WELCOME TO READROOTS
The innovative, comprehensive, engaging, and highly-effective approach to vocabulary instruction
Welcome to Readroots!
We believe you will find it to be a useful resource for teaching Greek and Latin roots and affixes (an affix is a prefix or a suffix). Greek and Latin roots and affixes make up at least 60% of English words and over 90% of Science words, so knowing them can help your students decode a lot of words! Because learners recall images easily, we use images to help students remember the roots and affixes. We also use repetition, games, and collaboration, as these are proven ways for students to hold on to what they’re learning.
What is Readroots?
Readroots is a series of 100 vocabulary-building units that help students learn important Greek and Latin roots and affixes. We made 100 units so that teachers in sequential grade levels can work together to present coherent and effective vocabulary instruction over time. The units are organized into twenty sets of five, so a fourth grade teacher might present the first 20 to 25 units, a fifth grade teacher might present the second 20 to 25 units, etc. Each unit incorporates images and a variety of collaborative activities that provide repeated opportunities for students to practice using the roots and affixes in different contexts.
Each unit requires students to learn just six parts, but the six parts work together to create lots of words. The six parts of Unit 1, for example, are the prefix “re_,” four roots (“pel/pul/puls,” “quer/quir/quest” “volv/volvo/volu/volt,” “mot/mov/mob”), and the suffix “_tion/_ion.” With these parts, students can construct the words: repel, repulse, request, require, question, revolve, revolt, revolution, remote, remove, and motion. Readroots is designed such that subsequent units connect directly with and build on the parts of previous units. Unit 2, for example, teaches: “de_,” “flex/flect,” “tect,” “press,” “ceiv/cep/cept,” and “fend/fens.” Students can now build: demote, devolve, reflex, reflect, reflection, repress, repression, receive, reception, deflect, deflection, detect, detection, depress, depression, deceive, deception, defend, and defense.
The Readroots Units
The User’s Guide and Units 1 – 5 are available as free downloads. If you want to download additional units, they are available in sets of five at $5.00 per set, which is just $1.00 per unit.
See what people are saying about Readroots
The appealing visuals and engaging activities of Readroots make it FUN to learn Greek & Latin roots and affixes and use them in creative ways. It’s a tremendous program for vocabulary development!
As an elementary educator, I noticed incoming fifth grade students struggling with spelling and decoding in their English language literacy activities. Readroots has proven to be a valuable, key component of our word building program. Students with varied literacy skills appreciate the ease of learning meaning and formation of unfamiliar words. It is morphology through games and it supports readers and writers who may have limited background knowledge in a topic. The visuals provided generate memorable conversations that allow students to better connect with the usage of the root. Readroots not only engages students to apply grade-level phonics, but strengthens word-analysis skills. I witnessed comprehension improve in my struggling readers, because they were able to break apart the word in root meanings.