Visualize the words using VISUWORDS

Holla!

I have been introduced with a few websites recently so I am all pumped up to try it all. Visuwords is one of them. It is an online graphical dictionary (as written in their website). So, is it as fun as it sounds? Lets check it out!

Am I the only one that thought
Visuwords sound like kinda Indians?hmm..

WHAT IS IT?

It is a tool that help you to search the meaning of the words, the connections between the meanings and their association with the other words and concepts so that you can get the whole picture of the word meaning. The most interesting part (I think it is interesting) is that the way they organize all the meaning and relationship of the words using kinda 'atomic structure-like' shape. ( Below, the right picture is the atomic structure and the left picture is the Visuwords picture. Aren't they look alike?...hmm)

                                       

WHO CAN USE IT?

This tool is suitable for students who:

• intermediate to advance level of English. The students with lower level of English might not understand how the system (the tool) work

HOW CAN IT BE USED IN TEACHING ENGLISH

• activate students' schemata for pre-reading activity

In some reading activity, the teacher might want to use Visuwords to activate students' schemata by showing them some difficult words meaning taken from Visuwords. As the tool explains a word meaning quite good, the students might understand the words better and might even get a picture of what the reading might be about. But please take note that use Visuwords for words that hard to explains so that students can get more benefits of the tool.

THEORY OF LEARNING USING THE TOOL

• So far, I can't think of one. I will update if I find one. (Do help me if you can. Thanks in advance.:p)

THINGS I LIKE ABOUT IT

• It gives lots of information about the words
• Unlike dictionary, it portrays words' meaning in a fun way (with colours, errors and the 'atomic structure' shape- great to impress students
• Besides giving the meaning of words, it provides us with example of the sentence using the words too
• It is free! No membership required to use the tool

THINGS I HATE ABOUT IT

• It is complicated to used- with all the errors showing the relationships that I don't really bother to know, I'm rather used my old thick dictionary to find words'meaning
• If you really want to look for the meaning only, Visuwords might take a lot of your time as it did not show the words meaning clearly, but showing all those relations and antonyms which you not need to know at that time
• It is quite confusing (When I tried it first time, I do find it confusing). With all errors and mix colours, it might not be something that we want to use just to know what a word means in a middle of our reading
• Sometimes, it explains words using a 'high level' words. Its like you have to search for the meaning of the word in the provided meaning ( please ask me about this if you still don't get what I'm trying to say)

STEP BY STEP TO USE VISUWORDS

Step 1: Go to Visuwords

Step 2: Enter the word that you want to know its meaning

Step 3: Press 'Enter' and the tool will generate the map of 
            word meanings and the type of relations those 
            meanings and related concepts have.

Enter a word

A map of the word's meaning appeared

EXTRA INFORMATION YOU NEED TO KNOW

• The various colours represent different types of connections. For examples, “is a kind of”, “is a member of”, “opposes”, etc. All of these connections are shown at the left hand side in the website
• When you move your mouse over a node, you will get more detailed descriptions and sample sentences. You can also drag the nodes and rearrange the image to concentrate on the parts you’re interested in.

Well, as you can expect (maybe some of you can...) I am not really into this tool. I might use it in my teaching if only I do not have any ideas to do my pre-reading activity. If you have any ideas in how to use it in classroom, please feel free share it with me.:-)