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Thesaurus Activities for Elementary School By James Mascia, eHow Contributor • S tudents usually learn how to use a dictionary very early on in their school career. Learning how to use a thesaurus, however, is often overlooked, as many teachers do not see a thesaurus as a necessary part of a child's education. Following this simple strategy, you can teach elementary students of any grade level how to use a thesaurus properly to help in their overall success. 1. ◦ 2. ◦ Explain the Thesaurus The first step to showing children how to use a thesaurus is to explain to them exactly what a thesaurus is and what it's used for. You must dispel the myth that a thesaurus is like a dictionary. The first time a child takes a look at a thesaurus, this is what he is going to think. You need to explain to your students that they won't find any definitions in the thesaurus, just synonyms. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star After explaining what a thesaurus is used for, a great first activity is this writing exercise. Give each of your students a copy of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and a piece of paper with the following words written on it: twinkle, little, star, wonder, up, above, world, high, diamond, sky. Have your students go through the thesaurus, find three synonyms for each word and write them on the paper. Then have them rewrite "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," replacing each of those words with one of the three they wrote down. Explain to them that not every word they find will always fit, so they need to choose words that will still make the poem make sense. Have your students recite their new poems to the class. 3. ◦ Friendly Letter Another great activity for students is to have them improve upon a writing sample. Give each of your students a letter that you have typed up beforehand (a great idea would be a letter that a character in a story you have read recently might have written). When you create the letter, use incredibly weak words -- words that are overused or are not "forceful" in their meaning -- so your students will have no choice but to improve the writing. Tell your students to read the letter, explaining that it is weak and needs to be stronger, which can be accomplished by using better words. Have them use the thesaurus to find words to replace the weak words in the letter and rewrite the letter with their improved words. Read more: Thesaurus Activities for Elementary School | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/list_5799341_thesaurus-activities-elementaryschool.html#ixzz1Yw6BmMky