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Keys to Literacy recently launched its newest professional development program: Advanced Word Study - Grade 4 and Beyond. Sometimes referred to as advanced phonics, instruction for advanced word study teaches students how to read and spell multi-syllable words by using a combination of word analysis that focuses on syllables, and structural analysis that focuses on meaningful units (morphemes - roots, prefixes, suffixes). Learning how to focus on morphemes also helps students determine the meaning of an unfamiliar word.

During kindergarten through grade 3, students are developing phonemic awareness and learning beginning phonics concepts that support word reading. Because English has an alphabetic written language, these skills are essential for learning how to decode unfamiliar words and develop the ability to use the orthographic mapping process to map and remember thousands of sight words, enabling fluent reading. In a previous post I discussed the value of a phonics scope and sequence that covers phonics concepts from basic letter-sound correspondences in kindergarten to advanced correspondences and learning syllable types in grade 3.

What type of advanced word study instruction do students need beyond grade 3? Students in grade 4 and above who are still having difficulty with basic decoding skills may need supplemental instruction for the basic skills described in the previous paragraph. However, most students beyond grade 3 benefit from instruction that focuses on strategies and practice for reading unfamiliar, multi-syllable words. Ehri's Phases of Word Reading Development (1991) provides a model of how word recognition develops over time. As shown in the graphic below, there are four phases: Pre-alphabetic, Early Alphabetic, Later Alphabetic, and Consolidated Alphabetic. Advanced word study instruction is for students who have reached the Consolidated Alphabetic phase where they are beginning to read fluently by sound, syllable, and morphemes, typically during grade 3 and the start of grade 4. This includes instruction to build automatic recognition of the six syllable types, application of syllable division principles,recognition of morphological (meaningful) units within words, an understanding of the schwa vowel sound in unaccented syllables, and knowledge of spelling rules for adding suffixes.

English is a Morphophonemic Language, Including Words Derived From Greek and Latin
Written English words are comprised of both sound-spelling correspondences and morphemes that provide clues to meaning. We spell by both the sounds in words (phonemes) and the meaning represented in word parts (morphemes). Certain morphemes keep their written spelling even though their phonemic forms change. When the sound in a word changes in a different variation of the word, the spelling does not change. This can be challenging for students when they read or spell more complex words in grade 4 and beyond. For example, read the sample pairs of words below and notice how the spellings for parts of the words stay the same even though the sound changes.

Another challenge for students is that a large percentage of words learned after grade 3 are multi-syllable words derived from Latin and Greek (Carlisle, 2007); 60% of unfamiliar words in middle school books are derived words (Nagy & Anderson, 1984). These words consist of roots that hold the core meaning of the word, and prefixes and suffixes that can alter the meaning or function of a word. Once students begin reading multi-syllable words, they are further challenged by the occurrence of the schwa vowel sound. The schwa is the most common vowel sound in the English language, accounting for 20% of the vowel sounds (Yule, 1996), and it often is the cause of spelling mistakes. The schwa sound is formed with a neutral mouth position, and it replaces a vowel sound in the unaccented syllables of multi-syllable words. It is sometimes called the "lazy" vowel, and can sound like a muffled version of the short u sound or the short i sound, as in the words . It can be spelled with any vowel. See a previous post I wrote about schwa for more details and examples.
Instructional Suggestions
Multi-syllable word reading and spelling is aided by the application of an approach that COMBINES:

Word analysis focused on syllables: breaking words into parts by identifying vowel sounds, applying syllable division rules, saying each part, then putting the parts together to say the word

Structural analysis focused in meaningful units: reading words through recognition of roots, prefixes, and suffixes

Common Core Reading Foundations standard 4.3.a for grade four expects students to "use combined knowledge of all letter-sound correspondences, syllabication patterns, and morphology (e.g., roots and affixes) to read accurately unfamiliar multisyllable words in context and out of context."

