Morphology and spelling Peter Bryant and Terezinha Nunes

Morphology and spelling

Peter Bryant and Terezinha Nunes

Unputdownable morphemes

Morphemes are units of meaning and many words are constructed from more than one morpheme

1. glad read put

2. gladly, gladness readable put down

3. unreadable putdownable

4. unputdownable

The spelling of affix morphemes (-ly, -ness, -able) is highly consistent and therefore regular in English as well as in other languages

Conditional morphological spelling rules exist in many orthographies (French, English, Greek,

Portuguese, Hebrew, Arabic) when: the same sound is spelled in different ways

fox sockseducation magicianδίνω νερό

different sounds are spelled in the same way cats dogsheal health

spelling represents morphemic distinctions that aren’t represented in speech

la maison les maisons The boys drink The boy’s drink

Residents refuse to be put in the bins

’

Three questions

Do children have particular difficulty in conforming to these morphemic rules in spelling?

What causes these difficulties?

Do children overcome these difficulties by learning about morphemic spelling rules or in some other way?

Three questions




Phonemes, not morphemes, in invented spelling (substitution for past verb “ed” ending)

halpt likt

kild watid wotid

helped

liked

killed

waited

wanted

Charles Read, 1986

“s” or “z” for plurals in invented spelling

onges boxis

pnnez disaz owsenz

oranges

boxes

pennies

dishes

oceans

Charles Read, 1986

Spelling the endings of /d/ and /t/ non-verbs

/d/ ending /t/ ending

bird belt cold exceptfield nextgold paintground soft

Nunes, Bryant & Bindman

Mean correct phonetic spellings of non-verbs ending in /d/ or /t/ (out of 10) in 3 sessions over a

period of 21 months

0123456789

10

6yr5m 7yr5m 8yr7m

start7m later21m later

N=297


Spelling the endings of regular past verbs with /d/ and /t/ inflections

/d/ ending /t/ ending

called dressedcovered kissedfilled laughed killed learnedopened stopped

Mean correct “-ed” spellings (out of 10)in 3 sessions over a period of 21 months

0123456789

10

6yr5m 7yr5m 8yr7m

start7m later21m later

N=297


most of the mistakes with regular verb endings are phonetic transcriptions: e.g. “kist” for “kissed”

these inappropriate phonetic transcriptions are made even by some 10 year olds

0123456789

10

6 7 8 9 10

Phonetic endings instead of the correct “-ed” ending

Number of incorrectphonetic transcriptions of regular verb endings

Generalisations and overgeneralisations of the “-ed” ending

many children put “-eds” on the ends of irregular past verbs (sleped) (71%), and also of non-verbs (sofed, necsed) (59%) as well as of regular past verbs (kissed)

the generalisation to irregular verbs is incorrect but grammatically appropriate

the generalisation to non-verbs is incorrect and inappropriate grammatically


Incorrect generalisations of the “ed” ending to irregular verbs “sleped” & to non-verbs “necsed”

at first the children make the two types of generalisation roughly equally

but by 8 yrs they make many more generalisations to irregular verbs than to non-verbs 0

0.10.20.30.40.50.60.70.80.9

1

to non-verbsto irregvbs


/d/ and /t/ endings are spelled as “d” and “t”

/d/ and /t/ endings are sometimes spelled as “d” and “t” and sometimes as “ed”

“ed” endings are for past verbs:“d” and “t” endings are for everything else

grapheme-phoneme rule

extension ofgrapheme-phoneme rule

morpho-phonemic rule

The –ion ending: how 880 children spelled four words with the “-t-ion” ending:

percent correct

0102030405060708090

100

7 to 8 8 to 9 9 to 10 10 to 11

electiondestinationcombinationemotion

τόπι(ball) νερό(water)

φωνή(voice) δίνω(I give)

μιλάμε(we talk) παιδί(child)

μήλο(apple) πόλη(town)

Sound in real word stems

Sound in real word inflections

/o/sound

/i/ sound

μιλάμε(we talk)δίνω(I give)φιλώ(I kiss)ρίχνομαι(I fly into)

