Latest / New Teacher Talk / Ep 188: Morpheme Magic: Transform Literacy Instruction with the Smallest Units of Meaning That Make the Biggest Impact

Transcript

Ep 188: Morpheme Magic: Transform Literacy Instruction with the Smallest Units of Meaning That Make the Biggest Impact · New Teacher Talk

Greetings friends!
Have you ever wished you learned more about literacy before
you started teaching?
I have, and still do,
but I make it my mission to continue my journey of lifelong
learning.
Always.
My name is Leana Malinowsky,
and I am an elementary teacher and certified structure
literacy dyslexia specialist in New Jersey.
Today I'm going to talk about more themes in our language
and how they are magical.
I always share with people that I have three loves of my
teaching life, special education, literacy,
and teacher leadership.
I love sharing my knowledge of literacy with others,
especially teacher candidates and early career teachers.
Those who know me best say I could talk about literacy for
hours and that's true.
Today my time with you is limited,
so I thoughtfully selected the topic of morphemes and why
it's beneficial for us to think about them during our time
together.
To me,
morphemes are magical and I hope you'll soon feel the same.
So what is a morpheme?
A morpheme is the smallest unit of language that has a
meaning.
The English language is considered to be morphophonemic,
which in simpler terms means that it's a combination of
sounds and meanings combined.
Now, some morphemes are considered free,
meaning they can stand on their own and some are bound.
That means they need to attach to a base word.
These are popularly known as our prefixes and suffixes.
So these bound morphemes can be classified in two different
categories.
Inflectional,
where they change the syntax such as the tense,
or derivational.
That means that the meaning of the word is changed.
If you're still with me friends and you haven't hit pause
or stop yet,
I congratulate you for sticking through that explanation
because it can be a lot.
Let's think about one example to help us.
The word play has a meaning on its own.
It's a free morpheme.
The suffix er means one who,
so when added to play it makes the word player.
I'm sure you probably guessed that.
I always tell my students to think of a simple math
equation to help.
Play plus er equals player.
Using this visual is something I suggest you try in your
classroom too,
especially if your students are new to morphology and maybe
derivational because it changed the meaning of the word.
What if we add the suffix ed instead?
Well, play plus ed equals played.
This is inflectional because it changed from present to
past only.
It didn't change the part of speech.
Oh,
and what's interesting is if you take play plus the word
ground, you equal playground.
Two free morphemes make a compound word.
Pretty interesting, right?
First, as teachers, it's important to know about morphemes,
so I highly suggest reading some of Deb Glasser's work.
She has books, Morpheme Magic,
and Morpheme for Little Ones that can help you.
I also know there are many articles that discuss
morphology,
such as a recent article I came across titled explicit
morphology instruction to improve overall literacy skills
in secondary students,
which I'll be sharing with you as a resource.
As I mentioned earlier, and in other episodes on literacy,
you didn't learn everything you need to know about teaching
literacy in your college courses.
I don't say this to be harsh or offensive,
but the truth is that most programs don't teach specific
literacy content such as morphology in their classes.
And even if they do,
there certainly isn't enough time to cover everything.
We have to keep learning and growing together in order to
understand how our language works so we can deliver evidence
-based instruction to our students.
Another resource that I like is reading rockets.
Not only is it user-friendly for families,
and you can share those resources with them,
but it explains a lot of literacy topics,
including morphology, in simple terms as well.
For those of you listening who teach younger students,
you might be thinking,
how can this apply to my classroom since many of my
students can't read yet?
Morpheme's may sound difficult for your class,
but there are a few ways to work on it, and you should.
And once you do,
you'll be unlocking the magic to reading for your
students.
Morphology helps students learn to read.
One of the ways I introduce morphemes to younger students
is by holding the pen.
I will model and demonstrate how to write, spell,
and state the meaning of each morpheme as I go along.
I ask the students to think of words that have the same
morpheme in it,
and they think of other words that they know.
They love that part.
You could also have them underline the morphemes in given
words and state the meanings.
When they are ready,
they can complete something called word sums,
which looks like the equation I stated before for player
and played.
There are many more themes to choose from,
and it might feel overwhelming where to start.
If your current reading curriculum doesn't have any to
teach explicitly,
start with the ones you see in vocabulary words in other
different subjects or ones that come up frequently in
class.
Some basics to start with are the S, E-S, R-E, P-R-E, I-N,
E-D, I-N-G, E-R, and E-S-T.
Those are prefixes and suffixes often used in lower
grades.
Ones like E-R and E-S-T often come up in math,
so this is a perfect opportunity to learn what they mean.
For younger students, learning the meaning,
making connections to other subjects, texts,
and concepts is vital in their learning.
Learning morphology can also help students learn how to
spell.
For example, when learning the word tall,
they can learn the E-R and E-S-T suffixes and learn how to
spell two new words to make a total of three words that
they now can spell.
As the students master easier ones,
you can introduce more advanced ones as the year
progresses.
Now, if morphology does all that for our younger students,
let's imagine what it can do for our older students.
Students who are in the middle or high school grades
benefit from instruction in morphology for a few reasons.
First, if they are struggling with literacy skills,
teaching morphemes opens up the doors to spelling,
decoding unfamiliar words, fluency, vocabulary,
and comprehension.
Some educators of other subjects feel that teaching
literacy is not connected to their subject,
but they are wrong.
Oh, so wrong, my friends.
Next time you're casually talking to the science teacher
down the hall and he or she is mentioning that her students
don't understand key terms,
ask her if she taught the Greek base micro or hydro.
Oh,
and don't forget to inform your math teacher friend that
geometry can be hard if you're not aware of the Latin bases
tri or quad.
Take it from me, I know.
In the upper grades,
there are different ways you can incorporate morphology
instruction.
I always recommend teaching it explicitly.
Using the word sums with more advanced words is something
that even our teenagers often like to do and not consider
it babyish.
You can have students find words with morphemes in passages
and then do a vocabulary study, discuss the words,
talk about their meanings,
highlight the specific morphemes, and more.
There are many resources out there to help you.
The Florida Center for Reading Research has a great library
of literacy strategies, lessons, and materials.
I'll share a link with you for a sample so you can get
started and see other options.
If we take the time to teach morphology,
we are taking the time to invest in our students' learning
of all subjects, content,
and building background knowledge,
which could be a whole separate topic for another podcast.
This also builds their confidence.
Oh, and if you like learning through podcasts,
there are many out there on literacy,
including morphology topics.
One is from the See Here Speak podcast by Dr.
Tiffany Hogan.
Remember friends,
you do not have to be perfect at teaching morphemes to give
it a try.
We are all learning together and growing our own literacy
skills so we can teach them to our students just by being
here today and continuing your learning shows you care.
And I know you'll continue to do great things in your
classrooms as you teach literacy.
Thank you for listening.
I hope you become a regular follower of this podcast
channel.
Check us out at New Teacher Talk on Instagram and Blue Sky.
And remember, as a new teacher, we are here to help you.