Words which illustrate their meaning

[Emma Wadmore]

This is a difficult one to explain! I have been doing some work with a class of 7-9 year olds where they have been formatting text so that the word illustrates itself, for instance the word 'rainbow' is written in the colours of the rainbow, 'triangle' is formatted to look like a triangle, 'circle' likewise. Other ones we have changed are 'lean', 'ghost', 'stretch', 'grow' etc. The lesson is taken from the ICT QCA for Year 3, but it doesn't give the word used to describe this effect. I used to know it. I have asked colleagues and even an education inspector who was visiting, but to no avail. Please help, it's driving me round the bend now!

[RobbieCook]

You're going to drive me insane as well, but I'm going to have a look for it. The word which keeps springing to the front of my mind is "onomatopoeia", but that's a word which represents its sound, as I'm sure you'll already know.

[Shad]

is it VIGNETTE...meaning word picture

[BobK]

Me too (insane, that is). I can add to the list of words that don't quite fit: a rebus is a representation of a word in the form of pictures that represent the syllables or other substrings of the target word - a bee and a table, say, for 'beatable".

I'll ask my son when next we speak; he did this in GCSE art a few years ago, and he's the sort of person who'd have remembered the official word.

b

[Shad]

i did not get that!

[BobK]

Originally Posted by Shad

i did not get that!

Which 'that' - Emma's post, Robbie's, or mine?

[Emma Wadmore]

Thanks to all who have replied so far. Robbie, you're right it's not onomatopoeia, and Bob it's not rebus. Shad, a vignette is a scene described by words rather than words being graphics themselves. I've attached a document with some samples. This is becoming as clear as mud!

[Wolfgang]

Is "calligram" the word you are looking for?