Improving Vocabulary with Word Parts and Context Clues.docx

TEACHER: In this lesson, you're working to answer the lesson question, how do word parts and context clues help you understand the meaning of a word? You've already seen the goals of the lesson and some vocabulary that will be important for you to know. You've also started thinking about zooming out to look at the larger picture around the word or zooming in to pay 00:00:24 attention to the smaller details. In a sense, both of these strategies are looking for clues, just like a detective, like the one we have here in this image of the famous detective Sherlock Holmes. Just like a detective uses clues to solve a mystery, you can use clues to help you figure out the meaning of a word you don't know. Let's begin by looking at context clues, 00:00:47 or the bigger picture. Section 2 00:00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING] TEACHER: Do you ever come across unfamiliar words when you're reading? Happens to me all the time. But you don't always have to look up the word in a dictionary. You can use context clues to figure out what it means. 00:00:18 Context clues are hints to a word's meaning that are found in the text around the word. In this lesson, we'll be talking about four different types of context clues. With definition clues, the word is actually defined in the sentence. With example clues, the text gives examples that help you figure out what the word means. 00:00:37 There are also synonym and antonym clues, where the word you don't know is compared or contrasted to a word or idea you already understand Finally, there are explanation clues, where the text gives a description or explanation that you can use to figure out the meaning of the unknown word. We're going to take a closer look at all four 00:00:58 types of clues, but let's start with just the first two, definition clues and example clues.

[MUSIC PLAYING] Remember, definition clues show up when the text itself defines a difficult word, kind of like a dictionary would. And example clues are just what they sound like, 00:01:21 examples that show what the difficult word means. Here's a sentence that uses a definition clue. "Spelt, an ancient form of wheat is gaining popularity as a health food." The word spelt might be unfamiliar to you, but if you look at the context of the sentence, you'll see a definition, an ancient form of wheat. Here, the definition is set off by commas. 00:01:43 Sometimes, the definition is somewhere else in the sentence, or even somewhere else in the passage. Now, here's a sentence with an example clue, "Infrastructure, including bridges, roads, and buildings require constant updates to make sure they are safe." Let's say you don't know the word infrastructure. Look at the examples, bridges, roads and buildings. Then think about what bridges, roads, and buildings are. 00:02:10 Bridges, roads and buildings are important physical parts of a community that serve the community's needs. And that's one definition of the word infrastructure. Next, you'll get to practice using these types of context clues. Section 4 00:00:00 TEACHER: Now let's talk about synonyms and antonyms as context clues. Synonym and antonym clues occur when the text uses a word that has a similar or opposite meaning, respectively, as a nearby word. Let's look at some examples to make this clear. Let's start by looking at a synonym clue, and a synonym is 00:00:23 a word that has a similar meaning to another word. Our sample sentence says, "Although all Greek city-states were aggressive, Sparta's culture was the most bellicose." We have this challenging word, "bellicose." Let's see if we can find a synonym for it in the sentence.

We can see that Sparta is being compared to all these Greek city-states which are aggressive. 00:00:49 So "bellicose" and "aggressive" are synonyms of each other. Now let's look at the antonym clue. An antonym is a word that has the opposite meaning of another word. Our sample sentence says, "The Rockefellers lived in relatively Spartan conditions compared to the luxury of the Vanderbilts." 00:01:13 Then we have this unfamiliar term, "Spartan," to think about. But we can see that the Rockefellers are being contrasted to the Vanderbilts. So if the Vanderbilts live in luxury, then "Spartan" should mean something the opposite of luxury. And it does. It means something that's simple or frugal or without a 00:01:35 lot of comforts and luxuries. Now you can practice using synonym and antonym context clues. Section 7 00:00:00 TEACHER: So now, let's learn about explanation clues. An explanation context clue provides a description or explanation that you can use to infer the most likely definition of the word. Let's look at an example of an explanation clue. We have the sample sentence "I would recommend the first book in the series, but each subsequent book gets worse and 00:00:27 worse." We can use the context of the sentence to help us define this challenging word "subsequent." We see that the sentence talks about the first book in the series. And from that, we can infer that "subsequent" probably means what comes next in the sequence. Here we have a sample of something that is not an explanation clue. Let's look at the sample sentence. 00:00:52 "The subsequent book, or the one that follows, is not as good as the first. There is a context clue here to help us define the word "subsequent." We have "the one that follows," but that's actually a definition of the word.

