Morphology and Etymology Flashcards
6 cards from real CALT practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 6 Morphology and Etymology flashcards as text
Etymology is most directly useful in structured literacy instruction because it:
Answer: Explains why words are spelled the way they are based on their language origins
Understanding a word's etymological history explains its spelling patterns because Latin words often retain their original spellings even when pronunciation has shifted.
The three main language layers of English morphology and spelling are:
Answer: Anglo-Saxon, Latin, and Greek
English orthography is structured around three etymological layers: Anglo-Saxon for everyday words, Latin for academic vocabulary, and Greek for scientific and technical vocabulary.
The Latin root scrib and script as in describe and manuscript means:
Answer: To write
The Latin root scrib and script derives from scribere meaning to write, linking words like describe, manuscript, transcript, and inscription.
A student learns the prefix un- meaning not and encounters unhappy. Applying morphological knowledge, they determine the word means:
Answer: Not happy
The prefix un- means not, so unhappy equals not plus happy, demonstrating how morphemic analysis enables productive vocabulary decoding.
Which instructional activity best reinforces morphological awareness for students with dyslexia?
Answer: Word sorting tasks where students group words by shared roots or affixes
Word sorting by shared morphemes develops students' awareness of meaningful word patterns, building both spelling and vocabulary systematically.
The word autobiography can be fully analyzed as:
Answer: auto meaning self, bio meaning life, graph meaning write, and -y as a noun suffix
Auto meaning self plus bio meaning life plus graph meaning write plus the noun suffix -y equals a self-written account of one's own life.