τόπι (ball)παιδί (child)βόδι (ox)νησί (island)

θότινεπίσόβικιφί

ψήνει(s/he cooks)μήλο(apple)κήποι(gardens)νησί(island)

ζώνη(waistband)πόλη(town)θέση(place/seat)φωνή(voice)

λόχηκόσηρέκηβοπή

κλείνομαι(I am shut up in)θείοι(uncles)δείχνουμε(we show)πειράζει(s/he teases)

ψήνει(s/he cooks)δένει(s/he ties)πειράζει(s/he teases)κοιτάζει(s/he looks at)

πέφειγίβεισιφάγειδιπάγει

κοιμάμαι(I sleep)τοίχοι(walls)κοιτάζει(s/he looks at)ανοίγουμε(we open)

τοίχοι(walls)θείοι(uncles)κήποι(gardens)καιροί(days/times)

λίροιμίοινίγοισεποί

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

22

24

26

28

30

32

Session A (Mean age:6y10m)

Session B (Mean age:7y6m)

Session C (Mean age:8y6m)

Real Word Stems

Real Word Inflections

Pseudoword Inflections

Chliounaki & Bryant, 2008

Answer to first question

The conditional rules are seriously and persistently difficult for a lot of children

The degree of difficulty may vary from script to script

Three questions




Three questions




Not enough explicit morphological awareness?

Several studies with English speaking children show a relationship between children’s morphological awareness and their use of conventional spelling for inflections

We ourselves have used 2 main tasks to establish this relationship

Two morphological awareness tasks

Sentence analogySentence analogy:

Tom helps Mary

Tom helped Mary

Tom sees Mary

_____________

Word analogyWord analogy:

teacher taught

writer ______

walk walked

shake ______

Age

IQ

Spelling “ed”s in 1st session

Word analogy predicts correct use of “ed” 7 months later:

Outcome measure - spelling “ed”s 7 months after the 1st session

Word analogy in 1st session

Nunes, Bryant, & Bindman

13.8%

11.1%

8.0%

4. 0%

How general is the link?

Several researchers have found this predictive relationship in English-speaking children (e.g. Kirby & Deacon in Canada) and it seems to be true of Israeli (Levin) and Brazilian (Rego) children too

It is likely that it’s a 2-way street (Levin; \Nunes & Bryant)

But it may not be true of orthographies in which spelling is not conditional on morphology e.g. Finnish

Geminates Clusters

Stem prinseSSaksikimaLLukseksi

harraSTuksenapuhaLTamiseksi

Inflection

tilaisuudeSSakumppaniLLa

älykkyydeSTälasketteluLTa

A test of spelling geminates and consonant clusters given to Finnish 7-year olds

This task was given to the children at mean age 7 yrs (Time 1)and 5 months later at mean age 7yrs 5m (Time 2)

Lehtonen & Bryant, 2005

Morphological awareness and spelling geminates & clusters

At Time 1 & 2 we also gave the children a Finnish version of Berko’s Wug task, devised by Lyytinen (1988)

We used the adverb, comparative and past tense subtests

Our question was whether these scores would predict spelling of inflections more than of stems

There was no difference: the correlation between the morphological test at Time 1 and spelling at Time 2 was .48 for stem spelling and .41 for inflection spelling

Answer to second question

Children may ignore morphological spelling rules because they are not explicitly aware enough of morphological categories and morphological distinctions

It’s likely that they concentrate on phonology instead because that’s what they’re taught about

Three questions




Three questions




Morphemic spelling rules exist…….. But do people who eventually learn to spell words

using the conventional spellings for morphemes actually know and use the rules?