So we would label this a definition context clue, not an explanation clue. Now, you can use an explanation context clue to 00:01:16 help you infer the meaning of an unfamiliar word. Section 9 00:00:00 TEACHER: In this lesson you've been working on answering the lesson question, how do word parts and context clues help you understand the meaning of a word? So far you've been learning about context clues. Now let's start learning about word parts. If you think about this image here of fingerprints and how they work, fingerprints are small details at a crime scene 00:00:27 that tell us something about the identity of the criminal. Similarly, words have small details, the word parts, that tell us something about their identity or their meaning. We'll begin by looking at word parts called word roots. Section 10 00:00:00 TEACHER: So let's look at word rots, which is one kind of a word part. A word root is a part of the word that shows its central meaning. English word roots often come from other languages, especially Greek and Latin. So the word root is the origin, or source word, for 00:00:21 another word. Knowing the meaning of a word root can help you understand a word's meaning. And other word parts could be added to the beginning or end of a word root to create a new word which will have the same central meaning. So let's look at some common word roots together. Here, we have a chart which has roots in it that are used 00:00:46 often in the English language. It gives us the root, the meaning of that root, and then a sample English word that incorporates that root. Let's start with the root "dorm." "Dorm" means to sleep, and we see that root in the word "dormitory."

So if you think about how the root gives us the central meaning of the word, you can think about the fact that "dorm" means to sleep, and a dormitory is a building in which you sleep. 00:01:16 "Crat" or "cracy" means "rule," and we see it in the word "democracy," which is rule or government by the people. "Cred" means "believe," and we see that "cred" here in the middle of "incredible," which means "unbelievable." "Corp" means "body," and that root shows up in the word "incorporate," which means to put together as a company or a body of people. 00:01:45 There's the root "dict," which means to say or speak. And we see that root in the word "dictate," which means to say something with authority-- or one meaning of it is to say something with authority. We see the root "gen," which means birth. And that gives us the English word "generate," to create or birth something. And the last root we'll look at together is the root "geo," 00:02:12 which means "earth." and we see the root "geo" in the word "geography," which is the study of the earth. So now you'll get to practice using word roots to help you determine the meaning of challenging vocabulary. Section 13 00:00:00 TEACHER: In this lesson you've been learning about using context and word roots as tools to help you figure out the meaning of a challenging word as you work to answer this lesson question. How do word parts and context clues help you understand the meaning of a word? Now you're ready to learn about another word part. 00:00:23 In this image, we have a detective following a trail, looking for clues. Another set of clues you can use to help you figure out the meaning of a word can sometimes be found in the beginning or ending of a word.

So next you'll learn about the word parts that can be added to the beginning or ending of a word that can create a new word with the same central meaning. Section 14 00:00:00 TEACHER: So let's talk a bit about affixes. An affix is a word part that is added to a word root to make a new word. Let's think about an example. If I add this affix, "sub," to the root word "marine," I get "submarine." And if we look at the parts of it, we have "marine," which means "ocean," and we have "sub," which means 00:00:30 "under." Put them together and you get "submarine," or something that goes under the ocean. There are two types of affixes. The first is a prefix, or word part that is added to the beginning of a word root. Then, we have a suffix, or a word part that is added to the end of a word root. And one way that's easy to remember that is that the 00:00:58 "pre" in "prefix" means "before." So it comes before the word root, whereas a suffix comes after a word root. Let's start by looking at some very common prefixes together. Prefixes are affixes that are added to the beginning of a root word. And here we have a chart that gives us a prefix, the meaning 00:01:27 of the prefix, and then, a sample English word that uses the prefix. Let's go over it. Let's look at the prefix a-, which means "not" or "without." That gives us the sample words "amoral," which means "without morals," or "apathetic," which means "without feelings." The prefix ex- means "out." And we can see that prefix in "export," which means "to send out," or 00:01:58 "exclude," which means "to keep out." We have the prefix inter-, which means "between" or "among."

And we have the English words "interstate," which means "between states," and "intervene," which means "to get involved." Finally, we have the prefix im-, which means "not" or "without." And that gives us the English words "impossible," which means "not possible," and "immortal," which means "not mortal." 00:02:31 So now let's look at how adding an affix to the end of a word can create a new word with the same central meaning. An affix at the end of a root word is called a suffix. And again, we have a chart with some common suffixes. If we look at the suffix -cy, it means "a state or condition." And that gives us the sample English word "infancy," which is the state of being an infant. The suffix -ic, or -ous, means "having the quality of 00:03:06 something." And that gives us the word "cinematic," which is "film-like," or "curious," which is "having curiosity." The suffix -ful means "filled with." And that gives us the word "hopeful," or "being filled with hope." And finally, we have the suffix -ist, which means "someone who does something." And our sample word is "artist," or "someone who does art." Now you'll have a chance to practice using suffixes and 00:03:39 prefixes to help you define unfamiliar words. Improving Vocabulary with Word Parts and Context Clues