Saturday, January 8, 2011

Ninja Words - A Super Fast Dictionary

While looking on the web for more reading resources, I found Ninja Words, a super fast online dictionary created by Phil Crosby. Type a word in the search box and Ninja Words shows the definition(s) within a few seconds. Wiktionary provides the definitions. You can get single definitions by typing in the word in the search box and pressing Enter or typing in a combination of words separated by a comma and get multiple definitions to compare. Typing the terms in the browser address bar is another quick way for results. The history of your searches will show on the right of the screen or can be hidden from view.

Students would find this a good resource on any computer for all subjects. They could create their list of definitions for a particular assignment or topic and then bookmark it for later use or even send that link to other members of the class. Divide and conquer the work load!

Linking Ninja Words on your blog would allow students to quickly look up words they were having trouble with understanding or pronouncing while reading the blog articles.
Firefox or IE 7+ allows you to type in the Ninja Words address plus the words in question in your search toolbar and will bring up definitions, synonyms, antonyms, and thesaurus examples.

For those of you with an iPhone, try out the Ninja Words application by Matchstick Software. Some of the features listed on the site are:

• Works completely offline.
• Spellcheck!
• Word of the day each time you start the app.
• Touch to get a random vocabulary word.
• Recents.
• Favorites.
• Thesaurus (each definition has synonyms)

One of my favorite features would be Pronunciations! Although it requires network access, it has audio pronunciations for words with a click on the speaker icon. I wonder if there are different languages.

So, if you want to be like a Ninja – smart, accurate, and really fast – try using Ninja Words the next time you need a definition.

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