The American Heritage Student Dictionary Review

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The American Heritage Student Dictionary ReviewMy six year old needed a dictionary to look up words for her Junior Great Books homework. At first, I was drawn to dictionaries written for 8-10 year olds. They had larger print and flashier, more colorful pictures. Unfortunately, they didn't do the job of providing definitions for the unfamiliar words we needed to define (this week we needed to find tun, puncheon, bewail, and beadle.) I was forced to look at dictionaries aimed at an older audience and found that many were just not visually appealing. I didn't want a bland reference book that would be opened as little as necessary. I wanted something worth flipping through on a rainy day.
When I opened this one up, I was pleased to see a good number of color photographs. On one two page spread, for example, there are pictures of Thelonius Monk, a Monolith (on Easter Island), the Sydney Monorail, James Monroe, a montage (of photographs showing things in London), and Maria Montessori. The photos are clear and well chosen; I learned what a mummer and a samovar are by just flipping through and finding interesting photos of them. Even more importantly, it actually had definitions for the words my daughter was looking for, in type that wasn't too small for her to read!
This dictionary uses the pronunciation you're familiar with from collegiate dictionaries, with a small key for the symbols printed on the bottom left hand margin of every two page spread. It's a nice "training wheel" in the transition to this formal way of writing pronunciations. There are also shaded boxes in some of the outside margins that give information about word building, usage, geography, and science. A few short biographies are also included in colored boxes in the margins. I found these to be interesting and informative for kids and adults alike (do you know what the words enthuse, donate, and diagnose have in common?) A two page spread with the periodic table is found after the entry for "element," rather than at the back or front of the book in a reference section; similar space is dedicated to other words like "taxonomy" and "solar system." Simple etymology for many words is included at the end of the entries. For example, for acupuncture it says "First written down in 1684 in English : Latin acus, needle + English puncture."
The scope of this dictionary makes it useful as a family reference book throughout elementary and middle school. It has all of the words your kids will encounter in their reading, plus a few words that might be new to most adults.The American Heritage Student Dictionary Overview

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