Brown's Morphemes Flashcards
Content morphemes
words with defining meaning (dictionary words) that accept the addition of morphemes
ex. chair
Function morphemes
little words/word endings that modify, they don’t have meaning themselves and can’t have things attached to them
they serve a grammatical purpose
ex. “the” or “-ing” in running
Bound morphemes
must be connected to a root word
ex. ‘s’, ‘-ed’ or ‘-ing’ on the end of a word
Free morphemes
can be in a sentence by itself
ex. “dog”, “girl”, “yellow”, “look”
Inflectional morphemes
changes the tense
ex. walk + ed = walked (past tense)
developed first in preschool years
Derivational morphemes
whole grammatical class change
ex. walk + able = walkable, to drink -> drinker
come 2nd in grade school
Morphemes are only inflectional or bound if they are ____ (bound or free)
bound
Present progressive “-ing”
ex. “I walking”
- functional, bound, inflectional
Brown’s morphemes stage 2: 27-30 months
Prepositions “in” and “on”
ex. “in box” “on box”
- functional, free
Brown’s morphemes stage 2: 27-30 months
Regular plural inflection (plural s)
- add an ‘s’ to a noun to make it plural
ex. “My cars”
- irregular: man -> men
- functional, bound, inflectional
Brown’s morphemes stage 2: 27-30 months
Irregular past tense verbs
“Me fell down”
- children memorize these words they don’t truly understand the meaning
content, free
Brown’s morphemes stage 2: 27-30 months
Possessive inflections
- add an ‘s’ to the end of a word to show possession
ex. “man’s book”
- functional, bound, inflectional
Brown’s morphemes stage 3: 31-34 months
Uncontractible copula
- am, is, are, was, were
ex. “yes, it was” “we were sad”
- verbs that serve a grammatical purpose
- main verb of the sentence
- copula links a subject of the sentence to an adjective or noun
Brown’s morphemes stage 3: 31-34 months
Articles
- “A” and “the”
ex. “a ball on the book”
- use and form
Brown’s morphemes stage 4: 35-40 months
Regular past tense
- “-ed” signify something happened in the past
ex. “she jumped”
Brown’s morphemes stage 4: 35-40 months
3rd person present tense
- 2 allomorphs /s/ /z/ and /iz/
- 3rd person singular ‘s’
ex. “the puppy chews it” “Jason likes you”
Brown’s morphemes stage 4: 35-40 months
Irregular 3rd person
- do/does, have/has
ex. she does, he has
Brown’s morphemes stage 5: 41-46+ months
Uncontractible auxiliary
present and past forms of the verb to BE: am, is, are, was, were
- links subject with another verb
- typically in present progressive tense “-ing”
ex. “are they swimming?” “were you hungry?” “she was laughing, not me”
Brown’s morphemes stage 5: 41-46+ months
Contractible copula
ex. “She’s ready”, “They’re here” “Daddy’s got tomatoes”
Brown’s morphemes stage 5: 41-46+ months
Contractible auxiliary
ex. “My dog is running” -> “My dog’s running”
Brown’s morphemes stage 5: 41-46+ months
