Orthographic Inquiry in the Classroom: Identifying the Morphological Family

The following extract is taken from PETAA Book The Alphabetic Principle and Beyond...Surveying the Landscape, edited by Robyn Cox, Susan Feez and Lorraine Beveridge, published in 2019. This piece is from a chapter section contributed by Lyn Anderson and Ann Whiting.

Our learning community is comprised of young students (four-, five- and six-year-olds). There is a wide range of learners in our class – those who are beginning to interact with the text, to those who are working independently when reading and writing. This class includes students who speak English as a first language and as an additional language (EAL). Some EAL students are competent in communicating in English while others are new to the language. All members of the learning community, including teachers, study how the oral and written language works through a process of scientific inquiry as described in the classroom vignette below. This process of uncovering the meaning, sense and order of their writing system motivates and facilitates learning to read and write. 

Words are in the mainstream in our classroom where orthographic inquiry is a vital part of the current learning and everyday discourse. Morphology frames the understanding of etymology and especially phonology. As you follow the orthographic journey of these young students, you will understand that orthographic phonology can only be fully understood by studying the morphology and etymology of the word (Venezky, 1967, 1999; Chomsky & Halle, 1968).

The Learning Context

Our orthographic journey begins within the learning context of this classroom study: There are many cycles that affect life on earth. We read Jeannie Baker’s Circle (2016) to begin the conceptual and orthographic understanding of
‘cycles’ , starting with the question:

T: ‘What word best captures the heart of this story?’

The learning community suggests a host of words such as cycles, journey, birds, Godwit, migration. We select a key word, cycles, central to the text and the unit of inquiry. At the same time, we will study the orthography of ‘cycle’ through the three components: morphology, etymology and phonology. By investigating the word ‘cycle’, the students will learn significant orthographic conventions and principles that apply to all words. Deliberately embedding orthographic inquiry brings a deep understanding of the sense and order inherent in English orthography. This enriches the themes and concepts of our study. Our quest for understanding will take us full circle.

Identifying the Morphological Family

Please note: significant orthographic work has already been undertaken with the class when the teachers begin the work of identifying 'cycle's' morphological family. The full teaching and learning sequence is covered in The Alphabetic Principle and Beyond...Surveying the Landscape.

During this morphological investigation, the students will learn that words are related by a common base element and share an underlying meaning. A small set of familiar related words – cycles, cycling, bicycle, tricycles, recycle – are placed in a word bag.

T: Words belong in families. Let’s find out the family of cycle.

One or two words are revealed and read each day. The teachers and students share their understanding.

T: How can you use cycling in a sentence? What does tricycle mean to you?

We announce (spell aloud), rather than pronounce, the elements of each word, for example:

T: C-y-c-l, replace the final non-syllabic < e > (pause) ing, cycling.

We hypothesise which words belong to the morphological family and place the words in or out of the word web. The children illustrate the words collaboratively and the word web begins to grow, as does the student’s understanding. Word
webs are a collection of the morphological family.

Each time the students encounter the word bag, we add a new word (cyclist, cycled, recycling) and often a provocation to consider: circle, cylinder, cyclamen, upcycle. Some of these new words may be unfamiliar to the students. We deliberately widen their lexicon to guide their morphological understanding.

We now shift our focus to understand base elements, the ‘main building block’ of words.

T: Bicycle is related to cycles. They share the same base element, c-y-c-l-e.

We write < cycle > on the classroom chart and explain that this is a signal to ‘announce’ what is inside the angle brackets: ‘c-y-c-l-e.’

Students have been exposed to the morphological term ’base element’ many times in our conversation. It’s at this point some students immediately announce the base element while others continue to work towards an understanding of this concept.

Within the context of the base element < cycle >, we explicitly teach the names of the alphabet letters for those who need it; introduce the conventional English graphemes and the orthographic markers, such as the single, final, non-syllabic < e >. We model how to write and announce the base element in the central part of the word web.

Next we turn to etymology to hear the story of cycle.