In order to apply word analysis, students must learn to automatically recognize the six syllable types (closed, open, silent-e, vowel team, vowel-r, and consonant-le). They must also learn how to fluently apply basic syllable division rules, including 1) VCCV, divide between C's (rab/bit); 2) VCV, usually divide before the C, then try after the C (mu/sic, cab/in); 3) words ending in consonant-le - the 3 letters stay together (bub/ble, ri/fle). In order to apply structural analysis, students must learn to recognize roots, prefixes, and suffixes.

Students benefit from learning a routine for "attacking" an unfamiliar, multi-syllable word. Click here to watch a video of a routine offered by PaTTAN of Pennsylvania titled Reading Big Words. The example below of a word analysis routine is from Keys to Literacy's new professional development offering, Advanced Word Study - Grade 4 and Beyond.

To support spelling of multi-syllable words for which a suffix has been added, it is helpful for students to learn the following spelling rules:

Doubling Rule 1-1-1: if a one-syllable base word ends in one consonant with one short vowel before it, double the final consonant of the base word when adding a suffix that begins with a vowel. (mad + est = maddest, mad + ly - madly)

Doubling Rule for Two-Syllable Words: two-syllable words double the final consonant before a suffix that begins with a vowel if the second syllable of the word is CVC, and if the stress (accent) falls on the second syllable (admit + ed = admitted, limit + ed = limited)

Silent E Rule: words ending in a silent e drop the e before a suffix beginning with a vowel, but do not drop the e before a suffix beginning with a consonant (hope, hoping, hopeful)

Y Rule: final y after a consonant changes to i before any suffix except one beginning with i (copy/copies/copying)

Teaching Advanced Word Study in Any Subject
While it is typically assumed that the English language arts teacher should be responsible for teaching students these skills, students must read multi-syllable words in every subject. Academic words derived from Latin and Greek appear in all content area text, and it is often the case where science and math present the best opportunities to practice the application of advanced word analysis skills. Every teacher, regardless of the subject-area taught, can play a role in helping students learn to apply advanced word study skills to read, spell, and identify the meaning of unfamiliar, longer words.

References

Carlisle, J.F. (2007). Fostering morphological processing, vocabulary development, and reading comprehension. In R.K. Wagner, A.E. Muse, & K.R. Tannenbaum (Eds.). Vocabulary acquisition: Implications for reading comprehension. New York: The Guilford Press.

Ehri, L. C. (1991). Development of the ability to read words. In R. Barr, M. L. Kamil, P. B. Mosenthal, & P. D. Pearson (Eds.), Handbook of reading research, Vol. 2, pp. 383-417). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Nagy, W.E. & Anderson, R.C. (1984). How many words are there in printed school English? Reading Research Quarterly, 19, 304-330.

Yule, G. (1996). The study of language (2nd ed.). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

Joan Sedita

Joan Sedita is the founder of Keys to Literacy and author of the Keys to Literacy professional development programs. She is an experienced educator, nationally recognized speaker and teacher trainer. She has worked for over 35 years in the literacy education field and has presented to thousands of teachers and related professionals at schools, colleges, clinics, and professional conferences.

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What is advanced word study? - Keys to Literacy

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Keys to Literacy recently launched its newest professional development program: Advanced Word Study - Grade 4 and Beyond. Sometimes referred to as advanced phonics, instruction for advanced word study teaches students how to read and spell multi-syllable words by using a combination of word analysis that focuses on syllables, and structural analysis that focuses on meaningful units (morphemes - roots, prefixes, suffixes).

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KIS Vocabulary and Morphology Sentence Expansion - Google Jamboard

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KIS Vocabulary and Morphology Sentence Expansion

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A word map is a graphic organizer that supports connections among vocabulary and ideas. TextProject provides Word Maps for the Core Vocabulary-the most important words in written English. Three typ…

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Word Zones for 4,000 simple word families

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Word Zones for 4,000 simple word families

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TextProject

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Vocabulary knowledge is the strongest predictor of reading comprehension. Four kinds of vocabularies contribute to reading comprehension: core vocabulary, academic words, content-area words, and literary words. TextProject provides free resources for all four types of vocabulary .

