Word-Detective Assignment

Yesterday, I mentioned about finding the important words in any writing or communication. Review that post to identify those types of words.

Here is the assignment.

Pick three important words. You may have an idea of what they mean or they may be completely unfamiliar to you.

Step 1 -- without consulting a dictionary, write down the important word.
Step 2 -- based on the context in a sentence, (like replacing the word with a blank underline--like a "fill-in-the-blank question), write down your first impression of what the word means in this chapter.
Step 3 -- each time you come across the word again, see if your first impression or guess still fits. If so, go on. If not, write down an alternate meaning for the word or refine your original guess. If you do refine it, write down the second guess, etc. Keep doing that until you come to the end of the chapter.
Step 4 -- look up the word in the dictionary AFTER GOING THROUGH THE ABOVE STEPS. Compare the different different definitions the dictionary gives to your final guess as to a definition of the word. Write down the one that is the closest. (Most of the time you will find that you did at least get close. If not, still write down your guess and a dictionary definition--and chalk things up to experience.)

So, your final report for this assignment will be like this:
1. word 2. original guess 3. subsequent guesses if the original changes any 4. final guess 5. dictionary definition that most closely matches your homemade definition (if there is one close--if not, write down the one you think matches best to what the author was talking about.)

Do this for three different words.

(Yes, these reports do count toward your required number of posts for the week.)