Abstract:

Human beings are curious to learn new things. For a child, mother tongue is new as well as a foreign language. While children learn mother tongue in the family environment, they learn a foreign language through courses. This learning begins at the level of word and develops with the rules of other languages. New words enrich people’s vocabulary. This situation helps one person to communicate with others in a healthy way. The most important element in communication is meaningful messages. Healthy communication is provided with meaningful words. A child learns basic meaning of the words in a natural environment but they usually ask their parents to teach the description of the new words and abstract concepts. This is also an acceptable fact for foreign language learning. However, the meanings of many words are learned by the help of dictionary. Dictionaries with almost every type hold an important place in people's lives. Dictionaries are often used to learn the meaning of unknown words and different meanings of words. Dictionary which is more used as a reference contains the treasury of the language. In order to benefit from this treasury is required to read the dictionary. In this study, firstly, "Is the dictionary to be read or is the dictionary to be used only as a reference?" issues will be discussed. Then, we will focus on the benefits of reading the dictionary for students who study at the department of Turkish Language and Literature.

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