The Core Vocabulary

The core vocabulary consists of a relatively small number of English words that accounts for the majority of all words in books from grades K to 12. About 4% of the different words in schoolbooks account for at least 90% of all of the words in school books. Automaticity in reading the core vocabulary is the foundation of proficient reading. TextProject provides free resources to support students in automaticity in recognizing and understanding the core vocabulary.

The Core Vocabulary: The Foundation of Proficient Comprehension

Core Vocabulary: Word Zones

The core vocabulary consists of 5,586 words. When root words that share endings (-ed, -ing, -s, -es) are grouped together, the number falls to 4,000. When words that share prefixes and suffixes (e.g., un-, -ful) are included, the number is even smaller: 2,500. The core vocabulary can be grouped into five word zones of frequency. ( Remember that this list is intended for use by teachers, not for students to memorize.)

Core Vocabulary Word Maps

A word map is a graphic organizer that supports connections among vocabulary and ideas. TextProject provides Word Maps for the Core Vocabulary-the most important words in written English. Three types of words maps are available for the core vocabulary: synonyms, morphology, and multiple meaning of words.

Core Vocabulary Word Maps by grade level and subject

Core Vocabulary Word Pictures

The core vocabulary consists of the 4,000 simple word families which account for 90% of the words in written English. Function words (e.g., the, of) and general academic words (e.g., compare, relate) are prominent in the core vocabulary but there are also many concept words which can be pictured.
Core Vocabulary Word Pictures by concept group.
Academic Vocabulary

Academic vocabulary words are important in school and scholarly texts. Words such as connection, composition, and system are unique to school texts and are not used frequently in common conversations or simple text. Academic words are used to describe and explain ideas in content-area texts but are not the words that communicate the substance of a content area. For example, system might be used to describe weather but is not a word specific to the topic of weather.

The Academic Word List (AWL) has been used in numerous studies. Of the 570 words on the AWL, 343 are in the Core Vocabulary Word Zones.

Literary Vocabulary

Literary words are the verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs that authors use to make their stories come alive. High-quality stories are distinguished in their authors' use of expressive words- gambol rather than run or cavort rather than jump. TextProject has two programs of free, comprehensive lessons that help students use knowledge of familiar words (e.g., stop) to learn the Tier 2 words of texts (e.g., flee, abscond).

Growing Capacity with the Vocabulary of English Language Arts Programs: Vocabulary Megaclusters

E4: Exceptional Expressions for Everyday Events

Word maps of Tier 2 words are provided for familiar and frequent words in students' lives: quiet, think, and want. In all, E4 provides 32 free lessons that include English-Spanish cognates, morphological family members of root words, and synonyms.
Complete Exceptional Expressions Edition or individual lessons
S4: Super Synonym Sets for Stories

Tier 2 words are used by authors to create the details and mood that engage readers in a story. Free lessons are provided for 20 of the most important ideas in stories-Tier 2 words representing emotions, traits, movement, and communication.
Complete Super Synonym Sets Edition or indivdual lessons
Content Area Vocabulary

The Content-Area Word Pictures depict imageable concepts that are essential to specific content areas.

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Vocabulary knowledge is the single best predictor of students' comprehension of texts. The reading of complex texts requires that students have rich vocabularies. The two types of reading les...

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KIS Possible Scope & Sequence Initial Work

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KIS Possible Scope & Sequence Initial Work

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KIS Possible Scope & Sequence - Google Jamboard

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The version of the browser you are using is no longer supported. Please upgrade to a supported browser. Dismiss

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Foundations Lessons- https://ufli.education.ufl.edu/foundations/toolbox/

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We teach and report on power standards, but these foundational skills are not areas that we report on in upper grades. How can time and resources be restructured to allow for this? How can teachers learn more to have the appropriate background knowledge to teach this well? What resources already exist for us to draw from?

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We have lots of this base knowledge already, including from prior sessions. We would love more time to test out the strategies and tools for ourselves and have access to the examples, scope & sequence, and tools so that we can quickly and easily adapt them to our classrooms.

