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Rationale

     As a rule primary, secondary and sometimes higher shool pupils/students are taught and asked by their teachers to keep so called vocabularies. Students' school vocabulary is a little exercise book where students usually write new English words, their meanings and sometimes pronunciation. Students usually start keeping vocabulary at the first form. I am a student of the eighth form and I still keep one. Being a student of the first form I have taken an ordinary thin exercise book and started writing new words, their pronunciation and meanings in Russian. Since that time I have been changing  exercise books by starting a new one after completing the previouse one. Now I don't write the transcription of the words, because I think it takes a lot of time and I know how to read words in English, though sometimes I make mistakes. I write words which can get me in trouble.

     Not long ago I started carying a paper pocket dictionary for school students, because there are more words, besides, they are in alphabetical order and there is transcription of the words. Then you can understand what part of speach the words are because there is corresponding abbreviation next to each word. As a student of the eighth form I started using one and the same words in different contexts with different meanings, so I need to know several meanings of the same word. The pocket dictionary I use gives them, though not as many as my cousebook sometimes provides or requires. So I still need my handwritten vocabularty. Even though the pocket dictionary provides some information on synonims a word I work with, still some information is missing in it.

 

     Sometimes I want to know when and how the word appeared in the language, then while practising some grammatical aspects  I need some information about whether a noun  is countable or uncounable, what prepositions I can/should use with the word and some other gramma issues. Beginners usually learn the meanings of a word,  pronunciation and spelling. Seniour students do grammar exercises on wordbuilding, synonyms, countable/uncountable nouns, use of the article. For example, in the Activity Book of the 8 form on page 5 the exercise 6 is on wordbuilding. In the Student's Book on page 116 there are phrasal verbs. On page 117 there is an  exercise on how to differentiate meanings of the same words. On page 126 the exercise 57,B is on synonyms. On page 127 the exercise 59 is on wordbuilding.

     My pocket dictionary contains pronunciation of the word, its meanings, what part of speech it is and some limited examples of wordbuilding. It also contains some information on modal and irregular verbs, but very often the information I need is not provided by the pocket dictionary. I know that modern technologies give us access to some online electronic dictionaries and even those which you can have in your telephone even if you are not online. In an electronic dictionary there is more information than a paper dictionary as there isn't the problem of the volume. Big paper dictionaries aren't comfortable to carry. That's why an e-dictionary is more useful than a paper dictionary. But the advantage of a paper dictionary is that it doesn't depend of the battery.

     So the question is what dictionary to use to  become a successful language learner. I need to find an ideal dictionary for myself. To answer the question I need to  learn

- what types of dictionaries there are;

- what information each type of dictionary provides and to what extend it meets my needs;

- find out what scientists tell us about compiling dictionaries;

- ask my classmates and school friends what dictionaries they use.

I need to define my own needs. In order to do it I have to

- look through the exercises I do;

- ask myself what information on the words I ask my teacher to satisfy my curiosity.

- ask my elder brother what information I will need in the nearest future.

     I decided to carry out my research online because of the advanages of modern online dictionaries I mentioned previously and availability of online resources.

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