Vocabulary Lesson 5
Memorizing definitions by using context clues
and visualization
Giddy
• Causing dizziness
• Lighthearted
• Silly
• foolish
Visual Challenge
• Think of something that makes you dizzy
Now think about the merry-go-round:
• It’s fun, silly, foolish, and to make the horses go you might say “giddy-up”
• ….get it? … giddy• Causing dizziness; lighthearted; silly;
foolish
interminable
• Having or seeming to have, no end
Visual challenge
• Think of the super hero that never dies….
• A series of popular movies starring the former Governor of California…
• Who is it?
• A Context clue in the word itself is
• Termi
• I N T E R M I N A B L E
Did you guess the TERMINATOR?
• The terminator is a character that never ends…
• The definition is seeming to have no end.
wary
• Watchful• Cautious• This may be the feeling you would get while walking on a dark street.
Visual Challenge
•Think of how the word wary sounds similar to the word scary…
You would be wary walking down a scary street!
•Wary: watchful and cautious
Convoluted
• Complicated
• Having many overlapping folds or paths
Visual Challenge
• “CON” is a prefix for against
• Visualize v-o-l-u-t-e-d sounds a bit like vault looted….and a person can not easily enter a vault and loot it!
• It is too complicated to loot a vault, right?
You can not loot a vault!
• It is convoluted:
• Too complicated
But, if you do
•Take the loot,
• You must have a clever plan to…
evade
• Escape or avoid by cleverness
EVADE
• To escape or avoid by cleverness
innocuous
• Harmless
• A rubber knife would be innocuous
Visual Challenge
• To inoculate someone is to give the person a vaccination against a disease…the disease is then harmless. Inoculate comes from the same root as innocuous.
• Visualize a vaccination! • (if you dare)
Ouch!• Inoculate…• innocuous…• to make
harmless!
• No germs can harm me now!
enhance
• To heighten or intensify
• To make greater in value
Visual challenge
• “enhance” sounds a little like “in hands”
Visualize yourself with hands full of flowers, planting them in front of our
school• Flowers “in
hands,”enhance the beauty of our school.
• Enhance: to make greater in value; to heighten; to intensify
insuperable
• Impossible to overcome
Visual Challenge and a Context Clue
• Within the word is hidden a word that symbolizes another hero…a super hero
• Who is this man of steel?
“SUPERMAN”• Superman is
impossible to overcome.
• The definition of insuperable is impossible to overcome!
• What a coincidence!
endorse
• To give support or approval to something
Visual Challenge
• Imagine a famous person, perhaps a famous baseball player.
• This player is signing autographs.
• He approves of a product he uses and wants you to use it too.
• Some famous people make money by selling their autographs.
He is endorsing a baseball for some children. He approves of this activity!
• Endorse: to give approval
impede
• To interfere with
• To slow the progress of
Visual Challenge and Context Clue
• The underlined part of this word impede has a sound similar to speed.
• “IM” is a prefix for “not”
• For example, “im” before possible creates the word impossible and changes the meaning from something that can be done to something that can not be done.
In conclusion,• Begin with the first word and visualize the
spot in the room assigned to that word.
• Think of the word and its definition.
• Go over the material silently, 5 times.
• Now see if you can write the words and definitions on your paper.
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