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Upcoming TDU with conceptual words to explore with the matrix and etymology.

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Having access to these slides would be great. There are so many awesome ideas that we see but they go by so fast. I'd say this is the case for most of our EKC sessions. I realize the slides might be proprietary, but having access to them gives practicality and longevity to these sessions.

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At wordtorque, we believe all educators deserve the opportunity to deepen their own understanding of English orthography. New insights will help each teacher, from K-12, be more effective in doing what they love most - empowering students.

We offer professional development that supports agency in critical thinking, vocabulary, reading and spelling, across all subject areas. Through scientific investigations of the structure of words, uncover the logic of the English spelling system and build a bank of tools and strategies you and your students can use to analyze, synthesize and find relationships among words.

Join a workshop in Bangkok, or participate in training @yourschool, and give your students greater control of their language, literacy and thinking skills.

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wordtorque | professional development in English orthography

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Word Inquiry workshops in Bangkok and at your school supporting student agency in critical thinking, vocabulary, reading and spelling, across all subject areas.

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http://wordsinbogor.blogspot.com/

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Upcoming SWI On-Line Workshops with Pete

Two new on-line courses hosted by EduSpark (live and recorded)

One new on-line session hosted by Reading with TLC (live and recorded)

One new on-line course from WordWorks (real-time only, not recorded)

November 2, 7-9 pm EST "Hot Topic Webinar" hosted by Reading with TLC (live and recorded) $40. Info and register .

This same series has hosted talks by David Kilpatrick, Louisa Moats, Maryanne Wolf, and Jan Hasbrouck.

5-Session General SWI Course for the Seriously Curious

Nov 9, 15, 22, 29, Dec 6 (Wednesdays, North America)

(7:30 - 9:30 EST 4:30 - 6:30 PST)

Click HERE for a video describing the course.

2-Session Spelling-Out Orthography Course

Dec 5 & 12 (Tuesdays, North America)

(7:30 - 9:30 EST 4:30 - 6:30 PST)

Click HERE for a video describing the course.

See video below for an interview on this topic with Pete.

Understanding the Tools of SWI & Teaching How the Written Word Works (Special 2-session version 3 hrs ea)

Nov 19 & 26 (Sundays in Australia & Thailand)

11:30 am - 2:30 pm (Melbourne)

7:30 am - 10:30 am (Bangkok)

Nov 18 & 26 (Saturdays in North America)

4:30 pm - 7:30 pm PST

7:30 pm - 10:30 pm EST

Click HERE for a flyer with more details. Email Pete < peterowers1@mac.com> to register or inquire.

New video on "Spelling-Out Orthography"

For more on this key practice in SWI lick HERE for a recent video in which Shawna Pope-Jefferson interviews me on "Spelling-Out Orthography."

This is an in-depth hour-long talk that includes discussing videos of young students using this process. To jump directly to that part of the video, click here.

See my webpage with many resources and videos on this topic HERE.

Consider these messages about the effect of my courses:

1. Click THIS LINK for details about my on-line and in-person PD, fees etc.

New videos of tudents 'spelling-out orthography' for reading and spelling.

Explore my archive of WordWorks Newsletters and Special Publications at THIS LINK.

Here are a couple of recent special publications about learning in my courses with many orthographic concepts and resources to support your learning.

Click for my most recent special publication of a teacher new to SWI having great success with her pull-out group.

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Upcoming SWI On-Line Workshops with Pete Two new on-line courses hosted by EduSpark (live and recorded) One new on-line session hosted by Reading with TLC (live and recorded) One new on-line course from WordWorks (real-time only, not recorded) November 2, 7-9 pm EST "Hot Topic Webinar" hosted by Reading with TLC (live and recorded) $40.

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How the Written Word Works (Peter Bowers)

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How the Written Word Works (Peter Bowers)

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WW Revised Teacher Resource Book & 70 Matrices DVD

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The Morphology Project - The Grammar Project

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In 2022, three educators and a speech pathologist from Rivergums Primary School, Serpentine Primary School and Fremantle Language Development Centre collaborated on a series of morphology lessons for Grades 3-6. This project is a bank of explicit, direct instruction style PowerPoint lessons that align with the Reading Science in Schools (RSiS) morphology scope and sequence created by Jasmine Shannon.

