The Grade 4 English Dictionary.

An old saying that carries a piece of advice.

Adages and proverbs are short sayings that have been repeated so long they became common property, and each one packs a lesson. Don't count your chickens before they hatch means don't plan on something you haven't got yet. They differ from idioms in that a proverb is advice, while an idiom is just a colorful way of saying something.

Capital letters start sentences and mark names of specific people, places, and things.

Capitalize the first word of a sentence, the word I, and proper nouns — the names of particular people, places, days, months, and titles. The rule that catches people out is particular versus general: a river is lowercase, but the Mississippi River is capitalized, because there is only one of it.

The people in a story — and you learn what they're like from what they DO.

Writers rarely announce that a character is kind or stubborn; they show it through actions, words, and thoughts, and let you work it out. That is why describing a character in fourth grade always comes with the question "how do you know?" — the answer must be something the character actually did on the page.

Reading two things about one topic and noticing where they agree and disagree.

Two writers on the same topic will pick different facts, use different words, and sometimes flatly disagree. Putting them side by side shows you things neither one alone would — including that you should probably check a third source when they conflict.

A sentence needs someone and something they do — no more running two together, no more stopping halfway.

A complete sentence has a subject (who or what) and a predicate (what they do or are), and it expresses a whole thought. A fragment is missing one of those and leaves the reader hanging. A run-on jams two complete sentences together with no punctuation to separate them. The fix for a run-on is a period, or a comma plus a joining word like and or but.

Using the words around an unknown word to work out what it means.

You almost never need to stop reading at a word you don't know. The sentence around it usually gives it away — sometimes with a definition right there, sometimes with an example, sometimes by contrast with a word you do know. Guessing from context and then checking is how most people's vocabulary actually grows.

Fixing spelling, punctuation, and grammar — the last pass, after revising.

Editing is the close-up pass for correctness: spelling, capital letters, punctuation, and grammar. It comes after revising, because there is no point perfecting the punctuation of a sentence you are about to delete. Reading your work out loud is the single best editing trick — your ear catches what your eye skips.

Words that sound the same but mean different things — the ones spellcheck won't catch.

These are the traps: to (toward), too (also, or more than enough), two (the number 2); there (a place), their (belonging to them), they're (they are); your (belonging to you), you're (you are). Spellcheck cannot help, because every one of them is a real word. The test that works: say the long version out loud — if "they are" fits, write they're.

The strand about how sentences are built and where the punctuation goes.

One of the five parts of fourth-grade English. Grammar is not a list of rules to be scared of — it is the set of moves that lets a sentence say exactly what you meant. In fourth grade you learn the words that join ideas together, the tenses that show something was still happening, and the punctuation that makes people's talking look like talking on the page.

A saying that means something completely different from what the words say.

An idiom is a phrase whose meaning you cannot work out from its words. It's raining cats and dogs has nothing to do with animals. Idioms are the hardest thing about English for someone learning it, because context clues fail: the only way to know is to be told, or to hear it used.

Writing that explains something clearly — teaching, not arguing.

Informative writing has one job: leave the reader understanding something they didn't. You introduce the topic, group related facts together in paragraphs, use the real vocabulary of the subject, and finish with a closing that ties it up. Your opinion stays out of it. Headings and diagrams are allowed and often help.

The words that show how one idea connects to the next — for instance, in order to, also, however.

Linking words are the signposts that keep a reader from getting lost between sentences. Some add (also, in addition), some show cause (because, therefore, in order to), some give examples (for instance), and some turn (however, on the other hand). Writing without them reads like a list; writing with them reads like thinking.

What a piece of writing is mostly about, held up by the details underneath it.

The main idea is the one sentence the whole passage is trying to get across; the details are the facts and examples that support it. A common mix-up is grabbing an interesting detail instead of the main idea. The test: does every other sentence in the passage help explain this one? If not, you picked a detail.

A helping verb — can, may, must, should, might — that changes how sure or how required something is.