The alternative is that they learn the specific spelling of each word (“word specific” or “lexical” learning), or that they learn about a set of specific sequences

The acid test is to present children with pseudo words which have an obvious morphemic structure e.g. “Yesterday I /bopt/ along the road as I went to school”

A study of Greek children’s learning of how to spell vowel sounds in inflections and in stems

The best evidence that children actually learn morphemic spelling rules comes from Greek

Greek is a highly regular orthography as far as reading is concerned

Spelling is less predictable because there are very few vowel sounds in Greek, and more than one way of spelling three of the vowels

e.g. /i/ is represented by: ι , η , ει, οι /o/ is represented by: ο , ω /e/ is represented by: ε , αι

μιλάμε(we talk)δίνω(I give)φιλώ(I kiss)ρίχνομαι(I fly into)

τόπι (ball)παιδί (child)βόδι (ox)νησί (island)

θότινεπίσόβικιφί

ψήνει(s/he cooks)μήλο(apple)κήποι(gardens)νησί(island)

ζώνη(waistband)πόλη(town)θέση(place/seat)φωνή(voice)

λόχηκόσηρέκηβοπή

κλείνομαι(I am shut up in)θείοι(uncles)δείχνουμε(we show)πειράζει(s/he teases)

ψήνει(s/he cooks)δένει(s/he ties)πειράζει(s/he teases)κοιτάζει(s/he looks at)

πέφειγίβεισιφάγειδιπάγει

κοιμάμαι(I sleep)τοίχοι(walls)κοιτάζει(s/he looks at)ανοίγουμε(we open)

τοίχοι(walls)θείοι(uncles)κήποι(gardens)καιροί(days/times)

λίροιμίοινίγοισεποί

τόπι(ball) νερό(water) βεσό

φωνή(voice) δίνω(I give) λιβώ

μιλάμε(we talk) παιδί(child) θότι

μήλο(apple) πόλη(town) ρέκη

Sound in real word stems

Sound in pseudo-word inflections

Sound in real word inflections

/o/sound

/i/ sound

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

22

24

26

28

30

32

Session A (Mean age:6y10m)

Session B (Mean age:7y6m)

Session C (Mean age:8y6m)

Real Word Stems

Real Word Inflections

Pseudoword Inflections


Session A Session B Session C

RW-PW- 35 10 3

RW+PW-30 23 17

RW-PW+ 0 1 0

RW+PW+ 25 56 70

Number of children (out of 90) significantly above chance level (+) or not (-) with real word inflections (RW) and pseudo-word inflections (PW)

Chance level .375: 18+/32 above chance level

Session A Session B

Real word inflections

Pseudoword inflections



.434**

-.036


Session A Session B





.434**

-.036


Session B Session C





.390**

-.010


Session B Session C





.390**

-.010


Session A Session B

Real word stems


Real word stems


.146

.172


Session B Session C

Real word stems


Real word stems


.253

.197


Conclusions from the Chliounaki & Bryant study

Children get to spell inflections correctly in real words before pseudowords

Cross lagged correlations between real and pseudo-word spelling of inflections suggest a causal connection:

It is that word specific learning lays the basis for inferring the morphemic spelling rules

So what about learning English morphemic spelling rules?

Do English-speaking children learn the morphemic spelling rule for the plural?

In English the last sound in “buns” and “dogs” is /z/ but it is spelled as “s” because “s” is the spelling for the plural morpheme in English

Since children don’t often write “dogz” (Treiman, Read) it is possible that young children at least know the morphological rule for “s” as the plural ending

However, there is also a frequency rule: in almost every word that ends in a /z/ sound which is preceded by a consonant the /z/ ending is spelled as “s” (e.g.“dogs”)

but when the /z/ ending is preceded by a vowel sound, as in “trees” “freeze” “please”, the ending is as likely to be “ze” or “se” as “s”

The children saw two ________ at school today.

The children saw two ________ at school today.

The children saw two pleens at school today.

The children saw two prees at school today.

Percent of children’s “-s” spellings of the /z/ sound at the end of plural words and pseudo-

words

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

fibs trees pleens preesReal plural words Plural pseudo-words

Kemp & Bryant, 2003

Adults’ “-s” spellings of the /z/ sound at the end of plural pseudo-words

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

pleens prees

Secondary

Tertiary

Educational Levels

Kemp & Bryant, 2003

/z/ and /ks/ ending words We repeated the previous experiment with adults, and

extended the /z/ end sound data to one- morpheme vs two-morpheme verbs as well (finds: sees, sneeze,)

We also included words ending in /ks/ : the rule here is that : 1-morpheme words end in “x” or “xe” (I fix, six, axe) and 2-morpheme words in “cks” (he picks, socks).

