Root Words & Inflections
CONCEPTUALIdentify frequently occurring root words and their inflectional forms (e.g., look/looks/looked/looking), using affixes as clues to word meaning and understanding how suffixes create nouns and adjectives
Mastery Evidence
- Identify 'play' as the root in 'played', 'playing', 'player'
- Explain that '-ful' in 'careful' means 'full of care'
- Use '-ness' and '-er' to form nouns from root words: 'sad → sadness', 'teach → teacher'
Assessment Prompt
“When [child] sees words like "play," "plays," "played," and "playing," do they understand they all come from the same root word and can they use each form correctly?”
Curriculum Standards6 alignments
L.1.4bCommon Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical SubjectsUse frequently occurring affixes as a clue to the meaning of a word.
L.1.4cCommon Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical SubjectsIdentify frequently occurring root words (e.g., look) and their inflectional forms (e.g., looks, looked, looking).
L.3.4bCommon Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical SubjectsDetermine the meaning of the new word formed when a known affix is added to a known word (e.g., agreeable/disagreeable, comfortable/uncomfortable, care/careless, heat/preheat).
Eng.App2.Y2.Word.1The national curriculum in EnglandFormation of nouns using suffixes such as –ness, –er and by compounding [for example, whiteboard, superman]
Eng.App2.Y2.Word.2The national curriculum in EnglandFormation of adjectives using suffixes such as –ful, –less
Eng.App2.Y2.Word.3The national curriculum in EnglandUse of the suffixes –er, –est in adjectives and the use of –ly in Standard English to turn adjectives into adverbs
Prerequisites2
- Word Parts as ClueshardAges 5—8
- SuffixessoftAges 6—7
Show full prerequisite tree
- Phonics Vocabulary hard
Segmenting words into phonemes and spelling CVC words requires knowing 'phoneme', 'segment', and 'CVC' as defined terms
- Phonics Vocabulary hard
Suffix spelling rules (doubling final consonants, dropping -e) require knowing 'suffix', 'root word', 'vowel', and 'consonant'
- Phonics Vocabulary hard
Segmenting words into phonemes and spelling CVC words requires knowing 'phoneme', 'segment', and 'CVC' as defined terms
- Phonics Vocabulary hard
Spelling with suffixes requires knowing 'suffix', 'root word', and understanding how suffixes attach
Unlocks1
- Word Families and Root WordshardAges 7—9