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Etymonline - Online Etymology Dictionary

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The online etymology dictionary (etymonline) is the internet’s go-to source for quick and reliable accounts of the origin and history of English words, phrases, and idioms. It is professional enough to satisfy academic standards, but accessible enough to be used by anyone.

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SAMPLE Morphology Weekly Lesson Plan-struct.docx

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Advance Word Study Small Group (RW or WW) Planner

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Advance Word Study Small Group (RW or WW) Planner

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Advanced Word Study Focused Reading Group

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Make a Copy before planning.

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Commonness Morphology- The Reading Teacher’s Sourcebook

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Commonness Morphology- The Reading Teacher’s Sourcebook

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Morphological Analysis Instruction in the Elementary Grades: Which Morphemes to Teach and How to Teach Them

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Morphological Analysis Instruction in the Elementary Grades: Which Morphemes to Teach and How to Teach Them

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Are there any resources that provide a list of morphemes to teach at each K-5 grade level? I have been looking for a definitive list of morphemes that is organized by grade level like the Fry sight word list. I often come across research about how L1 and L2 students acquire morphemes, but I am looking for a list that represents the morphemes that students will most likely see in print at each K-5 grade level. Does anything like that exist? Thank you for your time. Shanahan response:
The short answer to this question is, "No, I don't know of such a list."

But when have I ever been satisfied with the short answer to anything?

Let's make sure we're all in agreement as to what constitutes a morpheme? Basically, a morpheme is the "smallest grammatical unit." It isn't the same thing as a word, and yet many words are morphemes. The distinction turns on whether the unit (the morpheme or word) can stand on its own. Words have to have that kind of independence, while morphemes don't require it.

Thus, bags, trucked, running, and redirect are all words in the English language while bag, s, truck, ed, run, ing, re, and direct are all morphemes. Each morphemic unit carries meaning, but sometimes morphemes can do that independently (bag, truck, run, direct), and sometimes they need to be combined with other morphemes to be considered a word (s, ed, ing, re).

I admitted ignorance on this issue, and I've tried to turn that ignorance to your advantage. I contacted Jeffrey and Peter Bowers. Both are outstanding scholars (Jeff at the University of Bristol in the UK, and Peter at WordWorks Literacy Centre, in Ontario) who are particularly knowledgeable about teaching morphology to improve literacy. They've both published widely on the issue, and both have chided me when they felt I wasn't paying sufficient attention to how words work morphologically. These days I know no one better able to provide you with a thoughtful answer to your question, and boy was I right! I apologize for the poor renditions of the Word Matrix and the Word Sums. I'll be working with my webmaster to get the real graphics in, but in the meantime you can go to the Word Works website to see them in their full glory. http://www.wordworkskingston.com/WordWorks/Home.html
Word Matrix:
A map of a word family Here is Peter Bower's response (with my light editing):
Word Sums: reveal underlying structure of any complex word (a word with more than just a base)

"I have no knowledge of such a list, but I wouldn't recommend one anyway.

"My recommendation based on theory not direct research evidence - is that the main value comes from teaching all or many members of a morphological family at one time with the matrix and word sums (see the attached figure illustrating a matrix and word sum). In the younger grades I start with free bases [those morphemes that stand alone as words], but once that is established, I have no trouble introducing bound bases [the units that can't stand alone]. This relates to the research we cite about the value of studying meaningfully related items at one time rather than disconnected items.

"Instead of a "scope and sequence" of morphemes to teach, what I recommend is starting with words in the children's vocabulary, analyzing such words to find their bases, then looking for other members of that family.

"The point is not that there is a "scope and sequence" of morphemes to teach. Rather there is a kind of a "scope" of orthographic concepts that we want students to learn, and teachers can address those concepts based on whatever words are central to the readings they are introducing to the students.

