Why antonyms are important

One of the most creative "circumlocutions" I ever heard was a kid who didn't know the word for "sheets" and floundered until she came up with "clothes for the bed. I needed some food for thought as I get ready to focus on antonyms this week.

I enjoyed the description and connections to non examples I just learned the Frayer Model this summer in a science workshop and the circumlocution -very interesting. One of the chefs teaching was from Lyons, France. I spoke to him with my Quebec French and finally he - nicely but firmly - corrected my French. I think antonyms would be useful in working with dialect, as they would make the original word clearer when it is different in one dialect to the other, as the antonym would possibly be different also and the proper usage, therefore, easier to understand.

This is really hard to explain. Never heard "circumlocution" used like that before, but I certainly use the process a lot. I struggle with Spanish - sometimes going to the French word and then trying to think what it might be in Spanish. Sorry - I'm off the topic. Post as a guest or become a member today. New members welcome!

Join the conversation! Post now as a guest or become a member today. Welcome Teachers! Replace the underlined words in the paragraph with appropriate synonyms. Write the new paragraph on your own sheet of paper. When most people think of the Renaissance, they might think of artists like Michelangelo, Raphael, or Leonardo da Vinci, but they often overlook one of the very important figures of the Renaissance: Filippo Brunelleschi.

Brunelleschi was born in Florence, Italy in He is considered the very best architect and engineer of the Renaissance. A major blow to the progress of the construction happened in Brunelleschi had designed a special ship to carry the one hundred tons of marble needed for the dome.

He felt this would be the most inexpensive way to transport the marble, but the unthinkable happened. The ship went down to the bottom of the water , taking all the marble with it to the bottom of the river. Brunelleschi was really sad.

Nevertheless, he did not give up. He held true to his vision of the completed dome. Filippo Brunelleschi completed construction of the dome of Florence Cathedral in His influence on artists and architects alike was felt strongly during his lifetime and can still be felt in this day and age. On your own sheet of paper, write a sentence with each of the following words that illustrates the specific meaning of each synonym. When children do not just study the words, but also similar or opposite words, it ensures that they are not just completing a task.

Learning these extra words makes learning a well-rounded education because they are learning the language and not just a word in particular. They will cultivate the habit of looking up the words on their own because they would want to know some synonyms and antonyms.

If children develop the habit of learning more words associated with one particular word, they indirectly get trained for higher-level learning as well. In the future, the SATs and other advanced level exams would not scare them because they have been in the game for a long time. The thrill to read more new words, and find more information about them, or find words and feel the joy of already knowing the meaning is something else. Children who keep their vocabulary on a high will get into an automatic habit of reading more.

This entire process of knowing a word, finding its associate words will become like a recreational activity. They will take up vocabulary less like studying, and more like an exciting challenge. Synonyms and antonyms are not a part of the vocabulary but are the vocabulary itself.

Therefore, skipping only to definitions, and not knowing anything more about a particular word would not be a complete learning process. It would lack refined learning opportunities. There is an availability of several games that teachers and parents could include to make learning vocabulary fun.

Get Word of the Day daily email! Test Your Vocabulary. Can you spell these 10 commonly misspelled words? Love words? Need even more definitions? Homophones, Homographs, and Homonyms The same, but different. Ask the Editors 'Everyday' vs. What Is 'Semantic Bleaching'?