Tag Archives: word roots

This week’s Text is a lesson on the Latin word roots duc and duct. They mean “to lead” and grow such high-frequency English words as abduct, aqueduct, induct, deduct, deduce, and seduce, all of which are included on the scaffolded worksheet, complete with Romance language cognates. I open this lesson with this context clues on the verb guide. I’d like to think that short do-now points toward the meaning of the two Latin roots under analysis in this lesson.

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This week’s Text is this lesson plan on the Greek word roots -cracy and -crat, which mean government, rule, and power. I open this lesson with this context clues worksheet on the verb administer, which I hope, perhaps naively or erroneously, points the way toward the meaning of these two very productive roots. We get aristocracy, democrat, meritocracy, and bureaucracy from these roots; all are included on this scaffolded worksheet, which is the gravamen of the lesson

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

This week’s Text, for the final Friday of the first month of 2025, is this lesson plan on the Latin word roots carn and carni. They mean, which you know if you’ve ever enjoyed a non-vegetarian bowl of chili con carne, “flesh” and “meat.” This is a vigorous root in English, growing such words (all included on the worksheet below) as carnage, incarnate, reincarnation, and carnivore.

This lesson opens, should you be inclined to use it, with this context clues worksheet on the noun game. In this context, the word doesn’t define things you play at, but rather wild animals served as a meal–that is, game birds like pheasants, large mammals like deer (i.e. venison) and the like. This, I hope, points the way toward the meaning of these word roots.

Finally, this scaffolded worksheet is the principal work of this lesson. It includes all of the words listed above, as well as cognates from the Romance languages.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the Latin word root arbor. It means, of course, tree. This is a productive root in English, yielding such words as arboreal, arboretum, and Arbor Day. These are not exactly high frequency words in English. However, if the author of the book from which this material is drawn is correct, they are likely to appear on the S.A.T.

This lesson begins with this context clues worksheet on the noun copse. A copse is “a thicket, grove, or growth of small trees,” and is also called a coppice. Either way, it points students toward the meaning of arbor. You’ll need this scaffolded worksheet, complete with cognates from the Romance languages, to deal with the principal work of this lesson.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the Greek word roots arch, archi, arche/o, and archae/o. Collectively they mean rule, chief, first, and ancient. This complicated root, as you have probably already recognized, is very productive in English: It grows relatively high-frequency words (particularly in educated discourse) like archenemy, archaeology (obviously), anarchy, archetype, architect, hierarchy, and monarchy, all of which are included in this scaffolded worksheet, which is the principal work of this lesson.

I open this lesson with this context clues worksheet on the adjective ancient to point students in the right direction when analyzing these word roots.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Alright, as the summer winds down and the days contract, this week’s Text is this lesson on the Latin word root uni. You already know, of course, that it means one. You also know that this root is quite productive in English, giving us words like unidirectional, unify, unilateral, and unique, all of which are included (along with a list of cognates in the Romance languages) on the scaffolded worksheet that is the primary work of this lesson.

Generally, I try to pair context clues worksheets with these lessons that point the way toward the meaning of the root under study. So I am uncertain what I was thinking or I attended when I prepared this worksheet on the noun discord for this lesson. Use it or not (and like it or not, which, as of this writing, I do not), but it is what I have for this at the moment.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

This week’s Text is a lesson on the Latin word root trans. It means “across,” “through,” “change,” and “beyond.” This is an extremely productive root in English, yielding such high frequency words as transact, transcript, transit, transform, and transfer. In fact, all of those words are on the scaffolded worksheet that is the principle work of this lesson, and which includes, as all the Latin word root worksheets on this blog do, a list of cognates from the Romance languages.

I use this context clues worksheet on the transitive verb ford to open this lesson. It means “to cross (a body of water) by wading.” Needless to say, it is meant to point students toward the meaning of across in this word root.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.