"A brief list of those concepts that should be taught would include:

Every word is a base or a base with something else (another base or affix)

Bases and affixes (morphemes) are the meaningful building blocks that construct words.

We can analyze complex words into constituent morphemes with word sums and show their interrelationship with a matrix.

English spelling prioritizes consistent spelling of morphemes over consistent pronunciation of morphemes. (This is why we refer to morphemes by their spelling not their pronunciation. The base of the word action is not referred to by the pronunciation of the wordact. Instead it is referred to by its spelling. The base "a - c - t". This is the same as the fact that we don't refer to the <-ed> suffix by one or all of its three pronunciation, we call it by it's spelling "e-d suffix.")

Thus, we need to understand grapheme-phoneme correspondences from within the context of morphological families. (e.g. we learn the phonology of the grapheme by studying morphological families).

There are reliable conventions for the three suffixing conventions.

Studying and understanding the suffixing conventions is not primarily about improving spelling accuracy, it is about being able to analyze hypotheses about connections between words. We can test the hypothesis that "imagine" has a base "image" only if we know vowel suffixes replace final, non-syllabic "e" (image/ + ine -> imagine).

The "structure and meaning test": To determine that two words share a base, we need evidence from both structure (word sum) and meaning (etymology). So with the earlier example of words related to "play" (play, playing, playful, replay, playhouse), we can prove all of those words can be analyzed with word sums with coherent affixes and bases. But we can also show that they all go back to an Old English rootplegan, plegian for "frolic, move rapidly". However, the word "display" which can be analyzed structurally turns outnot to be related. It does not belong in the morphological family with the others because it goes back to a Latin rootplic(ere) for "fold". So to "display" is to "unfold".

"If we are going to teach children how their writing system works, we need to teach them the interrelation of morphology, phonology, and etymology. As we have pointed out, this is why Structured Word Inquiry (SWI) is not about "adding" morphological instruction to phonics instruction - its about teaching how the system works. This is why I argue that SWI teaches grapheme-phoneme correspondences more explicitly and accurately than phonics. Phonics instruction (under the definition of associations of pronunciations and letters without reference to morphology or etymology) cannot explain the grapheme-phoneme correspondences in countless words like does or rough or every or homophones, and so on. So many people miss the absolute detail into orthographic phonology that comes with SWI.

"Here are some videos to illustrate my point:

Gr. 2 teacher showing investigations from his class Grade 2 morphology video

Investigating grapheme-phoneme correspondences in a Gr. 1 class - with the context of morphological word sums Grade 1 morphology video

A kindergarten lesson I taught introducing the word sum and matrix that touches on grapheme-phoneme correspondences like the pronunciation of the <-s> suffix for /z/ and /s/ Kindergarten morphology video

"It's as simple as starting with the "known" and then expanding from that. Even if kids know all the words in a morphological family (e.g. play, playing, playful, replay, playhouse) the lesson is not about new vocabulary, but learning how word structure links words. That concept can then be applied anywhere.

"The other thing I keep in mind when choosing morphological families to investigate is the orthographic concepts a family has to offer. If I've established the fact that words that share a base share a spelling and a meaning connection, then I can introduce a base like with words like actor, acting, react, and action as a way to introduce the fact that the pronunciation of morpheme might change but keep the spelling. In that way we learn the phonology of t is not the "t sound", but that the grapheme can write/t/ when that is the appropriate sound. I've attached an example of a lesson I've used for that before.

"I also draw on the <-ed> suffix from early on to highlight this same concept that morphemes do not have pronunciations until they are in a word. The pronunciation of a word like is another useful one to get rid of this idea of a "t sound" since this very common pronunciation of a very common suffix is what is typically thought of the "t sound," but their ain't no /t/!

"And then you also encounter words that give rise to the need to teach all the suffixing changes.
Shanahan again:
"These are concepts teachers need to learn and they can bring into work with their class as they investigate words."

I don't disagree with Peter on any of this, except I'm not as dismissive of the kind of list that you are requesting. I don't see it as mutually exclusive from the curriculum goals that he specified or contradictory of the kind of instruction he described.