In this experiment we used pseudo-words, as well as a real word control, and we gave the young adult participants a choice between two spellings

foxThe wily old was very cunning. focks

tricks That magician always his audience.

trix

yoxJim sometimes after work. yocks

gricks We have a in the garden.

grix

kleesThe children saw two at school .

kleeze.

proosThe children saw a at school .

prooze

Frequencies of correct choice for /z/ ending verbs in 205 young adults educated at school only

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29

10% of sample significantly above chance

Number of correct choices out of 30

Numberof participantsout of205

Frequencies of correct choice for /z/ ending nouns in 205 young adults educated at school only

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29




Frequencies of correct choice for /ks/ ending verbs in 205 young adults educated at school only

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29




Frequencies of correct choice for /ks/ ending nouns in 205 young adults educated at school only

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29




Frequencies of correct choice for /z/ ending nouns in 72 young university students

0

5

10

15

20

25

14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30Number of correct choices out of 30

87.5% of sample significantly above chance

Frequencies of correct choice for /z/ ending verbs in 72 young university students

0

5

10

15

20

25

14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30Number of correct choices out of 30


Percent significantly above chance in choice of correct endings in the three samples

N z nouns ks nouns

10-14 year olds 190 40 44

20 year recruits 205 12 17

20 year students 72 88 92

The difference between the recruits and the students represents an educational and a social class fault-line

Conclusions from English and Greek studies

The developmental process of children inferring rules on the basis of their word-specific knowledge seems to work better for Greek than for English children

It also works much better for some English individuals than for others

They are probably also due to the lack of explicit teaching about morphemic spelling rules

Test of the lack of teaching idea

We gave children of 7-8 years two sessions teaching about when to use “-ion” and “-ian” endings

magic

music

history

library

Egypt

Italy

Hungary

India

magician

musician

historian

librarian

Egyptian

Italian

Hungarian

Indian

political

technical

politician

technician

protect

infect

subtract

add

confess

discuss

suggest

collect

educate

imitate

protection

infection

subtraction

addition

confession

discussion

suggestion

collection

education

imitation

Group pre-test

Two intervention sessions: pairs

Immediate post-test

Delayed post-test

Two month interval

Four kinds of intervention

We included four groups:

Explicit (morpheme) N=40 C.A. 9y6mImplicit (morpheme) N=42 C.A. 9y7mMixed (morpheme) (implicit followed by explicit)

N=42 C.A. 9y7mControl (comprehension)

N=76 C.A. 9y5m

confession

The gang made a ____________________ to the police.

musician

The __________________________ was wonderful.

Joe was a _______________ .

Christian

magic magician

?music musician

protect protection

infect ?infection

Mean correct spelling of ion/ian endings in real words (out of 16)

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

Pretest Immediate posttest

ExplicitImplicitMixedControl

Nunes, Bryant, Pretzlik & Hurry

Mean correct endings (out of 4) with pseudo- words ending in -ian

11.21.41.61.8

22.22.42.62.8

3

Pretest Immediate Posttest

ExplicitImplicitMixedControl

Morphemes change the

meaning of words

Count the morphemes and

compare them with your neighbour’s

fortunatefortunate

unun ateatefortunfortun

tiedtied

un dis im in

unun

honesthonest

un dis im in

disdis

focal

illogical

logical

To solve maths problems you need to be very ___________________.

electricians

mechanics

electrics

The people who were rewiring the house were ___________________.

Nunes, T., & Bryant, P. (2006). Improving Literacy through Teaching Morphemes. London: Routledge.

Nunes, T., & Bryant, P. (2009). Children’s Reading and Spelling. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell

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Morphology and spelling Peter Bryant and Terezinha Nunes