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Renea. It's a great idea to use a thesaurus, but the student then has to consider if the word makes sense in the context of the sentence. I agree that using a dictionary if they aren't sure is the best bet. We don't want our students to become to dependent on technology, but sometimes the thesauraus tool can be valuable, if only it is used properly.
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