Peter Bowers contributed this post. Pete is a doctoral candidate at Queen's University, Canada and the creator of the WordWorks Literacy Centre. Pete authored a prior post on Vocabulogic.
I am pleased to be invited to use this week’s post to describe our meta-analysis on morphological interventions (Bowers, Kirby, & Deacon, 2010) that comes out in the June issue of Review of Educational Research. Vocabulogic emphasizes instruction of morphology among a wide array of vocabulary instruction strategies, so our finding about positive effects of morphological instruction on vocabulary learning is of particular relevance for this blog. Vocabulary, however, was not a special focus of our study. We report on effects for a range of literacy outcomes at the sub-lexical (oral and written features of words), lexical (spelling, reading and vocabulary), and supra-lexical (reading comprehension) levels. Before describing the results, a short refresher on morphology may help.
Morphology: The meaning structure of words
I am pleased to be invited to use this week’s post to describe our meta-analysis on morphological interventions (Bowers, Kirby, & Deacon, 2010) that comes out in the June issue of Review of Educational Research. Vocabulogic emphasizes instruction of morphology among a wide array of vocabulary instruction strategies, so our finding about positive effects of morphological instruction on vocabulary learning is of particular relevance for this blog. Vocabulary, however, was not a special focus of our study. We report on effects for a range of literacy outcomes at the sub-lexical (oral and written features of words), lexical (spelling, reading and vocabulary), and supra-lexical (reading comprehension) levels. Before describing the results, a short refresher on morphology may help.
Morphology: The meaning structure of words
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| Matrix (Real Spelling dot com) |
English spelling marks the interrelation of morphology and phonology
English spelling uses consistent spellings of morphemes even when pronunciation shifts (see Venezky 1999, 1967 for this and other spelling principles). Note that the base heal needs a grapheme that can represent both the ‘long e’ of heal and the ‘short e’ of health.
Morphology instruction and research
Morphology instruction and research
Morphology provides cues of word meanings, influences grapheme-phoneme correspondences, governs spelling changes due to suffixing and marks the grammatical roles of words. With such a fundamental influence on how spelling represents the meaning and pronunciation of words, it is surprising morphology has not played a larger role in teacher training and instruction (Henry, 2003: Nunes & Bryant, 2006; Moats, 2009).
Morphological instruction may have an intuitive appeal for teachers and researchers, but what does the research evidence show? Does morphological instruction actually bring educational benefits? Are the effects similar for less and more able students? How young can morphology be taught effectively? Are there identifiable methods of instruction that are more effective than others?
To investigate these questions, we conducted a meta-analysis of the existing published morphological interventions. (Meta-analysis is a quantitative technique for combining results across different studies.) We found 22 interventions conducted with children in preschool to grade 8 in languages that use the Roman alphabet (18 in English, 2 in Norwegian, 1 in Danish, 1 in Dutch) with a total 2,652 students.
Instructional strategies
Morphological instruction may have an intuitive appeal for teachers and researchers, but what does the research evidence show? Does morphological instruction actually bring educational benefits? Are the effects similar for less and more able students? How young can morphology be taught effectively? Are there identifiable methods of instruction that are more effective than others?
To investigate these questions, we conducted a meta-analysis of the existing published morphological interventions. (Meta-analysis is a quantitative technique for combining results across different studies.) We found 22 interventions conducted with children in preschool to grade 8 in languages that use the Roman alphabet (18 in English, 2 in Norwegian, 1 in Danish, 1 in Dutch) with a total 2,652 students.
Instructional strategies
A wide variety of oral and written instructional strategies were used. In production tasks such as a cloze or analogy task, children are taught to produce the appropriate word for a given context (e.g., magic/magician; music/________(musician)). Recognition tasks included selecting or sorting words and identifying morphemes within complex words. Problem-solving was an explicit focus in a number of studies (Baumann et al., 2003; Berninger et al., 2003; Bowers & Kirby, 2009; Tomesen & Aarnoutse, 1998). The meta-analysis includes a descriptive table of the morphological content and types of tasks used across the 22 studies.
