Spotlight: September 2004: Choosing a First Dictionary for Young Children Looking for the right kind of first Dictionary for a young reader is a task that should not be taken lightly. I embarked on this journey last month.

In April 2004, I was informed that I have a 5 year old kindergartner, who was assessed at having the reading ability and instructional capability of a 2nd grader in the 4th month of the school year. Takes a while to figure out what that means! Well, those were the results that the STAR Accelerated Reader program showed. I guess I was supposed to be thrilled that I had a precocious kindergartner, now 6 years old and a brand new 1st grader.

I hate these tests that try to place a child’s ability by comparing them to other children or national averages. Why? Because it tells me nothing that I did not already know about my child and it certainly does not help me assist my child’s development in any way. What is worse is that those administering these tests leave the future course of action open to you, the parent, to figure out what it is you should do with the information they just presented.

So, I decided that she was ripe for her very first Dictionary because she was asking all the right questions and I was running out of answers that did not require other big words. But, which dictionary should I choose? I went to research source #1 and Googled for “First Dictionary” and I was not surprised when the first result led me to Amazon. At this point, I had no clue what my decision should be based on. As I did more research on Amazon, I slowly formulated my criteria:

• number of words
• easy to understand definitions
• illustrations
• examples
• a kid-friendly pronunciation key

Notice that price did not figure in the list above. At least, not yet.

My first shortlist looked like this:

• Scholastic First Dictionary
  by Judith Levey
  1500 words


• Macmillan First Dictionary
  by Judith S. Levey
  2200 words


• Macmillan Dictionary for Children
  by Robert B. Costello
  35,000 words
  


• DK Children’s Illustrated Dictionary
  By John McIlwain
  5000 words


• The McGraw-Hill Children's Dictionary
  by Vincent Douglas
  30,000 words

Still not sure which dictionary to choose, I went back to Google and found the web site of Charles Harrington Elster, a lexicomane and a logophile. No, he does not have a terrible disease. It just means that he loves dictionaries and words. Charlie’s dictionary recommendations are mainly for older children and adults. Not 6 year olds who are advanced readers. So I wrote to him. And he replied. I could not believe it!! How many people respond to emails written to them by absolute strangers these days? Well, two co-founders of Tripod did, too, but that was another email, another story.

Here’s what Charlie had to say:

He added a few pearls of wisdom to my existing criteria for choosing a dictionary:
So which dictionary did I buy? After all this research and thought, I found our dictionary at Sam’s Club quite by mistake. They had the McGraw-Hill Children’s Dictionary with the Thesaurus on display. It was like they knew what I was looking for. I remembered this combination being listed on Amazon for $44.95. I bought it for $14.98. I figured if the dictionary was not good enough, I could always return it. Price was not part of my decision-making criteria but this was a steal at that price.

The The McGraw-Hill Children's Dictionary is a superb resource. It fits Charlie’s description like a glove. It has wonderful illustrations and the definitions are very easy to understand. Each definition is followed by an example of the word used in a sentence. My daughter is enjoying it immensely!! She's diving into it all the time. And very often one word leads to another. I was worried about the pronunciation key but that is fairly simplified, too. It is also a nice thick book, which in it and by itself makes her feel very important!!

Thank you, Charlie!!

I intend to keep a lookout for The Thorndike Barnhart Beginning Dictionary as I am pretty sure we will be needing it within the next year or so, if my daughter continues to progress at the current pace. It is currently out of print and only used copies of this dictionary are available. I am looking for a copy that is from a pet-free home and is reasonably well-used as that means that the pages will not smell musty or stick to one another.




  ¶ 9/24/2004 12:22:00 AM 0 Comments