Gruber's Essential Guide to Test Taking: Grades 6-9 - Gruber Gary R. 2019

Vocabulary
Verbal strategies

VOCABULARY SIRATEGY 1: Learn Prefixes and Roots

Any educator will tell you that the best way to increase vocabulary is to learn the important prefixes and roots of words. How many words can be learned from prefixes and roots? Well, studies have shown that the following list of 29 prefixes and 25 roots will give the meaning of over 125,000 words. Not bad for learning just 54 items!

This is, of course, just one way to increase vocabulary. The other way is to have your child read as much as he or she can—read anything, from children’s books and magazines to newspapers—and look up words that are unfamiliar. In the meantime, here are the prefixes and roots:

PREFIXES

ROOTS

WORD-DEFINITION EXERCISE-PRACTICE USING PREFIXES AND ROOTS

Now let’s see how many words your child can figure out using prefixes and roots. Have your child define the following words by looking back at the list of prefixes and roots. The answers follow the words below.

1circumvent

2malediction

3process

4stationary

5untenable

6convention

7revert

8retract

9sequel

10precursory

11monotone

12interject

13introduce

14recede

15concurrence

ANSWERS

See if your child’s answers match these answers.

Sentence: The politician cleverly circumvented the real issue.

Sentence: You are always saying maledictions about him.

Sentence: How do you want to process this order?

Sentence: The stars look like they are stationary.

Sentence: This is an untenable situation.

Sentence: Let’s go to the computer convention.

Sentence: Don’t revert to your old ways of doing things.

Sentence: I’m going to retract what I just said about you.

Sentence: Did you see the sequel to Rocky III.

Sentence: These are precursory symptoms of a fever.

Sentence: Don’t talk in such a monotone.

Sentence: You always interject your own ideas when I’m talking.

Sentence: Could you please introduce me to that girl?

Sentence: The army receded from its front position.

Sentence: All these events have a remarkable concurrence.

VOCABULARY STRATEGY 2 Learn Suffixes

Finally, your child should be familiar with the meanings of certain suffixes. Here is a list of some of the important ones:

Now that your child has already looked at the section on prefixes and roots, and after you have explained the suffixes with examples, let’s see how your child does with these questions. Some involve knowing suffixes only, but others involve knowing a combination of prefixes, roots, and suffixes.

QUESTIONS

1What is the meaning of tenacious?

2What is the meaning of irreversible?

3What is the meaning of precursor?

4What is the meaning of unidirectional?

5What is the meaning of parity?

6What is the meaning of tactile?

7What is the best meaning of the underlined suffix? director

(A) one who (B) place where (C) quality of (D) full of

8What is the best meaning of the underlined suffix? anthropology

(A) being (B) the quality of (C) the study of (D) place where

9Which is the prefix of the following word? inject

(A) i (B) in (C) inj (D) inject

10Which is the suffix of the following word? antagonism

(A) nism (B) ism (C) ant (D) onism

ANSWERS

After you have gone over your child’s work for the preceding ten questions, describe how to answer the questions using the following explanations.

1tenacious: ten = to hold acious = having the quality of

So tenacious = having the quality of holding on to

2irreversible: ir = not re = again, back vers = turning ible = able to

So irreversible = not being able to turn back

3precursor: pre = before curs = to run or = one who

So precursor = something that runs before or comes before

4unidirectional: uni = one ion = the act of al = having the quality of

So unidirectional = having the quality of acting in one direction

5parity: par = equal ity = the character of

So parity = the state or character of being equal

6tactile: tact = to touch ile = pertaining to

So tactile = pertaining to something that can be touched

7The or in director is the suffix that means one who (A).

Director means one who directs.

8The logy in anthropology is the suffix that means the study of (C).

Anthropology is the study of man.

9The prefix of the word inject is in. Inject means to put into.

10The suffix of the word antagonism is ism. Ism means the practice of.

Antagonism means the practice of antagonizing or hostility.

Essential Word List for Grades 6 • 7 • 8 • 9

What follows is a list of 268 words. This list was painstakingly derived from the words most frequently found on standardized tests, and contains words your child should know. Have your child look up in the dictionary 5 words per day. This list purposely does not contain the meanings of these words, because your child should get used to using the dictionary, and discover the meaning of the words himself or herself. Have your child check the words for which he or she has already found the meanings.

abandon

abnormal

abolish

abrupt

absolutely

absorb

abstruse

absurd

abundant

accidentally

acquiescent

adept

adjust

administration

admire

adversary

agility

alertness

allegiance

ambiguous

ambush

ample

amplify

amused

annex

annul

approximately

ardently

assuredly

attain

attire

attitude

audience

authority

aware

baffle

bewildering

bigoted

blend

boast

bountiful

brevity

brilliant

capillary

career

cargo

catastrophe

cautious

cavity

chore

coax

colossal

command

comment

commotion

compactly

complicated

composed

comprise

conflict

constrain

contemplate

contempt

controversy

creep

cunning

curb

cured

curiosity

customary

dally

decent

deface

deficiency

demolish

deposit

designate

desolation

Gruber's Essential Guide to Test Taking: Grades 6-9 - Gruber Gary R. 2019

VocabularyVerbal strategies

Vocabulary
Verbal strategies