connect the dots

(redirected from connected the dots)

connect the dots

1. Literally, to draw a line between dots, often as part of a children's activity to create an illustration or design. The kids are having fun connecting the dots and making pretty pictures for us.

2. To understand something by piecing together hints or other bits of information. Once I started to connect the dots, I realized that, if they hadn't called me by now, I probably wasn't getting the job.

connect the ˈdots

(British English also join (up) the ˈdots) find or show the relationships between different things: It’s not hard to connect the dots between crime and poverty. ▶ connect-the-ˈdots adj.: a connect-the-dots article

connect the dots

1. To draw connecting lines between a seemingly random arrangement of numbered dots so as to produce a picture or design.

2. To draw logical inferences connecting items of information to reveal something previously hidden or unknown.

See also: connect, dot

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

See also:

References in periodicals archive ?

The theme of the July 2007 issue was "Architainment and Attraction Lighting," with a cover story that connected the dots in Montreal and another feature that connected the dots between CFLs and LEDs.

Sign of the Times

He personally connected the dots from his experiences as a youth.

Connecting the dots: Steve Jobs' influence on the wider world

Flamarique says, "All of a sudden, I connected the dots" He hypothesized that those flashes included a UV signal that fish detected in shallow waters.

Guys roll eyes: fish show some eyeball to their rivals

The Democrats connected the dots to suggest that Bush's failure on Iraq made him untrustworthy on terrorism.

Gut instincts: in 2006, the Democrats belatedly learned to connect with voters emotionally. A little political nerve--and understanding of voters' neurons--goes a long way

Commons Lane successfully connected the dots between assessment and instruction in kindergarten.

Early intervention: learn what smart districts are doing to identify students' learning disabilities and enhance instruction in pre-k

William Norman Grigg's chilling article in your July 11 "Special Issue" on UN "reform" connected the dots; we have a self-professed devout Christian President Bush on a "sacred mission" to impose his Global Democratic Revolution via a highly militarized United Nations.

Connecting the dots

Second, even with the "wall" intact, the FBI and Justice Department could still have freely shared information internally (as well as with foreign intelligence agencies like the CIA), that would have "connected the dots" before 9/11.

Security vs. liberty: a balance in crisis

It suggests the range of an artist who, in collaborations with Cage, Mark Lancaster, Jasper Johns, Isamu Noguchi, David Tudor, Rei Kawakubo, and Robert Rauschenberg, has connected the dots between disciplines for at least two-thirds of the twentieth century.

MERCE CUNNINGHAM

Scientists plotted a data point for the C[O.sub.2] level every month between 1958 and 1986, and then connected the dots. The finished graph depicts the rise in C[O.sub.2] over time.

Say it with pictures

"For years, I and many others simply connected the dots from one ancient animal community to the next through time, treating them as part of a continuous evolutionary process," Potts says.

The ultimate colonists: human ancestors settled into one ecosystem after another