didactic

[ dahy-dak-tik ]

adjective

1. intended for instruction; instructive:

   didactic poetry.

2. inclined to teach or lecture others too much:

   a boring, didactic speaker.

   Synonyms: pedagogical, donnish, preachy, pedantic

3. teaching or intending to teach a moral lesson.
4. didactics, (used with a singular verb) the art or science of teaching.

didactic

/ dɪˈdæktɪk /

adjective

1. intended to instruct, esp excessively
2. morally instructive; improving
3. (of works of art or literature) containing a political or moral message to which aesthetic considerations are subordinated

Derived Forms

• diˈdacticism, noun
• diˈdactically, adverb

Other Words From

• di·dacti·cal·ly adverb
• di·dacti·cism noun
• nondi·dactic adjective
• nondi·dacti·cal·ly adverb
• undi·dactic adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of didactic¹

First recorded in 1635–45; from Greek didaktikós “apt at teaching, instructive,” from didakt(ós) “that may be taught, teachable” (from didáskein “to teach”) + -ikos -ic

Word History and Origins

Origin of didactic¹

C17: from Greek didaktikos skilled in teaching, from didaskein to teach

Example Sentences

It seems to have captured the quality of independence and self-determination without being didactic that kind of caught people’s imagination.

From Outside Online

Instead, “TV Buddha” appears in a gallery crowded with other pieces, busy with didactics.

From Washington Post

So she has chosen the path as her literary heroes, Charles Dickens and George Orwell: the entertaining but didactic novel.

From The Daily Beast

Many schools seem to include both didactic sessions and practice sessions with simulated patients.

From The Daily Beast

Will the next few hours be both didactic and entertaining, providing us with ample high and lowbrow cocktail party fodder?

From The Daily Beast

A footnote toward the end of the book gives a short, wonderful history of human adornment, but the discussion remains didactic.

From The Daily Beast

Your father hated didactic writings, hence this book had to be extremely playful ... I had to imagine him.

From The Daily Beast

His plays are essentially didactic, being aimed at some weakness or iniquity of the social system.

From Project Gutenberg

In didactic poetry Lucretius was pre-eminent, and is regarded by Schlegel as the first of Roman poets in native genius.

From Project Gutenberg

This discussion is necessarily didactic and assertive for it is impossible to prove or disprove any of these postulates.

From Project Gutenberg

Some, as that of Sidi-Yusef-Hansali, are mild in their rites and of a purely didactic or religious nature.

From Project Gutenberg

With him the last spark of the didactic ideals of the Haskala has entirely vanished.

From Project Gutenberg