What Linguistics Teaches Us About Words and Meaning

This chapter focuses on the teaching and learning of vocabulary. The linguistic fundamentals of word creation and word structure (morphology) and of meaning (semantics) are introduced. Students practice morphological analysis as they learn about the active inflectional morphemes (plural, possessive, present, past, progressive, perfect, comparative, and superlative). They review numerous derivational morphemes and their role in creating words in the same or other syntactic categories. They also learn how words are created as compounds, blends, abbreviations, clips, acronyms, and eponyms and how cognates and loanwords bridge languages and their speakers. Students are encouraged to complete LiFT activities focusing on teaching vocabulary in a content-based framework.