2.1: Words Influence Literacy

Vocabulary Strategies: Preparing to Comprehend What You Read

Why do instructors insist on teaching you vocabulary? It turns out your ability to understand key vocabulary in a reading directly affects your ability to comprehend the overall text.

This section will focus upon strategies for comprehending the meanings of keywords in a text without using the dictionary unless absolutely necessary.

The Big Picture: Context Clues

Context refers to surrounding time, place, and circumstances of a situation. We make assumptions about what happens in the world around us by observing context. Consider the following narrative in which a student observes other students in the library:

Context Clues are specific to reading – they are clues found in the surrounding text that help the reader to define a keyword.

Why use context clues? This is a very effective and efficient way to get the general meaning of a word that does not interrupt the flow of your reading. You can find the meaning of a word by reading the sentence and considering the words around it

Kinds of Context clues

Learning Activity #2: Context Clues

Remember that this assignment is graded and the submission space is located on BlackBoard.  No hard copies accepted; no late work.

Part 1: Watch the video, Word Attack! Using Context Clues to Become a Word Ninja (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbqJ...ature=youtu.be) . Take careful notes while watching so you can answer the following questions. In complete sentences, define the following kinds of context clues.

1. Definition Clues
2. Synonym/Example Clues
3. Antonym/Contrast Clues
4. GIST

Part 2: Use the SQ3R reading process to read and annotate the assigned reading (accessed by clicking on the Learning Activity #2 assignment in BlackBoard). Make a list of 4-6 key terms that you can define using context clues. Assume that you would need to learn this text well enough to take a quiz on it.

1. In complete sentences, in your own words, define the key terms you listed in your notes. Be sure to tell which kind of context clue(s) you used to derive your working definition. Be sure to reference the specific text of the sentence and explain how you derived the definition. This is the portion of the assignment that needs to be submitted for L.A. #2.

The above concludes your graded portion of work for this OER material, but please keep reading.  You will also be held accountable for the information found below this learning activity.

Bits & Pieces: Word Parts

Your “Plan B” for determining the meaning of a key word should be using word parts, or morphemes. Word parts are exactly what it sounds like – the reader breaks the word into parts and derives meaning by using what is known about the part’s meaning. It doesn’t necessarily interrupt the flow of reading, but, depending upon the reader, it may briefly.

There are Three Categories of Morphemes

Root Words

• Roots are the basis of complex words.
• Prefixes or suffixes may be added to them to modify the meaning.

Prefixes

• Prefixes are added to the beginning of a word to modify the meaning.

Suffixes

• Suffixes are added to the end of a word to modify the meaning.

Let’s try this out. Here is how word parts can be used to define the word “irreversible.”

Break the word into syllables: ir-re-vers-i-ble

At this point, determining which syllables make up which parts can be kind of like solving a mystery. The more word parts you are familiar with, the easier this becomes.

• Root: verse (meaning: turning)
• Prefix: re (meaning: again)
  • “reverse” means to turn again, to go back
• Suffix: ible (meaning: able to)
  • “reversible” means able to turn again, or able to turn back
• Prefix: ir (meaning: not)
  • “irreversible” means not able to turn again, or not able to turn back

Why Would I Do This?

Knowing word parts is efficient. It turns out that when a reader knows a set of 20 prefixes and 14 roots, and knows how to use them, they will unlock the meaning of over 100,000 words. (Imagine adding suffixes!) Would you rather learn 20 prefixes and 14 roots, or would you rather learn the individual definitions of over 100,000 words?

If you are entering a vocational program where there is a large amount of vocabulary, such as medical fields, this is THE way to learn key vocabulary, because discipline-specific vocabulary is often based upon specific, regularly occurring word parts.

Morphemes develop over time, so knowing the etymology, or history, of a morpheme adds to your understanding of them and their many variations.

Tips for Working With Morphemes

• In most cases, a word is built on at least one root.
• Words can have more than one prefix, root, or suffix.
• Words do not always have both a prefix and a suffix
• Roots may change in spelling as they are combined with suffixes (arid arable)
• Sometimes you may identify a group of letters as a prefix or root, but find that it does not carry the meaning of the prefix or root.

When to use the Dictionary

Stopping to look up unknown words while you are reading is highly disruptive to the flow of reading. It effectively keeps you from understanding the broader message of a text. For that reason, we try to determine meanings of key words AS we read, perhaps marking words to look up later. Then return to the reading later to try out your understanding. Using the dictionary to understand key terms should be your LAST option.

That being said, there are many good reasons to use a dictionary. Use a dictionary to:

• Look up key words before or after reading a text.
• Learn how to pronounce a word correctly.
• Find out the origins or history of a word.
• Determine how to correctly break the word into syllables.

Dictionaries have changed considerably over the years, making them much easier to use. You can certainly use a printed book dictionary, or an online dictionary, which are often free, and typically provide audio so you can learn to how to pronounce an unknown word.