Chapter 7 and 8 blog

Chapter 7:

1.         How do new words enter a language?

New words enter a language through several ways.  Some enter through coining, compounding, clipping, creating acronyms, blending, back-formation, and borrowing.   Typical example of how coining works could be explained this way.  If an individual uses a word for an object and it is generally accepted and used, then that becomes a part of language vocabulary.  Coining is used quite often with new inventions.  Examples could be seen from the new terminologies we use today in our computer language like when we talk about the mouse, ram and others. Some words got into our language vocabulary when two or more words are joined to become one like in backslide and cupboard.  In some cases the new words may be joined with hyphen like daughter-in-law.  These words are said to be formed by compounding.  When the words enter through clippings or acronyms, those words are simply formed by abbreviating already existing words as seen with chemistry for chem. and bio. for biology.  Furthermore, acronyms are mostly formed with the first letter of series of words and we see this quite often with naming our schools and Universities.  Few examples are LMS for Lilburn Middle School and LIU for Long Island University.  At times, new words are formed by blending other words together to form another.  As we see with breakfast a compound and lunch to produce brunch.  In the case of back-formation, new vocabularies were added where their existed noun form of words but no related verb form of that word.  An example is the noun word beggar, they have to come up with the verb form beg.  Of course some of the words were borrowed from other social groups that we come in contact with in our life’s journey.  Some English words were borrowed from Latin, Spanish or French such as the word bouquet, which is French.           

Ch. 8:

2.         What is the best way to increase vocabulary?

There are several ways to increase an individual’s vocabulary.  Some propose direct teaching of the vocabulary as the proponents of linguistic view will argue.  However, those of sociopsycholinguistic views will opt to do so through making it possible for students to engage in a lot of reading.  Each of these views has its advantages and disadvantages.  Having considered the two options, I believe that increasing an individual’s vocabulary could be achieved better through reading.  My choice is based on the fact that being exposed to the same vocabularies more often will eventually lead to acquisition of that word in one’s everyday usage of the word.  Reading allows the reader to see the same word used in different ways and  in different forms. It lends to better understanding of the word and more usage of that word.  Human tendency is to use what we are familiar with hence the saying “practice makes perfect”   This will not negate the need to do some explaining of the power words but within the context of what the students are to read.  It will also allow building background knowledge which will help the student have a better understanding of what they are reading and in turn help them acquire the vocabulary.  The idea of frontloading which involves learning about the concept to be taught, discussing it, talking about it and writing about it makes should be an integral part of reading a lot with focus on students acquiring more vocabulary.  

 
3. What does it mean to know a word?

            The knowledge of a word involves more than just being able to pronounce it, recognizing it in a reading passage or even using it in a sentence.  All of these are just a very small part of knowing the word.  Word knowledge encompasses having the following:

·        Phonological information about the word -which involves being able to recognize and pronounce the word in oral reading

·        Morphological information – this involves knowing the meaning of the small parts, the inflectional and derivational affixes that are joined together at times to form more complex words that an individual could use to decode the meaning of the complex words; this also involve some changes that could take place when the word is being used in the past or present and as an adjective or as a noun.

·        Syntactic information – this involves understanding the role of the word in a sentence; whether the word is being used as a noun or a verb, in the past or present. 

·        Semantic information – means that the individual can define or explain the word, be able to give the synonyms and understand the meaning of that word in a metaphoric terms

·        Pragmatic information – this involves the everyday usage of that word or what could be termed the real world use of the word.  It entails understanding the context under which the word is used or could be used.

When an individual has a good grip of all of the above, we can then same that he/she has understanding of that word. 

Posted from Ms. Naomi Onike:

Chapter 9: nonike_blog

Question 5

Combining generated series of sentences and using it to write a paragraph.

1. The teacher is a scientist. 2. The teacher has so many models in her class.

She teaches science. Some models are big.

She teaches at Lilburn Middle School. Other models are big.

The teacher is in room 5.013. She uses the models to teach

3. The biggest model is the globe. 4. The ocean floor model shows many things.

The globe shows the oceans. The ocean floor has mountains.

It also shows different continents. It has valleys.

The globe shows the oceans in blue. It has plains

5. There is a model of a wind vane.

The model turns when a fan blows at it

It turns to the direction of the wind.

It has pointer that turns.

The scientist teaches science in room 5.013 at Lilburn Middle School. She has many small and big models in her class which she uses to teach. The globe is the biggest model and it shows the ocean in blue and the continents also. The ocean floor model shows that is has mountains, valleys and plains. The wind vane model turns the pointer to the direction of the fan when it blows at it.

Question 3. Formulating a rule for changing statements into question

Active: The scientist discussed the processes of water cycle.

Passive: The processes of water cycle were discussed by the scientist.

The guideline to the rule for changing the active to passive involves:

· The scientist = NP AUX = 0 VP = discussed the processes of water cycle

· The scientist served as subject in the active statement

· The scientist served as object of the verb in the passive statement

· At deep structure, all sentences contain an auxiliary since it shows up in questions.

· In the VP discussed = V, the = DET, processes = ADJ; of = P; water cycle = N

The rule for changing this active to the passive is as follows:

Put the VP at the beginning and add the auxiliary verb “were” before the verb “discussed” and let the scientist serve as the object of the verb.

Final analysis: The processes of water cycle (NP) were (AUX) discussed by the scientist (VP).

Question 2 The position of a word in a sentence can change its function. Sentences to consider:

1. Only he said that he loved linguistics.

2. He only said that he loved linguistics.

3. He said only that he loved linguistics.

4. He said that only he loved linguistics.

5. He said that he only loved linguistics.

6. He said that he loved only linguistics.

7. He said that he loved linguistics only.

Sentence I and 4 imply that maybe in their group he was the only person that loved linguistic.

Sentences 2 and 3 imply that the only thing he said was that he loved linguistic.

Sentences 5, 6 and 7 imply that there could have been other options but he loved linguistics.

Based on the changes of the positions of just one word only, the meaning of the sentence was changed to something completely different. The changes go from where you get the sense that several options were available and he loved only linguistics to that he loved linguistics was the only statement he made. The third interpretation of the sentence is that in a group, he was the only person that loved linguistic. The implication of good understanding of syntactic information better prepares an individual in being a better reader and with understanding of the language since semantic information may be limited when things like metaphors and other sentence structures are involved in a reading passage.