Subtest II - Language Analysis Flashcards
Phonology
The study of how sounds are organized and used in languages.
Phoneme
The smallest unit of speech sound. It combines with other units of speech sound to form a word. Ex: The word tray contains three phonemes - /t/, /r/, and /a/.
Grapheme
A letter or number of letters that represent a phoneme or sound.
Phonetics
The study of how speech sounds are made and understood. Dictionaries include phonetic spellings for words to show the correct pronunciations (Ex: explicit = /ik SPLI sit/.
Morphology
The branch of linguistics that deals with the internal structure and forms of words. It is concerned with the rules for the use of morphemes in a language. Ex: the morphology of English allows its speakers to know that plural endings depend on the last sound of the word stem (spatula/spatulas; patch/patches).
Morphemes
The smallest unit of meaning
Context clues
The words and sentences around the unfamiliar word that often provide clues to its meaning.
Morphemic analysis
Recognizing prefixes, roots, and suffixes and their meanings. (Prefixes and suffixes are also called affixes).
Word family
A category of words built around the same word part. Ex: anachronism, chronicle, chronometer and chronological all include the word part chron-, which comes from the Greek word for “time”.
Compound words
Words made up of two or more smaller words. Students can decode compounds by noticing the meanings of the smaller words, as in sailboat (a boat with a sail).
Borrowed words
Words imported from other languages.
Inflectional affixes
Word endings that serve various grammatical purposes but don’t change the meaning of a word. (Ex: “-s” and “-es” make words plural, and “-ed” make words past tense)
Derivational affixes
Alter the meaning of a word by building on a base. (Ex: “anti-“ = against, “de-“ = undo, and “-er”, “-or” = person or profession)
Syntax
The rules and principles for constructing sentences in a language. (Features of simple, compound, or complex sentences)
Simple Sentence
(aka independent clause) contains a subjet and a verb and expresses a complete thought. (Ex: Apples and pears make a refreshing snack on hot days)
Compound Sentence
Contains two independent clauses joined by a coordinator, such as for, and, nor, but ,or, yet, so. (Ex: I hoped to finish first or second, but Joel won the race.)
Complex Sentence
Contains an independent clause joined by one or more dependent clauses. A complex sentence always has a subordinator such as since, because, after, although, when or a relative pronoun such as who, which, that.
(Ex: WHEN I saw the dark clouds, I knew a storm was on its way. People are stocking up on food BECAUSE of the storm)
Semantics
The study of meaning in language, both oral and contextual.
Pragmatics (Pragmatic Theory)
Focus on language as a tool for communication and is concerned with how different types of sentences or phrases are used in different contexts and for different purposes. Pragmatic theory is concerned with a speaker’s intended meaning rather than the literal meaning of an utterance.
Pragmatic competence
When a reader understands the true meaning of a passage or utterance. (Ex: When Mark Atony in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar claims repeatedly that Brutus is “an honorable man,” the reader knows that Antony means the opposite.
Etymology and Word Families
Word origin. Word families illustrate how words may share a common etymology (Ex: diction shares an entymology with dictate and dictionary).
Orthography
A standardized system for writing words with the proper letters according to accepted rules of usage. It includes the spelling rules for a language. (Ex: “i” before “e” except after “c”).