Findings of our meta-analysis
Findings of our meta-analysis
We found positive effects of morphological instruction but those effects were variable, which is not surprising given the range of participants and instructional methods employed. Analyzing the results for sub-sets of students based on age and ability and comparing types of morphological instruction provides a clearer picture of the effects. We found that morphological instruction was:
- More effective with less able students
- Generally more effective in interventions with younger students (Pre-K to Grade 2) than older students (Grade 3 and up)
- Generally more effective when integrated with other aspects of literacy instruction
Download a conference poster with a table of the results showing effect sizes for morphological instruction compared to control groups and compared to alternative treatments for outcomes at every linguistic layer at this link.
Implications
Implications
Evidence of greater effects with less able and younger students has important implications for classroom instruction and research. Adams (1990) cautioned against morphological instruction with beginning or less skilled readers. More recently, researchers (e.g., Carlisle & Stone, 2005; Kirk & Gillon, 2009; Lyster, 2002; Tyler, Lewis, Haskill, & Tolbert, 2003) presented evidence challenging that recommendation. Our meta-analysis addresses this debate directly with the finding that young and less able readers gain more from morphological instruction.
“But how do you teach morphology to such young children?” is a common question when I have presented these results at conferences. Perhaps the best response I can provide here is to point to two videos of instruction with young children (Grades 1, 2 and 3) illustrating the kind of morphological content young children can learn and use in the classroom: Video 1 (also available on You Tube) and Video 2 . These young children clearly demonstrate understanding of the internal structures of words and how that system informs the pronunciation and meaning of words.
“But how do you teach morphology to such young children?” is a common question when I have presented these results at conferences. Perhaps the best response I can provide here is to point to two videos of instruction with young children (Grades 1, 2 and 3) illustrating the kind of morphological content young children can learn and use in the classroom: Video 1 (also available on You Tube) and Video 2 . These young children clearly demonstrate understanding of the internal structures of words and how that system informs the pronunciation and meaning of words.
I hope that this new research evidence and examples of morphological instruction encourages you to consider looking for ways to integrate morphological instruction in your classrooms!
References
Adams, M. J. (1990). Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Adams, M. J. (1990). Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Baumann, J. F., Edwards, E. C., Boland, E. M., Olejnik, S., & Kame'enui, E. J. (2003). Vocabulary tricks: Effects of instruction in morphology and context on fifth-grade students' ability to derive and infer word meanings. American Educational Research Journal, 40, 447-494.
Berninger, V., Nagy, W., Carlisle, J., Thomson, J., Hoffer, D., Abbott, S., Abbott, R., Richards, T., & Aylward, E. (2003). Effective treatment for dyslexics in grades 4 to 6. In B. Foorman (Ed.), Preventing and remediating reading difficulties: Bringing science to scale (pp. 382–417). Timonium, MD: York Press.
Bowers, P. N. & Kirby, J. R. (2009). Effects of morphological instruction on vocabulary acquisition. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 23. 515-537.
Bowers, P. N., Kirby, J. R., & S. H. Deacon. (in press). The effects of morphological instruction on literacy skills: A systematic review of the literature. Review of Educational Research, 80.
Carlisle, J. F. & Stone, C. A. (2005). Exploring the role of morphemes in word reading. Reading Research Quarterly, 40, 428-449.
Henry, M.K. (2003). Unlocking literacy: Effective decoding & spelling instruction. Baltimore, Maryland: Brookes Publishing.
Kirk, C. & Gillon, T. G. (2009). Integrated morphological awareness intervention as a tool for improving literacy. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 40, 341-351.
Lyster, S. H. (2002). The effects of morphological versus phonological awareness training in kindergarten on reading development. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 15, 261-294.
Moats, L. (2009). Knowledge foundations for teaching reading and spelling. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal. 22, 379-399.
Nunes, T. & Bryant, P. (2006). Improving literacy by teaching morphemes. London: Routlege.
Tomesen, M., & Aarnoutse, C. (1998). Effects of an instructional programme for deriving word meanings. Educational Studies, 24, 107-128.
Tyler, A. A., Lewis, K. E., Haskill, A., & Tolbert, L. C. (2003). Outcomes of different speech and language goal attack strategies. Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research, 46, 1077-1094.
Venezky, R. (1967). English orthography: Its graphical structure and its relation to sound. Reading Research Quarterly, 2, 75-105.
Venezky, R. (1999). The American way of spelling. New York: Guilford Press.
