7 Activity 2: Learning Vocabulary Through Morphemes

Estimated time: 25 minutes

Objectives:

Students will be able to

• Analyze English words and divide them into their parts
• Identify the meanings of common English morphemes
• Apply morphemic knowledge to text

Materials

• Text of story “The Selfish Giant”

Activity

Part 1: What is a Morpheme?

A morpheme is a piece of language that has meaning and cannot be split into smaller units of meaning.

Examples of morphemes:

• walk
• -s (at the end of a word to signal a plural noun)
• -s (at the end of a word to signal a simple present tense verb)
• -able (suffix)
• un- (prefix)

Examples of words containing more than one morpheme:

• Walks (as in “He walks. walk + -s)
• Walks (as in “My dog goes on two walks every day.” walks + -s)
• Walkable (as in “Walkable cities give people the opportunity for more exercise.” walk + -able)
• Unwalkable (as in “Much of Los Angeles is unwalkable, so tourists should rent a car.” un- + walk + able)

Free morphemes can stand alone as their own word (“walk”). Bound morphemes only occur as part of another word (“-s,” “-able,” “un-.”) Sometimes free morphemes can be combined with other free morphemes (“home” + “work”).

• Students list more examples of morphemes.
• Create words from the morphemes you listed. Work alone or in pairs.
• Present your lists to the class. Other students can “remix” morphemes by adding to the list if they see new possibilities.
  • Which bound morphemes always go with nouns?
  • Which ones always go with verbs?
  • Which ones can go with either?

Part 2: Using Morphemes in Reading

Look at the first two paragraphs of “The Selfish Giant.” Examine each word and determine if it can be divided into morphemes. How many morphemes can you identify?

Every afternoon, as they were coming from school, the children used to go and play in the Giant’s garden.

It was a large lovely garden, with soft green grass. Here and there over the grass stood beautiful flowers like stars, and there were twelve peach trees that in the springtime broke out into delicate blossoms of pink and pearl, and in the autumn bore rich fruit. The birds sat on the trees and sang so sweetly that the children used to stop their games in order to listen to them. “How happy we are here!” they cried to each other.

1. after
2. noon
3. come
4. -ing
5. child
6. -ren
7. use
8. -d
9. –‘s
10. love
11. -ly
12. beauty
13. -ful
14. flower
15. -s
16. tree
17. spring
18. time
19. tree
20. blossom
21. bird
22. sweet
23. -ly
24. game
25. cry
26. -ed