Modals are small words that sit in front of a verb and change its temperature. Can means able to; may means allowed to or possibly; must means required; might means maybe; should means it would be a good idea. Swapping one modal for another can change a suggestion into an order.

Telling a story — real or made up — with events in an order that makes sense.

A narrative sets up a situation, introduces a narrator or characters, and unfolds events in a natural order. What makes it good in fourth grade is detail and dialogue: showing what people said and did instead of announcing how they felt. It ends with something that follows from what came before, not with "and then I woke up."

Writing that argues for what you think — and gives reasons, not just feelings.

Opinion writing states what you believe and then earns it. The shape: say your opinion, give reasons, back each reason with a fact or example, and finish by restating what you want the reader to think or do. "Because I like it" is not a reason; a reason has to be something that would also convince someone who doesn't agree with you.

English puts adjectives in a certain order, and everyone follows it without being taught.

When you stack adjectives in front of a noun, English wants them in a particular order — roughly opinion, size, age, shape, color, origin, material. Nobody teaches this rule, but everyone follows it: a small red bag sounds right and a red small bag sounds wrong. Fourth grade is where you notice the rule you already obey.

Who is telling the story — and what they can and cannot know.

In first person the narrator is in the story and says I; you only ever learn what that person knows, which means they can be wrong. In third person the narrator is outside, saying he, she, or they, and often knows more than any single character. Noticing the point of view tells you how much to trust what you are being told.

A word part added to the FRONT of a word that changes its meaning.

Prefixes are small, and each one does one job: un- and dis- mean not or the opposite, re- means again, pre- means before, mis- means wrongly. Learn a handful and you can unlock hundreds of words you have never seen, because the prefix does the same thing every time.

A little group of words starting with a preposition, telling where, when, or how.

A preposition is a word like in, on, under, before, with, or through, and the phrase it starts runs to the noun that follows it: under the bed, before dinner, with a spoon. These phrases add where, when, and how without needing a new sentence. A useful trick: most prepositions describe somewhere a squirrel could go relative to a tree.

A verb form that shows an action was, is, or will be still going on.

The progressive tenses use a form of be plus a verb ending in -ing. They tell you an action was in the middle of happening, not finished. "I walked" is done; "I was walking" is a story about to be interrupted. Past: I was walking. Present: I am walking. Future: I will be walking.

Quotation marks around the exact words someone says, with a comma joining them to who said it.

Quotation marks go around exactly what came out of a person's mouth — nothing more. A comma separates the speech from the he said or she asked, and it goes inside the quotation marks. Start a new paragraph every time a different person speaks, so the reader never loses track of who is talking.

The strand about what a story means, who is telling it, and how you prove your answer.

One of the five parts of fourth-grade English. Fourth grade is where reading stops being 'what happened' and starts being 'what does it mean, and how do you know?' You learn to find the theme underneath the plot, to notice who is telling the story, and — the habit that matters most — to point at the words on the page that back up what you just said.

The strand about getting facts out of real books, articles, and websites.

One of the five parts of fourth-grade English. Reading to learn is a different skill from reading a story: you hunt for the main idea, notice how the writing is organized, use the headings and diagrams instead of skipping them, and ask whether the writer actually gave reasons for what they claim. This is where being a careful reader turns into being hard to fool.

Checking whether a writer actually backed up what they claimed.

When a writer says something should be done or something is true, fourth grade asks: what reasons did they give, and what evidence backs each reason? A reason explains why; evidence is the fact, number, or example that proves it. Noticing when a writer gives you neither is the beginning of not being fooled.

The words where, when, and why, used to add information about a place, a time, or a reason.

Relative adverbs do the same hooking job as relative pronouns, but for places, times, and reasons instead of people and things. Where attaches to a place, when to a time, why to a reason.

A word — who, whose, whom, which, that — that hooks extra information onto a noun.

A relative pronoun lets you glue a second idea onto a noun instead of starting a whole new sentence. Use who for people, which for things, and that for either. The pronoun points back at the noun it is describing, so the reader always knows who you mean.

