Morphemic analysis increases vocabulary and improves comprehension

Abstract

The present study explored the effects of explicit and systematic teaching of morphemic analysis on vocabulary learning and comprehension. The reading class taught by the researcher was purposely taught the most common (30) prefixes and the most common (30) roots. Following fourteen 50-minute lessons, students were tested on their ability to recall the meanings of words used to teach the morphemic analysis skills, to derive meanings for new words that contained taught morphemic elements, and to comprehend text containing new words. The results indicated that (a) there was an immediate and delayed effect of morphemic analysis for lesson words, and (b) there was evidence that a morphemic approach improved students' vocabulary and, consequently, their comprehension. The findings of this study provide support for the implementation of a morphemic approach for vocabulary instruction.

Vocabulary Learning in Reading Comprehension: Learners’ Perception of the Use of Morphemic Analysis and Contextual Clues Strategies

“…This is because knowing the prefixes helped in understanding the word meaning. The finding was consistent with the studies done by Talerico (2007), Baumann et al (2002), Jarad (2015), Khodadoust, Aliasin and Khosravi (2013), Kieffer and Box (2013), Nagy, Berninger and Abbot, (2006), and Zhang and Koda (2013). These studies found that learners were able to improve vocabulary acquisition through comprehending different parts of words.…”

“…As can be seen in Item 3 in the questionnaire, learners did not seem to improve their confidence level in learning the language as the percentage was only 31.25% on the agree scale. This was in contrast with the study done by Jarad (2015) as the learners in his study improved in their confidence level. This was probably because the learners in the present study encountered some words that were difficult for them which was different from Jarad's study, where the learners were overwhelmed with the feeling that the words could be easily understood by dividing the words into the component parts when decoding their meanings.…”

“…Morphemic analysis awareness is important in language skills like vocabulary, spelling, and reading comprehension. It helps learners to spell words more accurately, promotes vocabulary growth as it brings about stronger word attack and vocabulary skills and contributes to better reading comprehension (Jarad, 2015;Khodadoust, Aliasin & Khosravi, 2013;Nagy, Berninger & Abbot, 2006) through vocabulary learned. Nagy and Anderson (1984) clarified that many English words comprised two or more morphemes like prefixes, suffixes, and roots.…”

“…Based on the participants' responses, the strategy had its limitations as they could not comprehend some of the difficult vocabulary even after applying the strategy and the use of the strategy was difficult for them. Jarad (2015) deduced that the learners may have faced problems with the complexity and irregularity of morphemic analysis, thus roots and affixes would not be helpful in all circumstances. As such, learners may face difficulty in understanding English vocabulary if they could not master the strategy.…”

Exploring the Efficiency of Associative Vocabulary Teaching Strategies to Foreign Language Learners

“…Morphological analysis instruction which is a strategy that enables EFL learners to acquire new words by analyzing the words' components to infer and understand inclusive word meanings can facilitate vocabulary learning for EFL learners (Brandes & McMaster, 2017). Jarad (2015) searched for the effects of morphemic analysis in increasing learners' vocabulary size and comprehension. The results indicated that the morphemic analysis strategy enhanced learners' vocabulary and comprehension.…”