The Role of Morphological Awareness in Vocabulary and Reading development

The Role of Morphological Awareness in Vocabulary and Reading development
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The Role of Morphological Awareness in Vocabulary and Reading development
Due to the high rate of worldwide migrations, the number of students whose native language differs from the language of instruction, in the learning institution they enroll has increased at an alarming rate. These students encounter a double challenge of conceptualizing academic content, and learning their second language concurrently. As result, students whose native language differs from the language of instruction perform poorly because they cannot comprehend text easily as the native speakers do (Stone, 2006). This paper explores the role of morphological awareness in vocabulary acquisition.
Morphological awareness entails the ability to identify or recognize the smallest units of meaning of words, and includes knowledge of derivational and inflectional morphemes. Research has revealed that approximately 60 percent of all new words encountered by children in academic reading materials might be morphologically complex. Training students to enhance their morphological sensitivity is one of the ways that can be effective in increasing their vocabulary knowledge, and their reading skills. Vocabulary knowledge plays an integral part in fluent use of a language. Vocabulary size determines how well students can perform in different academic language skills such as writing, listening, and reading. Having inadequate vocabulary knowledge acts as an obstacle to students’ reading comprehension in such a way that the student will find it difficult to maneuver through the path of academic achievement (In O'Connor & Vadasy, 2013).
As a result, vocabulary learning should be a central activity in students whose native language differs from the instructional language. Morphological awareness is one of the strategies that can be adopted as a potential strategy in enriching students’ vocabulary. Morphological awareness enable students to learn morphemes and morphemic boundaries by breaking down complex words into less complex words whose meaning can be easily understood. Nowadays, morphological awareness is embraced as a dimension of vocabulary knowledge. Morphemes have phonological, semantic, and syntax properties, which explain the role of specific words in the reading context. In addition, Morphological knowledge enables students to detect spelling, and any sort of phonological irregularities (Vadasy & Nelson, 2012).
Morphological processing is bound to play a significant role in the acquisition of reading skills for the simple reason that it is essential to language comprehension. Readers who are unaware of morphological components of written words are at a particular disadvantage in decoding, vocabulary and reading comprehension. Efficiency of processing and ease of recall are thought to be benefits of morphological awareness (Cheung...