Many teachers, when referring to morphology or "structural analysis", actually are talking about affixes alone, and not the bases. If that is the case here, there are some lists like that which present the most common prefixes and suffixes from textbooks in grades 3-9 (White, Sowell, & Yanagihara, 1989). You can easily find those lists on line and you could definitely make use of those lists to make sure that you are hitting all the notes if you do the word sums and matrixes that Peter recommends.

Otherwise, I haven't been able to come up with a graded list of bases for you to use. But I have passed your letter along to my friends at MetaMetrics (the Lexile people) and have asked if they could produce such a list from their language corpus of more than 1 billion words. Stay tuned!

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Morphology Instruction in Reading | Shanahan on Literacy

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This blog explores the newest ways of teaching children to make sense of word meaning through morphological analysis. Unlike past approaches, this one focuses on younger students--and not just older ones.

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The Morphology Project - The Grammar Project

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In 2022, three educators and a speech pathologist from Rivergums Primary School, Serpentine Primary School and Fremantle Language Development Centre collaborated on a series of morphology lessons for Grades 3-6. This project is a bank of explicit, direct instruction style PowerPoint lessons that align with the Reading Science in Schools (RSiS) morphology scope and sequence created by Jasmine Shannon.

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Morphology Home / Matrix Home

Welcome

Welcome to the main information page for Mini Matrix-Maker.

We aim to provide a simple low-cost web-based tool for creating word matrices, similar to the one below. For the moment, the current version is free.

Visit our Morphology Home page for other useful tools, which can help you improve your matrices.

Run Mini Matrix-Maker (free version)

Click the link below to run the program.

www.neilramsden.co.uk/spelling/matrix/run.html?version=temp

You may wish to add a bookmark to this link.

Please read the current terms and conditions before running it. They may be updated periodically.

Free Usage

We may charge for using the Mini Matrix-Maker in future, but for the moment usage is free. The most likely next step will be to include a voluntary donation box to help keep this web-site active.

Using Mini Matrix-Maker now doesn't commit you to any future involvement.

Example Matrix

View a sample Matrix Results Page, built from word sums around the base element <mode>.

What is Mini Matrix-Maker?

Mini Matrix-Maker will automatically build a word matrix for you from the set of word sums in your word family.

Normally, deciding how to organise your word matrix can be hard to get right and even one small change to your word sums can make a big difference in how the matrix looks.

Mini Matrix-Maker makes life easy for you, because all you have to do is concentrate on the word sums. From there, building an accurate, attractive matrix is all done for you.

How do you use a Word Matrix?

Word matrices are powerful tools for exploring and testing knowledge of word structure. They provide a graphical shorthand for illustrating families of interrelated words.

Word matrices read from left to right.

From them, you make single, complete words.

You may use one element from a column at a time.

You don't have to take an element from every column of a matrix - but you must not "leapfrog" over a column.

How does Mini Matrix-Maker compare with Word Microscope?

The Word Microscope program can more actively guide you in creating word sums and matrices. It recognises prefixes, bases, connecting vowels and suffixes, and includes checks and reference tools. You can also easily save and retrieve your work, or print a customised findings log.

Learn more by reading the quick comparison between Word Microscope and the Mini Matrix-Maker.

There is a Word Microscope download for Microsoft Windows, which can be used for free for a limited period.

Word matrices originated within Real Spelling. Visit the Real Spellers web-site to discover more about Real Spelling concepts and the role of matrices in understanding English orthography.

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Morphology Home / Matrix Home Welcome to the main information page for Mini Matrix-Maker. We aim to provide a simple low-cost web-based tool for creating word matrices, similar to the one below. For the moment, the current version is free. Visit our Morphology Home page for other useful tools, which can help you improve your matrices.

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Vocabularians: Integrated Word Study in the Middle Grades

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Amazon.com: Vocabularians: Integrated Word Study in the Middle Grades: 9781625310163: Overturf, Brenda J: Books