Why should I learn roots and affixes (prefixes and suffixes)? BECOME FLUENT

• Beginners should first memorize NATIVE words

• Intermediates need a shortcut to learn the THOUSANDS of BORROWED words needed to achieve FLUENCY.

•Roots and affixes offer a shortcut for learning these borrowed words.

•English has a huge number of words -- far more than any other language. All English words are either native to English or borrowed from another language.

•NATIVE words are the short, simple words which all English speakers use in ordinary everyday situations.

NATIVE words tend to fall into five major classes:

1. body parts: foot, mouth, thumb

2. family relationships / kinship terms father, brother, mother

3. everyday, natural objects rock, house, hill

4. physical acts think, drive, ride

5. physical characteristics red, cold, young

•Notice that native words often name concrete objects or properties of the physical world -- things people need to talk about everyday life. These are the first words English-speaking children learn. If you learned English as a child, you absorbed most of your native vocabulary words by the time you were six.

•Borrowed words came into English after it had become a separate language.

•The most frequent words in English are 70% native. But 75% of all the words in the English dictionary are borrowed! English speakers borrow lots of words, but they don't use them as often as native words. Most borrowed words come from Latin, Greek, and French. These words are used most frequently in academic and technical vocabulary.

Source: Department of Linguistics, University of Oregon

Affixes Handout on uses of prefixes and suffixes from Brown U

AFFIXES AND ROOTS BY GRADE LEVEL

Building Vocabulary: Prefixes, Roots, and Suffixes

Fourteen Master Words- Key to Meanings of More Than 14,000+ Words 14 words found in over 14,000 other words

GREEK AND LATIN ROOTS, PREFIXES, AND SUFFIXES Some teaching ideas

Mini Greek and Latin Roots Intro Presentation.ppt Examples of words formed from Greek and Latin roots

Roots Prefixes Suffixes Prefixes, suffixes, and roots to expand your vocabulary

Common Adjective Suffixes

Words-ending-with-ing-mind-map

Word Searcher Type root word and get all the possible new word combinations

Collins has an excellent COBUILD dictionary that explains how prefixes and suffixes are used. This type of dictionary is very good for English learners. I recommend this dictionary for all students.

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english

https://grammar.collinsdictionary.com/grammar-pattern

There are some interesting webpage with root trees. I would note that roots are not just for students learning English, so some of these affixes and roots are more advanced. Students who want to be scientists have to learn THOUSANDS of technical words. Medical school forces students to MEMORIZE those words! Learning roots is one of the secrets to quickly learning a lot of words!

Roots and affixes are just as useful for students interested in the liberal arts and humanities. Take a look at the two links "demo" meaning PEOPLE and "cracy" - meaning GOVERNMENT. Yes - these are the two roots for the word "democracy" which is government of the people.

DEMO + CRACY = democracy government of the people

Useful Webpage: Word Roots - Wordpandit

Word Root: Demo - Wordpandit Word Root: Cracy - Wordpandit

Here is a link to a webpage that has WORD ROOT OF THE DAY

If you learn one or two roots a week, you will find in a couple of years that you have mastered a lot of words! Give it a try and tell me if it helps you.

Word Root Of The Day Archive | Membean Word Root Of The Day Archive | Membean

membean.com/wrotds/lig-tie

membean.com/wrotds/extra-outside