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Strategies for Building Your Vocabulary

1. Read and check.

When you are reading and you come to a word you don’t know, check the surrounding words (the context) to help figure out its meaning. Here are some ways to do this:

• Study the sentence containing the word, as well as the sentences that come before and after it.
• Search for synonyms (words with the same meaning).
  

  Because I plan to be an actor, Dad calls me a thespian. (A thespian is an “actor.”)

• Search for antonyms (words with the opposite meaning).
  

  Dad says fishing is tedious, but I think it’s exciting.(Tedious means “boring,” the opposite of “exciting.”)

• Search for a definition of the word.
  

  We saw yuccas, common desert plants, on our drive to the Grand Canyon. (Yuccas are “common desert plants.”)

• Search for familiar words in a series with the new word.
  

  In the South, many houses have a veranda, porch, or patio.(A veranda is a large, open porch.)