didactic

See also: didàctic

English

WOTD – 26 April 2010

Alternative forms

• didactick (obsolete)

Etymology

From French didactique, from Ancient Greek διδακτικός (didaktikós, “skilled in teaching”), from διδακτός (didaktós, “taught, learnt”), from διδάσκω (didáskō, “I teach, educate”).

Pronunciation

• enPR: dī-dăkˈtĭk, IPA^(key): /daɪˈdæk.tɪk/, /dɪˈdæk.tɪk/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: di‧dac‧tic

Adjective

didactic (comparative more didactic, superlative most didactic)

1. Instructive or intended to teach or demonstrate, especially with regard to morality.
   • 1837 Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution: A History

     Falling Bastilles, Insurrections of Women, thousands of smoking Manorhouses, a country bristling with no crop but that of Sansculottic steel: these were tolerably didactic lessons; but them [the Nobility] they have not taught.

   didactic poetry

   • Macaulay:

     The finest didactic poem in any language.

2. Excessively moralizing.
3. (medicine) Teaching from textbooks rather than laboratory demonstration and clinical application.

Synonyms

1. (Intended to teach or demonstrate): educative, instructive

Derived terms

Derived terms

• didact
• didactical
• didactically
• nondidactic
• autodidactic

• didacticism
• didacticist
• didacticistic
• undidactic
• autodidacticism

Translations

instructive or intended to teach or demonstrate

• Azerbaijani: ibrətli
• Catalan: didàctic
• Danish: didaktisk, belærende
• Finnish: didaktinen (fi), opettavainen, kasvattava (fi)
• French: didactique (fr)
• German: didaktisch (de)
• Italian: didattico (it), didascalico (it) m
• Norwegian: didaktisk

• Persian: تعلیمی‎ (fa) (ta'limi)
• Portuguese: didático (pt)
• Russian: наставнический (ru) (nastavničeskij), нравоучительный (ru) (nravoučitelʹnyj), дидакти́ческий (ru) (didaktíčeskij),
• Serbo-Croatian: didàktičkī (sh)
• Spanish: didáctico (es)
• Swedish: didaktisk (sv)
• Turkish: eğitici (tr), eğitsel (tr), didaktik (tr), öğretici (tr), öğretsel

excessively moralizing

• Danish: didaktisk, docerende
• Finnish: opettavainen

• Russian: нравоучительный (ru) (nravoučitelʹnyj)

teaching from textbooks rather than laboratory demonstration and application

• Catalan: didàctic
• Finnish: teoreettinen (fi)

• French: livresque (fr)
• Turkish: öğretici (tr)

Noun

didactic (plural didactics)

1. (archaic) A treatise on teaching or education.

Translations

treatise on teaching