Vocabulary and Morphological Awareness

Vocabulary is the term for the words of a language and morphology is the term for the study of the parts of words.  TextProject has numerous resources for supporting vocabulary learning and the development of morphological awareness.

Vocabulary

April 7, 2011

Of all the features of complex text, vocabulary is the one that best predicts students’ comprehension. It is also the feature of complex text that is the most straightforward to teach. TextProject has numerous resources to aid in teacher knowledge and in classroom implementation of a generative vocabulary program—one in which students come to understand how English vocabulary work as opposed to strictly memorizing new words.

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Morphological Awareness

April 5, 2011

Vocabulary is the term for the words of a language and morphology is the term for the study of the parts of words. Students’ vocabularies expand through the study of word parts, specifically root or base words (e.g., connect), affixes (e.g., reconnect, connection), and inflectional morphemes (e.g., connects, connecting, connected). The study of word parts increases awareness of the links between words, including the origins of words in other languages. The term cognate means to have “the same ancestry.” Many English words are close cognates to German words (e.g., apple/Apfel). Other English words are easily traced to French words (e.g., communicate/communiquer). French and Spanish both originated from Latin which means that cognates also exist between English and Spanish words (e.g., communicate/comunicar). TextProject provides valuable resources for teachers to support students in developing morphological awareness and knowledge across languages.

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