Changing what your writing SAYS — adding, cutting, and moving things around.

Revising is the big-picture pass: is anything missing, is anything in the wrong order, is anything here that doesn't belong? It is not fixing spelling — that comes later. Cutting is the part nobody expects: taking out a sentence you liked, because it wasn't helping, usually makes the piece better.

The core of a word, left after you take off the prefixes and suffixes.

Under most long words is a short one carrying the meaning. Strip unhelpfully down and you find help. Some roots come from Latin and Greek and appear everywhere once you notice them: port means carry (transport, portable), and tele means far (telephone, television). Finding the root is the fastest way to guess a word.

Where and when a story happens — and it usually shapes what can happen.

Setting is the place and the time. It is not just scenery: change the setting and the story often cannot work the same way. A tale about being lost in the woods becomes a different story on a spaceship, or in a city, or a hundred years earlier.

Two ways of comparing — a simile says like or as, a metaphor just says it IS.

A simile compares two things using like or as: she ran like the wind. A metaphor drops the like and states it flatly: she was a rocket. The metaphor is stronger precisely because it does not hedge. Both are ways of explaining something by holding it next to something the reader already knows.

A word part added to the END of a word — it often changes what kind of word it is.

Suffixes usually change a word's job as well as its meaning. -ful means full of, -less means without, -able means can be, -ly turns a describing word into a how word, and -ness turns a describing word into a thing. Notice that care, careful, careless, and carefully are all one root wearing different endings.

A short retelling of the important parts — in your own words, without your opinion.

A summary keeps the main events in order and leaves out the small details, and it does not include what you thought of the story. The hard part is deciding what counts as important: ask whether the story would still make sense if you left a thing out. If yes, leave it out.

Synonyms mean nearly the same; antonyms mean the opposite — and 'nearly' is the interesting part.

Synonyms are words with close meanings and antonyms are words with opposite ones. The fourth-grade insight is that synonyms are almost never exactly equal: big, huge, and gigantic are synonyms, but they are not interchangeable. Choosing between near-synonyms is most of what good writing is.

Pointing at the actual words in the book that show your answer is right.

Text evidence is the sentence you can put your finger on. In fourth grade almost every reading answer comes with "how do you know?" and the only acceptable answer is a quote or a specific detail from the text — not a feeling, and not something you assumed. This one habit is what separates reading from guessing.

Headings, bold words, captions, diagrams, maps — the parts that aren't the paragraphs.

Text features are everything on the page that isn't running text: headings, bold or italic words, captions, labels, diagrams, charts, glossaries, and indexes. They are not decoration — a writer uses them to tell you what matters and where to find it. Skimming the headings before reading is a real strategy, not cheating.

The shape a writer chose — in order, cause and effect, compare, or problem and solution.

Non-fiction writing comes in a few standard shapes: chronological (in time order), cause and effect, compare and contrast, problem and solution, and description. Spotting the shape early tells you what to expect next and makes the whole thing easier to hold in your head. Signal words give it away — because and so mean cause and effect; but and however mean compare.

The lesson or big idea underneath a story — not the same as what happened.

The plot is what happened; the theme is what the story is saying about life. A theme is usually not stated outright, so you find it by looking at what the main character learns or how they change by the end. Write a theme as a sentence about people in general, not about the character: not "Maya learned to share," but "Sharing is worth more than keeping."

The strand about figuring out words you have never seen, and the ones that don't mean what they say.

One of the five parts of fourth-grade English, and the one that quietly does the most work. Instead of memorizing word lists, you learn how words are built out of pieces, how the sentence around a word gives it away, and how to hear when someone means something other than the plain words — a simile, an idiom, an old saying.

The strand about the three kinds of writing, and the fact that nobody gets it right the first time.

One of the five parts of fourth-grade English. You learn three jobs writing can do — argue for something, explain something, tell a story — and that each one has its own shape. The other half of the strand is the part people skip: real writing is rewritten. Planning, revising, and editing are not punishment for a bad draft; they are how every draft becomes good.